Photographers Blog

Karachi, Pakistan

By Insiya Syed

A few days after I photographed my second Fashion Week story in Karachi over the course of a month, a friend of mine asked me a legitimate question: “Why do these organizers call it “week” when it’s never a week? Why not just call it a month then? Or a millennium? Pakistan Fashion Millennium! That sounds so nice.”

Each year, Pakistan has a few of these events: Pakistan Fashion Week, Karachi Fashion Week, Pakistan Fashion Design Council Fashion Week… And then there’s Bridal Couture Week, which I’ve now had the opportunity to cover two years in a row.

Every year, and with every fashion show, I face the same struggle to obtain full backstage access – my primary area of interest – and I find myself making the same promises to remain an unobtrusive photographer.

But the struggle is worth it because one thing is for sure: backstage is where you really find all the fashion. It’s where all the gossip happens, where the chaos begins and ends, and is the source of all the mad rushing and pushing around. This is where it all starts.

Over the course of the three-day Bridal Couture Week, one of the many designers, Zainab Chottani, showed bridal wear ranging in price from $3000 to $8000, while the most expensive piece of jewelry designed by Nadia Chotani was priced at $2000. These are significant quantities of cash in Pakistan where, according to UNICEF statistics, around 23 percent of the population lives below the international poverty line of $1.25 a day.

Paris, France

By Philippe Wojazer

Now I know where United Nations negotiators should be trained: in the fashion world!

If you want to cover a “not usual” story in the world of fashion, you have to learn what negotiation means. If you want to take pictures backstage at a fashion show, you have to be ready to send 120 emails and call the recipients to explain what you meant in your messages and hear “I am afraid this will not be possible”. But, once those people are convinced – they might change their mind the very next minute – but if they don’t, you enter the fashion and model’s world and realize, it was worth it. I didn’t know if I would be able to photograph this story untill the last minute. Once I finally got the accreditation for the Valentino show, the model had to be rushed to the dental emergency and was not guaranteed to work that day. But suddenly the clouds opened and I started seeing the sunlight of the fashion world.

GALLERY: A DAY WITH A MODEL

My goal was to show the part of the fashion week we usually don’t see – a model’s life backstage.

Guangzhou, China

By Tyrone Siu

It was hard to imagine that Liu Qianpina was related to the word “model” when I first met him. To me, the 72-year-old former farmer looked no different from those typical types of grandfathers you see sitting in the park every day, usually playing chess with a group of friends or dozing off on a bench. Except that Liu has a very cool name, MaDiGaGa, and is now in the spotlight among the modeling world.

Gallery: Grandpa turned model

One hand on his hip, lower legs crossed, with his head looking up in the air – posing in front of the camera was no difficulty for Liu. He did not need any instructions from the photographer before he changed his pose to present his figure. It was not hard to notice that, when compared to other models who pose for a living, Lui did not appear natural and smooth. But for a model who started styling at the age of 72, he’s made a very good start that most would envy.

It all began when the grandfather decided to pick up some of his granddaughter LV Ting’s clothes, and wore them for fun. The clothes, meant to be sold in an online fashion store, were supposed to be worn by a model who suddenly cancelled. But the way Liu wore them created a fresh and funny image, so LV Ting decided to use her grandfather’s pictures for promotion instead. The odd styling took internet users by surprise and Liu soon became one of the hottest topics in the digital world, attracting a five-fold increase in visits to the fashion website.

By Suzanne Plunkett

On the outside, Angels The Costumiers is a drab grey warehouse bordered on one side by an industrial estate and on another by an artery of railway lines ferrying weary commuters to the endless suburbs of northwest London. Inside, it’s pure Hollywood.

As the world’s largest supplier of outfits to cinema, stage and television, Angels is home to more than eight miles of clothing rails — a vast and dizzying maze in which it’s simultaneously possible to lose yourself and stumble upon a piece of movie history.

SLIDESHOW: COSTUMES OF THE STARS

“This here is our £60,000-pound rail,” says Jeremy Angel, a creative manager at the costumier, gesturing to a rack on which hangs hundreds of drab-looking ecclesiastical garments. “It’s where we found the Obi-Wan Kenobi robe.”

Reuters photo editors Peter Jones and Sam Mircovich explain the process of transmitting hundreds of images from Hollywood’s premier event – the 84th Academy Awards. Photos created by Mike Blake in the Oscar photo room are quickly sent from camera to editor, reaching clients around the world.

Click here for a look at photographers covering all angles of the red carpet.

Tuxedo-clad photographers and editors come together for Hollywood’s most anticipated night – the 84th Academy Awards. Mario Anzuoni, Lucas Jackson and Lucy Nicholson take spots on the congested red carpet to capture the styles of the stars, looking for glamour, intimacy and surprising moments.

In this multimedia piece, Lucas turns the camera toward the photographers themselves.

Oscar photographers:

Mario Anzuoni – Arrivals 2

Mike Blake – Photo Room

Gary Hershorn – Awards Show

Lucas Jackson – Orchid Court

Lucy Nicholson – Arrivals 1

By Nacho Doce

Three days after photographing the svelte models at the upscale Sao Paulo Fashion Week, I found myself in the crowded backstage of the Miss Brazil Plus-Size beauty pageant, a contrast in every aspect from body size to the organization’s budget and the cost of each dress.

Backstage the overweight models pushed their own dress-filled suitcases with no assistants to help them, very different from the Fashion Week models, each of whom had two or three people dressing, preening, and supervising them.

Television channels filming Miss Plus-Size were offering the stream to reality shows, while at Fashion Week the transmission was to a more serious audience, focusing on present and future stars in the fashion world.

While covering Lisbon Fashion Week, photographer Rafa Marchante spoke with fashion designers, models, photographers and journalists, asking them if they thought the fashion world was frivolous.

By Allison Joyce

Held twice yearly in February and September, New York Fashion Week features designers from all over the world, displaying their creations on the runways. A small venue of tents pops up in Lincoln Center to house the crowd of celebrities, designers and models who descend upon the city. The event also draws its own share of notable and outrageous personalities, fashionistas, and those who come just to be seen on the scene.

I am now into my fourth year of covering the event and have started to recognize a group of colorful, sassy characters who come to Fashion Week each year. Some are former models, some are bloggers, and others seem to be famous just for their outlandish outfits or feline sidekicks. A few of them stand out because they are decked out in the same colorful suits, ostentatious hair styles and eye catching accessories year after year, appearing in the lobby or on the pavilion like clockwork. Most of them seem to be there for the same reasons, to network and be part of the scene.

While most New Yorkers are sitting at their desks or following their daily routines on a Monday morning, ten blocks away, an entirely different scene is unfolding. Backstage, there is a flurry of hairspray, lipstick, clothes, shoes and champagne. On the runway, Anna Wintour is perched on her front row seat next to Nicki Minaj, watching the show to the boom of house music. Meanwhile, out front in the lobby, Janet Finkel is walking her cat, Natasha, while Cognac Wellerlane struts by, coiffed in her beehive.

After six long days covering fashion shows in Sao Paulo, Brazil, the best opportunity to produce a nice shot happened on the last day, at the last show: a model tripped over at the beginning of the show.

During Cavalera’s show at Sao Paulo Fashion Week, models were made to walk through a big puddle of water while artificial rain fell, so the floor was very slippery. When the show began, I concentrated on shooting all the models as there was a big chance that somebody would fall. Indeed, it happened! When the fourth model came towards the end of the soaked catwalk, the poor girl slipped, very close to the photographers pit, but quickly smiled and got back on her feet. The photographers’ reactions was funny because when a model trips they shout and celebrate the fall as an opportunity to make a good picture. The public, on the other hand, applaud in support of the model.

I was using a Canon EOS-1D Mark IV with a 70-200mm lens, ISO 500, f4 and shutter speed of 1/320. I shot 24 frames from the beginning until the end of the fall.