Japan Fashion Week officially cancelled

The Tsunami disaster is not only affecting Japan and its residents it has had a massive hit on fashion.

Many fashion labels and brands were forced to delay and even cancel the trend of fashion show Fall / Winter 2011 tsunami damaging aspects of the apparel industry. Sales of clothing and cosmetics estimated to fall 10.6 percent since two days ago. For example brand Uniqlo is down 17.5 percent, 13.79 percent of Takashimaya shopping center until the losers Shiseido 9:18 percent.

This has just shown me how quickly as a buyer or fashion worker the wheel can stop spinning causing real damage and time delay to a certain line or collection.

There is obviously rare cases that this can happen on this scale but this would mean delaying a line or finding another manufacturer to complete the order which in itself would delay the order.

With the chance although very minimal chance of this happening I wonder if the best idea and back up plan is to have connections with several factories so that if one were to fall through you have already the rapport with another to get your orders in to minimise delays further.

Focus Photography Exhibition

So on Sunday Dave and I took the trip up to Birmingham to visit the focus photography exhibition. Dave was very excited to go being a photographer but I was also excited to see what new equipment and ideas they had to show me and they didn't disappoint!!!

The exhibition was vast and it took the whole day to get around it and I still don't feel like we even touched the surface with all the stalls and displays.

I was particularly interested in the talks and displays they were giving.....I was able to catch an adobe talk (below left) which was really interesting about how he set prefixes when adjusting photography so that when it came to editing several photo's there was a saved preset to make the images all have the same effect.

There was also a top photographer (above right) who spoke about being a photographer and how he achieved his images but what I found more interesting is how he spoke about copy-write and how he never gives away his copy-write as that can restrict the amount of money he can make. The photographer was quite arrogant but he had some great advice! What photographer isn't a bit arrogant?!!!

There was a couple of great displays on photography and lighting which Dave and I stood around for ages for as they were so informative. It really taught me about how much difference a light box can make and how best to use it. It was especially great as they had a model and the experimented with the light and allowed the audiences to take pictures of the different lighting!

The real find for the day for me though is topaz labs!!!! Wow what an amazing display and package they offered! I bought the whole package topaz labs for £90 for a show price offer rather than the RRP $199 online! The package is a plug-in to Photoshop and it has all the tools which would usually take you hours it now takes minutes.....so happy to have found it! I can not do it justice by just explaining it so I have attached a video to show just how amazing it is!!!!

I'm very glad my boyfriend dragged me up to Birmingham to this amazing exhibition!!!! hehe!

Michelle xx

My love affair for Jessie J....

I have a new obsession with Jessie J....I love the way she dresses, her hair just the whole package....what I love most is her persona the girl next door who is cool, risky and sexy!!!?!

I love the make up used and her overall style and although its probably not something I can use in this project I wanted to make myself a note to remember in the future....

Isabella Blow reincarnated.....

Mcqueen and I....what can I say?!!

I always knew how much Mcqueen meant to the fashion world but after watching the documentary I really see now how much of a loss he is to Britain and more importantly world fashion. Although we have current designers, Galliano etc that push boundaries, I can't think of another designer that can leave us not knowing what will come next like Mcqueen did.... A true legend!

However throughout the documentary I have come to the conclusion that Isabella's spirit has been reincarnated in Lady Gaga, I could not believe the resemblances that they hold throughout there expressions and more importantly the way they express themselves through their clothes and accessories! So maybe we have not lost all and Lady Gaga is our future to finding a new designer who can push our imagination as Mcqueen once did?......

Michelle xoxo

PSD Tuts+

So I've been looking for some inspiration to my professional project and been looking into how I can create a real individual touch to my photography. I have been playing around myself with photography to get an even better eye for what can be achieved.

I've come across this FAB site recently which I hope is really going to bring my work to another level.... http://psd.tutsplus.com/

This is some photography inspiration I have found...

What makes a good image?

Open publication - Free publishing - More fine artist

Pull and Bear Supplier Meeting