Herb Ritts Macho Men in Makeup

Herb Ritts not only uses a verity of diverse models in his photography but be also uses male models wearing makeup. They wear makeup but are still portrayed as strait, manly and masculine, which is a hard taboo to break because people only really seem to be accenting of men in makeup if it is drag.

They have got me thinking of my Macho Man design and the boundaries that I can push without going too drag.

He also shoots in black and white so its interesting for me to see a majority of the tones he uses because I am planning to shoot in black and white also but I want to get the tones right.

DISCLAIMER: All images are property of Herb Ritts .com and are not mine.

Rankin's Diverse Models

Ranking shows his subjects in quirky and eccentric portraits of themselves. He uses age, androgyny and weight in his photographs and is open to all subjects.

Below are some diverse images of Rankin's. The have got me thinking abo9ut photographic image composition, lighting and model behaviour, because I really want my models personality to come through in the photos and I don't think anyone does that better than Rankin.

Grasshoppers and Mootzies

Mootzies were pregnant prostitutes. Customers could chose the mootzie depending on how pregnant she was.

Grasshoppers were ugly prostitutes.

Prostitutes in green boots with yellow laces were there for rough sex.

I think this shows the more perverse side to the sexual freedom shown in Berlin in the 1920s, because its still quite shocking eve in this day and age. Green seems to be a recurring theme in 20s Berlin which is something I can use in my own interpretation.

Below is a quick Berlin/gypsy inspired drawing I did. I think it is what the young grasshoppers and mootzies would have looked like.

Models of Diversity Documentry

The documentary above is about diverse models. I think some of it is really good in giving diverse models the opportunity to model and the message that it sends to other people...

BUT I have one big issue with this documentary. One of the models is missing an arm and we are shown photos of her modelling. In nearly every photo the half-arm is either

• hidden
• faded into the background
• NEVER facing the camera

I think this is such a shame because to me the true rule of diversity is to be proud of your diverse factors. She should be holding her half-arm in the air! I don't know whether this is down to her own self-conciseness or it was the direction of the photographer but either way I don't think it sends the message that it is trying to.

Rick Owens

The Rick Owens S/S/2014 catwalk showcased diverse models in their rawest form. Models of all different shapes and sized took the stage to defy what it was previously thought was the criteria to be a 'model' They stopped, they clapped, they snarled. they were a force to be reckoned with and they completely took over the entire room. They proved that you don't have to be typically beautiful for people to sit up and take notice.

http://worldofwonder.net/author/idris-and-tony/

This has helped inspire me in the further planning of my shoots, its bout bringing out someones presence and showing that off.

Enlisting a Photographer

Something that I learnt last year is that during the photo shoot for my final images I felt rushed and didn't have time during the shoot to primp and touch up my model, which made for a lot of post production later. My photography skills are also not the best and often my bad photography made good makeup look bad. I want to avoid that this year so I'm going to get a photographer to do the photos so that i can focus solely on the makeup and styling.

Olivia Wearing, a Second Year Fashion Photographer will be taking the photos for me. We have met and emailed to discuss the following:

Lighting

Lenses

Photo composition

Equipment needed

Photo colouration

Notes given to Olivia

Although she is taking the photos, I will be taking care of any post production because its my project.

NO SIGN OF FASHION BIRTHMARKS

I thought i would try googling models with facial marks to see if there were any modes working in industry with facial melasma or something similar, and the only thing that came up was a beauty spot.

BEAUTY spot.

.

Thats all well and good but its a fairly common thing that is seen as fashionable, there was no sign of large facial marks or marks anywhere else on the body, that had not been photoshopped out or even existed to begin with.

I think this is terrible because that sort of mark is something that is very hard to cover up and live with, so why should the media enforce that? It will only make it harder for people that have it to live with it, if it was shown in the media some more they might be able to wear it with pride nd look at it as a mark of individuality rather than a tarnish.