Showing posts with label photo shoot. Show all posts
Showing posts with label photo shoot. Show all posts

Friday, December 2, 2016

'The White Cat' Photoshoot by Baba Studio


Are you familiar with Baba Studio? If you love colorful, luxurious, jewel toned fairy tale things you'll likely bookmark this page, if you haven't already. Baba Studio have some of the most beautifully printed artwork reproductions on bags and clothing we have ever seen. They have a special love of fairy tales, but not your usual collection, so it's worth a browse to see the special things in their store.

In honor of Heidi announcing her soon to be released Puss in Boots and Other Cat Tales from Around the World - a *NEW* addition to the SurLaLune Fairy Tale Series - yay! (we are so excited) - we are sharing this unusual cat fairy tale photoshoot by Baba Studio.
This lovely series was made to promote some of their beautiful scarves and accessories almost a year ago now, but I haven't seen many people pick up on it (apart from Faerie Magazine some time ago). It's unusual in that it's based on the French fairy tale 'The White Cat', except that in this version, the prince is the transformed one. You'd think more fashion outlets would pick up on this tale and be inspired by it - there's so much detail in it, but then, that was also typical of French fairy tales around that time too.

There are many elements of the original tale sprinkled enticingly throughout the scenes in the photos if you look closely. I suggest you read the tale first HERE to refresh your memory so you pick up on all the details the art director added...

Here's a video showing the shoot in process  - which I wish they took more stills of - with a little behind the scenes as a bonus. You can sort of see some of the story being acted out.

Enjoy!

Saturday, July 18, 2015

Annie Leibovitz Inspired by Nordic Sagas, Slavic Folklore & The Snow Queen for Fashion Shoot

Annie Leibovitz is well associated with fairy tale themed shoots, so much so she is the official photographer-on-call for the Disney Theme Park shoots (which are live action interpretations of a scene from the animated movies). While those shoots are often very creative and do bring some surprises, I always find it most interesting when she steps outside the Disney properties and works with folk and fairy tales for fashion (often for Vogue).
Drew Barrymore's Beauty and the Beast shoot wasn't a Disney shoot, and you can see a lot of 'thinking outside the mold' in that one, which is wonderful. Keira Knightly's Wizard of Oz shoot remains striking, as does her Alice fashion photography with super model, Natalia Vodyanova.
This campaign was for a company called Moncler and shot in the stunning Icelandic landscape with two up-and-comers on the model scene, a Mormon brother and sister duo from Utah. For this shoot, touting the stylish warmth of this company's clothing, the Snow Queen makes an appearance. I'm always fascinated by how this character is interpreted when it comes to fashion but I have to say, I expected something a little more land-based (as in using the landscape forms of Iceland) rather than something that reminded me of the White Queen from Narnia (which I like better), still they're nice storytelling photos.


One Spanish website (Totumrevolutum) explains the concept of the shoot by summarizing the fairy tale:
"The Snow Queen" (Snedronningen) is a fantasy novel written by Hans Christian Andersen in 1845, which tells of the struggle between good and evil experienced by two children, Kay and Gerda.
And from a report discussing the shoot, via the Daily Mail:
The stunning images show Lucky and Pyper keeping warm in a range of Moncler's signature quilted outerwear, while navigating the rugged landscapes, from colossal ice formations to wind-sculpted rocks. 
Annie Leibovitz directs Lucky in a frozen woodland as he is captured by the Snow Queen
The Moncler campaign was apparently inspired by 'Nordic sagas and traditional Russian and Slavic folklore' - here Lucky encounters the Snow Queen on his travels.
You can see more photos from the shoot HERE, as well as more behind-the-scenes pics too, which I think are completely worth the click-through, just to see the incredible landscape.

Thursday, May 7, 2015

Kirsty Mitchell's Fairy Tale "Wonderland" London Exhibition Begins (And A Book On the Way!)


Big news for Kirsty Mitchell fans:
1) she's having a 'selling exhibition' starting TODAY (May 7th) in London for 2(ish) weeks, featuring gorgeous 2 meter prints (6 foot prints for the non-metric folks), that show all the teensy details in each amazing shot

2) she also aims to have a book available of her Wonderland work by the end of THIS YEAR! (ie hopefully ready for Christmas!)

By the end of 2015, she hopes to realize a 'Wonderland' book in collaboration with esteemed British book designer Stuart Smith through the launch of a campaign on Kickstarter backed by the photography platform LensCulture.
(I can hear you cheering from here!)
But back to the exhibition. Here are the details from the press release. I'm including the biography and summary notes about Ms. Mitchell and how this series came to be, for those who don't know much about her work:

Kirsty Mitchell ‘WONDERLAND’
7th – 23rd May 2015
Mead Carney Fine Art, 45 Dover Street, W1S 4FF
The show is kindly sponsored by Nikon UK.

Mead Carney is pleased to present 'Wonderland', a new selling exhibition by award winning fine art photographer Kirsty Mitchell.

'Wonderland' is a project created over the course of five years as an homage to the artist's mother who tragically passed away in 2008.

Having worked in fashion for a number of years, Kirsty understood the constructed and filmic nature of the photographic image. Building on this, she incorporated childlike whim through the creation of her favorite fairytales that her mother read to her as a child. With minimal support and finances, she built what can be likened to a film set in order to stage each frame. The tailor-made dresses and make-up add an element of high fashion into the work. However, props such as ships, headdresses and books transform the image further; each item carefully built and placed so as to convey a personal sense of imagination.

Kirsty's oeuvre is whimsical and dream-like. It consists of over 70 photographs that intertwine fantasy, literature and personal mediations. The selection presented shows the breadth and complexity of the highly constructed artworks. The highly saturated colours give a vivid, fairytale quality to each image. Intense contrasts intensify the surreal quality of each work; reality is undermined by the lack of gravity and soft lighting.

Upon completion in November 2014,  'Wonderland' immediately won 2 international awards, with over 280,000 followers on its social media. It has been extensively featured throughout the world achieving a viral status online, and has been published by prestigious names such as Harper's Bazaar, Vogue Italia, The Guardian, BBC news, Germany's Spiegel Online and Stern magazine to name but a few. The images warranted coverage from BBC News, Italian Vogue, and Polish Harper's Bazaar, to name a few. She won a number of awards including the grand prize for visual storytelling by Lensculture in 2014 and a place as the Nikon Ambassador of Fine Art Photography. 
I had to include one of her wonderful behind-the-scenes videos, which I highly recommend for fans, photographers and storytellers alike:
I'm also linking you to her video behind-the-scenes of prepping the ENORMOUS prints for this exhibit. Just amazing stuff. You can watch it HERE, along with finding out extra details about the gallery, the Wonderland show (what will and what will not be shown - only some is shown in the panorama shots below) and her note to fans about the upcoming book.
For those of us who can't see the exhibition, you can see the series at Mitchell's website HERE. And while you're there, I recommend checking out her other galleries too. Some of her personal portraits are truly stunning. (I've also collected a variety on a Pinterest board HERE, along with costume shots and behind the scenes pics, since these photos wouldn't be what they are with all Mitchell's artistry in design, costume and prop making - that's right - she designs and makes them all herself!)
And we'll be keeping our eye on Kickstarter for the rest of the year and cheer this book on to get published. I'd love to see more about the stories behind the photos - not just how the photos were made but which stories told her by her mother inspired which pieces. Clearly there is a fairy tale sensibility here as well as a 'modern-Victorian' faery atmosphere as well, which I would love to hear more about.

And then there's the future. If this is where she journeyed to creatively over five years, we have to wonder: just what amazing things will she do next?!

Wednesday, May 6, 2015

Tale As Old As This Library...

Note: Today's special Beauty & the Beast post is for a lovely girl who adores this fairy tale above all others.
Happy Birthday dear friend!

This library has to be seen to be believed. It really is like stepping into the Beast's library...

And who'd bother going to the ballroom when there's all this space and beautifully Baroque surroundings (not to mention the smell of books)?
In late December of 2014, a creative team, led by the innovative Von Wong, were given a few precious evening hours to shoot some photographs (and a little video) in this amazing place, which houses the largest monastery library hall in the world. Admont Abbey itself dates back to the 1st century (and is still functioning as a working monastery) but the library dates back to the same time period as the first version of Beauty and the Beast, so it's more than appropriate they were paying homage to the fairy tale there.
What's even cooler? This was the first creative photo shoot ever made there. Take a look at some of the gorgeous results!
About this project Von Wong said:
I have always loved photography for the adventures and opportunities that it brings, not the hours I would spend retouching in front of a computer. As a result the desire to search and explore the most exotic locations and make a shoot out of it, has always been a particular passion of mine.
Projects like these are particularly magical because of how they bring people together. From fans (now turned friends) Eva Creel and Nicolas Cormier, American expats and photographers living in Germany willing to embark on a spontaneous roadtrip to drive me across Germany so that I can indulge in my creative shenanigans, to friends of friends like Oliver Schlichtherle, who drove all the way from Switzerland through Austria just to assist in whatever capacity possible… People from all walks of life somehow end up gravitating towards these amazing projects.
And at the end, we not only have fantastic imagery to share with the world… but a story to laugh and remember for the rest out our lives.
Dream big, anything is possible.
You can learn more about the process, the lighting challenges (can you believe it was night tine when they shot everything?) and see a few more behind-the-scenes images on Von Wong's blog HERE.
There's also a great behind-the-scenes video detailing two projects, one in a cave system and this as the other. I've embedded it below for your enjoyment (the cave one - also lovely - is first):