McQueen goes Gaga

I love Alexander McQueen's spring/summer 2010 collection...and WOW at the shoes! This collection truly shows that fashion really is art.





McQueen was "casting an apocalyptic forecast of the future of ecological meltdown of the world: Humankind is made up of creatures that evolved from the sea, and we may be heading back to an underwater future as the ice cap dissolves."
This is shown through his reptile-patterns and choice of colours. His computer-generated art combined with his signature couture-based cuts, made up McQueen's dresses.

Alexander McQueen is on the leading edge of change due to embracing new technology and the drama of moving images in his show.



I also love lady Gaga wearing his designs in her new video "Bad Romance" (such a great song too)

Bags of fun....

On a boring weekend, we once again found that Farnham brought us the joys of a wide variety of things to do. NOT.
After bumming around the flat for a while, watching films and a few episodes of friends, we decided that we were a little bit peckish. Then we discovered a cupboard full of bags. Wow. It was like we were kids again, having immense amount of fun with a cardboard box, only we decided to make clothes out of plastic shopping bags.











At first it started off with a top, which then developed into some fetching shorts, followed by a lovely orange Sainsburys waistcoat and shoes.

OK they look shit and I don't know why we did this as we were completely sober, but it triggered my thoughts, making me think that you can literally turn anything into something wearable. With more time etc you could recycle unwanted items and turn them into clothes. I know I may probably sound like a mad hippie (I assure you I'm not), but if more designers and brands did this then there wouldn't be so much waste in the world.
With imagination you can turn anything into something.

There have already been designers launching Eco-friendly clothes made from natural materials such as hemp, bamboo and organic cotton. Gary Harvey is a designer who has taken materials such as old jeans, newspapers and even drinks cans, and turned them into extravagant dresses. His Eco-designs were first showcased at London's fashion week for Estethica last February, which is the hot spot for ethical fashion.

Life in plastic, is it fantastic?

Society today has become extremely materialistic, and you could say shallow. The beauty industry has rocketed over the last few years, with more and more cosmetic procedures being carried out on a regular basis. Surgery used to be seen as something terrible, when people were on a hospital bed desperate to survive. Now however, it is a normal aspect of every day life. It's main purpose to keep women looking young and beautiful. Getting cut open with knives, having unnatural products stuffed inside them like soft toys, as well as getting things sucked out of them, putting their bodies through hell just to achieve what they perceive as "beauty". What happened to growing old gracefully?

I don't understand why people feel the need to have these procedures. Why would people want to become anything other then who they are? In a sense they lose part of themselves and part of their identity. Growing up for so long and looking at yourself every day in the mirror and seeing your reflection looking back at you, and one day for that to change. It would be like looking for yourself but instead seeing a stranger.

There is so much pressure for people to look beautiful these days, but what actually is beautiful? Different people have different ideas, and not one person is the same. People should embrace their uniqueness instead of trying to look like clones of each other, else there will be an army of walking, talking Barbie dolls.


I personally believe that plastic surgery should only be for medical purposes only. If someone is in a fire, or car accident, they would be scared for life, their confidence may be crushed, and every time they saw a reflection of themselves they would see the memories of what happened to them. In these cases, surgery should put back how they were, it shouldn't change who someone is.

However saying this it is difficult to draw a line on where changing who you are with the use of cosmetics starts. Hair dye, teeth whitening, make-up and self tan all change you slightly, if not only enhancing your original features. But when is OK, not OK? I would say when you become addicted, needing surgery after surgery to achieve "perfection" and not stopping until you eventually turn into plastic.

Furthermore, plastic surgery is not always a quick fix to all your problems. Many procedures go wrong, leaving people disfigured and more unhappy with themselves than before. They may have an idea in their head of what they are going to look like once it's all over, however when it actually is, they aren't. They simple aren't the person they want to be, they are themselves, they have their own bodies, and that's what surgeons have to work with. You may want to look like Jennifer Anniston, but you are not. So no matter how much surgery you may have, you will not look like her.

What you may hate about yourself, another person might love.

Always be yourself.

Radio Evaluation (VoxPop)

Recording our voxpop for radio was very exciting as it was the first time that we went out with recording equipment. At first we were slightly nervous of approaching strangers in the streets and asking them to answer our question on Remembrance day, however after doing this a couple of times we got stuck straight into it and thoroughly enjoyed it.

We each asked someone our question, which after much deliberation amongst the group we finally settled on. It was, “Do you think Remembrance Day is still relevant or do you think it would be more relevant to remember those who are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan?” We felt that this question would make people think about their answer and would also perhaps cause debate instead of a yes-no answer, making it more interesting. We each also had a go at using the recording equipment.

The role I played in recording the vox was that I helped come up with the question, as well as finding people to interview. I asked our question to someone, helping to gain the amount of interviews we needed as well as using the recording equipment. When we got back I also helped edit the vox on the Macs, taking out all of our voices and empty spaces as well as any unnecessary speech to leave just those of the public. I also used soundcloud to help the other members of the group upload the vox to their blogs.

Even though we managed to successfully achieve what we wanted, I feel that there are a few things that we could have improved on. Firstly I think we could have improved by interviewing more people. This would mean that we would have more sound bites to work with and so would be able to choose the best ones in our finished vox. I also think it could have been improved if we had held the microphone closer to some of the interviewees, as when listening back, some of the people appeared very quiet compared to others and were slightly difficult to hear. We should have assessed the volume of the person speaking whilst we were recording and should have adjusted the microphone accordingly. However, in saying this, we didn’t want to intimidate or scare off the person with the equipment, as being recorded can be quite daunting.

Christmas Package Evaluation

I have learnt a lot about television whilst making our Christmas shopping package. Our first attempt was very rushed and as it was our first bit of filming, we didn’t really know what to say on camera or how to go about filming it. We therefore decided to film again, making sure we had enough time to achieve everything that we wanted to contain.

We included a lot more techniques in our package than we had previously done. We included a link, voiceovers, interviews and a piece to camera, which added to the sense of realism of the package. We also wrote a script before we went out filming, so we knew exactly what was to be filmed and said. This made things a lot easier and I felt that we were more prepared.

However, things weren’t that simple. It was difficult to find people to interview as many didn’t want to be on camera. Whilst we were filming we had to make sure it was quiet enough for the sound, as well as nothing going on in the background. We should have interviewed more people to give ourselves more choice on what to include when editing, and also made sure that whilst Holly was interviewing people, that they were both clear on camera, asking them to stand closer to each other. We should have also filmed better images for our voiceover, as I don’t think they truly represented what we wanted to show, however with a limited time scale and location, this was the best we were able to achieve.

I feel that I contributed a lot to the group whilst making our Christmas package. I gave ideas for the script as well as suggesting that we include different techniques in our package such as the voiceover and interviews. I also read out the link and helped with the filming, as well as trying to find people to interview.

I have learnt that filming and editing material for television isn’t as easy as it looks. You have to make sure that it appears “punchy” and interesting to grab the audience. You have to do this through your voice and body language as you are seen; the news isn’t written down on paper. I discovered that you have to learn the script, as when you are out and about filming you don’t have an autocue to help you. We were lucky in the fact that we were able to re-film if things went wrong, however we wouldn’t have been able to do so if it were live. You also have to be careful in who you approach to ask for interviews as many people run a mile as soon as they see a camera or simply don’t have the time.

Writing for TV is a lot different than writing for print. As it is read out you have to make sure that there is a lot of punctuation, to give the reader time to breathe and pause, which also makes it easier for the audience to listen too and take in. You also have to be careful about how you word things, as sometimes what you write might be quite difficult to say and so you would stumble over your words. You need to make sure that what you write is exciting and “punchy” to ensure that the viewers don’t get bored.