A collaborative project between communication and fashion students at the Otago Polytechnic School of Design has had some remarkable results, as Jude Hathaway reports.
The images range from the elegant to the bizarre
Some have a stark "look book" feel, while the location shots convey that provocative editorial quality that the fashion glossies have made into an art form. All have an individuality to reflect the particular fashion designer's aesthetic. Most importantly, the originality of many of the shots grabs the attention and the viewer wants more.
The images are the result of a collaboration between third-year fashion students at the Otago Polytechnic School of Design and two communications students also studying at the polytechnic.
The brainchild of Henry Hewat and Charlotte McLachlan, the eight-week project was seen as a way of creating a visual record for the fashion students and a body of work for themselves. Most importantly it would allow them to "test the waters" of the real world before they stepped into it at the end of the year.
"We decided that a project that contained a brief that worked towards a final outcome would be a good way to go about it," Hewat explains. "Margo Barton, academic leader of the school of fashion, was the key client, but we worked directly with 20 fashion students who also treated the project as a business exercise."
Most of the fashion designers secured professional models for the fashion photographs from the Ali McD Modelling School and Agency.
The pair's first five weeks were spent liaising with clients, working out what their fashion brands were all about and the approach each designer wanted for the photographic shoot.
Last month they succeeded in photographing the 20 collections in just two weeks, working every day from sunrise into the night. They scheduled up to three shoots a day, using indoor and outdoor locations as well as the photographic studio at the Otago Polytechnic.
"The models were amazing. They worked tirelessly, never complained and always looked beautiful," McLachlan says, adding their professionalism in front of and away from the camera was admirable.
The rewards were "huge". Hewat and McLachlan took their photographic skills to new levels, learned about sselecting from and editing as many as 300 frames per designer, and about time efficiency and working with others. Most importantly, the client was pleased.
