On Friday I headed down to Somerset House in the capital to photograph two catwalk shows for London Fashion Week. Having never been to a full scale fashion show (I’d seen plenty at wedding fayres), let alone photographed one, I wasn’t really sure what to expect.
Fashion show photography brings its own unique challenges. It’s fairly straight forward to get a decent picture of someone on the catwalk, what with the abundance of good lighting and stunning models. The difficulty is getting something a little more creative and unusual. This is made even more difficult by not being able to move position once you’re in the photography pit. If you’ve not seen the pit at a fashion show the picture here will give you an idea of what it’s like. Those on the front row are sat on the floor, the second row crouch behind them with the people on the rows behind on raised steps and even ladders. It’s a very cosy affair and you get to know the people around you very well very quickly! There are three positions in the dead centre of the front row, which are usually reserved for the big photo agencies, which everyone wants. For the first show I was stuck near the back at the far left hand side. To complicate things further the models were turning away from my position at the end of the runway so it was probably the worst spot in the pit!
The first show by The Outnet (part of the Net-a-Porter group) was geared towards high-end high street fashions. It was split into 4 mini themes – hyper florals, shimmer and shine, make it monochrome and that seventies show.
The second show was by design duo Fyodor Golan and was a lot more avant garde and visually striking. For this show I was able to bag a spot just off centre crouching on the second row. This was a was much better position and enabled me to get some more interesting shots as well as back ache!
I must say a massive thanks to Canon UK, Canon CPS Europe and Vodafone who gave me the opportunity to photograph at London Fashion Week 2105, it was a fantastic experience.
