We had a great Saturday afternoon doing a fashion shoot three levels underground below Manchester. The shoot was for Manchester designer Fatz K who came to me and enthused about her ‘Media Madness’ concept a couple of weeks previously and asked me if I’d be interested in doing the job. Absolutely yes!

There were two phases to the shoot; the first was themed by the obsession with media, headlines and ‘celebrity-ism’, whilst the models and Fatz' outstanding designs were detached or elevated from all that – in it but not part of it. Hence Fatz constructed a whole set with newspaper – walls, furniture, everything. It looked fabulous. We used one direct flash to give a hard ‘pap’ feel to it.

For the second phase we used purely candlelight and long exposure. It gave a gorgeous warm glow and our underground set became much more den-like and, at times, very spooky. Both styles, while totally different, looked great.

The team: Dan, Ruby, Fatz, Sophie.

The team:
Designer: FatzK www.fatzk.com
Design assistant: Steph Cooper
Models: Ruby Slate Balthazer & Sophie Robinson
Makeup: Laura Cotterill
Hats & headdress: Jen, H' Atelier, www.hatelier.co.uk
Thanks to ‘The Circle’ club in St Annes Square for allowing us to use their sub-basement.

Behind the scenes preparation


Sophie
Originally Fatz wanted a paparazzi look to the shots with flash on camera, but after doing a couple I felt that it was a bit too harsh, so I used a studio flash with a soft box set to under expose, then a small spot in centre frame to give it a slightly harder flash feel.


Sophie by candlelight
Some of my favourite shots were lit purely by candlelight, 1000 ISO, no flash at all!!


Ruby







Fatz in action










Laura Cotterill retouches Rubys makeup








In the lift to the sub-basement. It smelt awful!


The set - Media Madness