I know, I’m not a student any more, so it was a bit cheeky of me to get asked to shoot the annual MODO show again. Still, I couldn’t exactly say no – and there were still a couple of people I know in it!

With the most outrageous designer from the past few years not showing anything, there was never going to be the same wow factor I used to expect, but there were still some amazing designs. As my girlfriend pointed out to me, many of the clothes this year were even sporting such features as linings – so the production values were certainly up from when she used to be in the show.

After a hiatus at the Russell Hotel last year, the show was back in the UCL cloisters, and, much to my relief, finally lit decently. In previous years I’ve had to time shots to when models moved into lit areas of the catwalk, and multi-model shots were hit and miss as to whether they were all lit or half dark.

This shot is part of ‘The Kate Middleton Collection’, which was also featured on BBC London news.

What makes this show unique is that UCL doesn’t do fashion degrees – all the designers and models are studying for academic qualifications. The show programme highlighted studies as diverse as PhD Greek, PhD Neuropsychology, Modern Languages and Archaeology.

As usual, you can see a greater selection on Flickr, and those of you lucky enough to know me on facebook can see every single outfit in a rather large album over there.

Even though the UCLU Modo fashion society faced quite a few setbacks this year – their traditional venue within UCL was unavailable except at reading week, when no one would be around, and alternative venues were both ridiculously expensive and available for just one night, rather than their usual two, they pulled ‘The Green Fashion Show’ off spectacularly.

The Russell Hotel was a quite brilliant venue, and (from my point of view) the lighting was much better this year. Well, I say much better – I really mean there was some improvement. There was still a massive dark spot halfway down the runway, which happened to coincide with exactly where the models had been instructed to stop and pose… Luckily, the end of the runway was pretty well lit, and my new Sigma 70-200mm f/2.8 wasn’t exactly unhelpful.

Unfortunately the for-one-night-only show this year meant I couldn’t cover both backstage and the runway, although I managed a few shots of models dressing and being made-up before the show started. Nor this year – it being a Sunday, when I was editing a whole bunch of shots from Celebrating Streatham – could I get a timelapse done of the set-up: being in an external venue for just one day meant a 6am start for the crew, and probably a similar finish the next morning!

I’ll get a gallery up when I’m not quite so busy – for now, this shot should suffice to illustrate what in the end was the best Modo show I’ve seen over the past four years.

The start of a new university term isn’t all drinking and vomiting, despite what you may read (or remember from your own days avoiding the library).

UCLU this year saw 11,000 students over two days stream through the main UCL buildings in central London to view 150+ student-led clubs and societies, as well as commerical stalls ranging from Apple (whose stall consisted simply of two staff members and a laptop – literally nothing else) to graduate recruiters.

Getting 11,000 people through is no mean feat, and queues into the fayre at one point stretched out through UCL’s main quad and into Gower Street. Even on the quieter second day, it took me 11 minutes to walk as fast as I could around the fayre, filming for an updated freshers video – how long it takes for someone to get through while stopping to sign up and chat to societies, I don’t care to imagine!

The shot above is of Soraia, co-President of UCLU MODO, the fashion society. They are in many ways my favourite society (judging by the amount of material on here coming from their events!), and I may have entered into a foolish wager: if MODO have the highest number of members by February, I’ll be walking down their catwalk in one of Soraia’s dresses…

As part of my work with Modo this year, I set up my camera at the end of where the catwalk would be going up to capture a timelapse movie of the stage being constructed. The video was shot in a couple of batches (not my idea) over a couple of hours, with one frame every 30 seconds, compiled and inserted into the presentation at the beginning of the show as way of introduction.

Modo Fashion Show from Josh Blacker on Vimeo.

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Far fewer photos this time – no pressure to capture every single outfit – but some stunning images nonetheless from backstage at Modo‘s Elements fashion show. These were taken on the first night, 27th Feb, when by all accounts the stage lighting was slightly amiss. Luckily words were had and the Saturday night was much better lit for my photos of the catwalk itself.

The image above is of model Grace Barnett being fitted into one of Modo President Katie Jackson’s outfits in the second half of the show and is one of my favourite images from the two days.

Check the gallery below for more fantastic images of the backstage process, from hair and make-up to models coming fresh off the catwalk. Read the rest of this entry »