E-Mail [simplygorgeous1@hotmail.com]
We also have a separate Notice Board on Google Groups. This contains the very latest lads mags reviews. We always try to have reviews of the current week's lads mags (Nuts and ZOO) here: Notice Board.
 More of Alena at Body-in-Mind |
A new set of images of Alena from Body-in-Mind. The photos are by Chris Ruegge. Not a particularly original setting, and the poses are quite convnetional. The colour saturation is good. What makes this set so special is the girl herself. Alena is, in our opinion, just about the most gorgeous looking girl we've ever come across. |
 More of Alena at Body-in-Mind |
But sadly, it is the only thing worth noting about this month's issue. The shoot itself is slightly better than the usual for FHM. We get several pages of Rachel although we get two double page spreads of her spawling about in a variety of clothing such as dresses and lingerie. It is nothing too revealing however. Obviously, the lingerie poses are better and she looks more classy, with one pretty good shot of her knelt on a settee. That's about as good it gets however as once again the shoot has been taken in a pretty bland studio. The interview itself is pretty much about her time on the Beeb's Strictly Dancing in which she finished runner-up. Rachel also featured in FHM last year when FHM rebranded itself, the standard of that shoot hasn't been really been matched since. Also, I am finding myself getting irradiated by the seemingly lack of thought at placing captions across the images, it ruins them and distracts the reader. This is FHM trying to be 'with it' with their page layouts but it doesn't work at all.
The other girl shoot is of Lauren Harris, daughter of Iron Maiden's bassist. A few shots here too, two of them black & white posing topless although all you get to see is her back. The other shots has her surrounded by music items, etc.
In any case, Rachel Stevens is definitely worth a peek at least before she gets married this year and presumably will disappear from the public eye for the foreseeable future.
 More of Sonya at Body-in-Mind |
A very good photo shooot of a new girl Sonya from Body-in-Mind. The photos are by Max Asolo.
The girl is attractive and naturally sexy. The setting is romantic and atmospheric, the lighting is attractive and contrasty, and the colours are rich and warm. These images are a world away from the bland material that's churned out each week by the lads mags. It isn't easy producing striking and orignal sets of images, such as this set. We like them. |
 More of Sonya at Body-in-Mind |
On to the issue itself, the main cover star is Katy Perry. Ok, she's what you call a A-list celebrity I suppose but again it appears most of the entire budget has been blown this month again on the main feature. The shoot itself is taken in a old Victorian building overlooking Buckingham Palace so the article says anyway, we don't actually see the Palace through the windows. If you're into Perry's legs then this is a shoot for you, the shoot is very Arena-isque in style. Nothing revealing is worn and the poses are not at all adventurous.
The other shoots feature Beatrice Rosen, an actress who recently starred in Sharpe's Peril. Again, nothing to get overly bothered about. One shot in this shoot is a full-page but out of focus which makes it pointless in my opinion and it seems intentional.
Lastly, the other shoot has a couple of shots of a girl who was in Hollyoaks. Again, it's just the run-of-the-mill underwear shots, bland and boring.
The Playboy 2009 Video Calendar will be released (in PAL format DVD, in the UK), at the end of December.
Details at Amazon UK (about £16)
Playboy videos tend to be the best girlie videos available (there aren't that many others at all). We haven't seen the 2009 calendar yet, though in recent years the quality of the girls has been a bit disappointing.
Playboy's earlier videos tended to feature girls with large natural boobs, which move particularly well on video. In more recent years too many of the girls have had fake boobs, which have no natural motion in them.
Body-in-Mind have kindly sent us a copy of their hardback book, "Super Beauties Nude and Natural", for us to review.
We've occasionally looked on Amazon to see if there are any decent books of glamour photos. But these are actually surprisingly rare. Considering the 1,000s of books which seem to be published on just about every other subject, and considering too that photography is something which specifically lends itself to visual images reproduced as printed pages.
A couple of years ago we did review Helmut Newton's "Big Nudes". But art books are normally expensive, and often only contain a very small number of really good images, plus a lot of mediocre padding.
Lads mags such as Maxim have occasionally carried reviews of glamour photo books (not very often), which we have commented on in our own lads mags reviews, normally very unfavourably. The majority of glamour photography books currently on the market seem to have very poor quality models, and very poor photography.
The Body-in-Mind book is a relatively small page-size (A5, which is slightly disappointing), but is very thick (4cm). It contains around 400, mostly full-page colour photos, all of images from the www.body-in-mind.com website. This is a style of photography that we like, normally featuring good looking girls with good natural boobs, and frequently using natural outdoor locations. The large majority of images in the book (though not all) are nudes.
There are some sample scans of typical double-page spreads from the book shown just below. Click on each of the images for an enlargement. That will open a new window. You should then be able to click on the images in each new window to produce a further enlarged image, which will be roughly the actual size of the book page (28cm in width for each double page spread) and which will roughly fill a computer screen.
|
|
|
|
Overall, this is a good collection of nice images.
Our only minor niggles are that there are virtually no words in the book, beyond the introduction. The pages are exactly as you can see in the sample page spreads above. It would have made the girls seem less anonymous to at least have had some names given for the models, and possibly a bit of text about each of them, or about the circumstances of the photoshoots, or some other anecdotal material. The collection of images has no structure or organisation. The small number of non-nude images would have been better omitted. And a larger page size might have been desirable, though obviously reproduction costs and the resulting sales price are a factor in that.
Details at Amazon UK (about £20)
Details at Amazon US
There's a review of this book here: News of The World
Extract:
"Glamour model Jordan went for maximum exposure when Darryn was photographing her in St Tropez in the Med. At one point on the first day Katie was completely naked and posing on the back of the boat. The water around us was full of teenage French boys, all desperately treading water, trying to keep themselves afloat and take shots with their disposable cameras. Hilarious. They couldn't believe those breasts. After three bottles of champagne each and copious vodkas, Darryn and Jordan staggered off the boat. That night we hit the dance floor and, in truth, we hit it pretty hard because we were so p***ed we couldn't stand. I ended up lying on top of her, my face between those magnificent pillows."
Details at Amazon UK (about £12)
Abi Titmuss is one of the most successful lads mags models. At one point she was earning £1M a year. She developed the concept of commissioning and marketing all her own photoshoots.
There's a short BBC interview with Abi Titmuss, which was filmed at the time of her book launch, here (you can see stacks of this book in the backgound):
Abi Titmuss video
Details at Amazon UK (about £5)
"The Playmate Book" is a unique and exceptional book.
This is a large format glossy book showing every Playmate from the start of the magazine in 1953 up until 2004. For every Playmate there is a large color photo, in many cases plus a few smaller inset photos, plus a paragraph or so of anecdotal material about each girl.
There are also a small number of additional Playboy themed photos (a few showing Playmates around the Heff Mansion), and some collections of Playboy trivia.
Playboy photography reached its peak through the 1970s and early 1908s. During that time Playboy used many atrtractive girls, many with large boobs, and all were fully natural. From the mid/late 1980's the standard of the models, and the photography began to decline. In fact, using this book, it is possible to chart in some detail the exact decline of Playboy photography. For example, you can see that, prior to 1982/83, there was no trimming of public hair whatsoever; then a slight side timming begins to be introduced, which over months and years, becomes more aggressive. The gradual introduction of girls with fake boobs, and their eventual domination of the magazine can also be traced in detail.
All the images in the book are also available on the Playboy website, so what's the point of having a book? Well, this is a really nice book to possess. You can also read it if you haven't got a computer, or an internet connection, or a current subscription to Playboy; and it will still be around long after your computer has packed up.
See readers' rave comments about this book on Amazon US: Readers Comments on the book
Details at Amazon UK (about £16)
Details at Amazon US
Details at Amazon UK (about £19)
Details at Amazon US
The "Complete Centrefolds: Small Edition" has a page size of 32cm x 16cm. There is also a full size edition, reproducing the images at the larger size as in the magazine (68cm x 39cm), but this is much more expensive.
Read a string of rave reader reviews (of the full size edition) at Amazon US: Readers comments on the book
Details at Amazon UK (about £200)
Details at Amazon US (about $400)
Although the full size edition is expensive, this is a very collectable item. The same book is being offerred on Amazon marketplace at prices up to £450/$750.
Firstly, there was a feature on the Channel 4 "Sex Education Show". This was mildly tittilating. The presenter, Anna Ryder Richardson, admitted that she knew nothing about the subject, but she coughed up some money to have a couple of hours instruction from some self-styled expert, into the mysteries of the art. Though, with hindsight, it seems the only art the instructor was really expert in was conning people, and Anna Ryder Richardson, her TV crew, and the viewing audience, were all well and truly conned.
We then had a more serious article about the subject in The Times:
Will tantric sex help my love life? (Times)
This article had two contributors, the The Times' own regular doctor, who admitted he didn't know that much about the subject, and recommended that readers should go find a book and learn from that; and there was also a woman who had attended a "Tantric Workshop". She said:
"There was lots of stuff about “openness” and “personal journeys” and the “inner self” and “enlightenment”... By the time Leora asked us to pretend that we were whisking eggs in a bowl in our pelvis, my husband was feeling twitchy, and when we were asked to walk around the room and touch foreheads with whoever we were next to when the music stopped, he finally threw in the towel and snuck away back to the giggling receptionists... What had we learnt? Not much, really. As we drove home, we agreed that neither of us felt remotely enlightened; in fact, we felt that tantric sex seemed to make more sense on paper than it did in practice." [lots more to read in the full article].
We then had a further article in The Times, about a new "self-help Tantric Workshop":
Sex therapy: the return of free love (Times).
There is a DVD available (from Amazon) about this "self-help Tantric Workshop". There's an advertising trailer for the DVD on YouTube here:
"The Workshop" Trailer (YouTube)
This is a bit more tittilating than the rather boring scenes shown on Anna Ryder Richardson's TV program. And there are some more fascinating teasers about "ultimate truths" and such, which were not mentioned at all by Anna Richardson's teacher.
DVD details at Amazon UK (about £9 and available now)
DVD details at Amazon US (due for release in US in 2009)
The Time's doctor had recommended that readers find a good book. Amazon offers several hundred boobs about Tantra. Most of these are slightly tittilating. Many are illustrated with tittilating posed photos.
We believe that there is probably only one authentic book, "Tantra: The Cult of the Feminine".
We believe this book is authentic for 3 reasons:
Not tittilatiing, a heavy read, but probably authorative, for those who have a need to know.
Details at Amazon UK (about £19)
Details at Amazon US
The shoot itself isn't too bad. It's technically well done, bright and sharp. Although nothing too revealing is worn and it's just a white studio backdrop for the majority. If you're a fan of her then it's worth a look, if not then you may be best leaving the issue on the shelf. The French edition of FHM ran the exact same photo set in their November issue but they got more other girlie features which also had full nudity.
We do get 2 other picture of the French High Street Honey winner, Laura Thomas. But it is nothing too remarkable about it to be honest.
The issue also carries the UK's High Street Honey supplement of the top 100 entries. I don't vote at this stage, I wait until they round it down to 10 in the new year. The supplement is the usual mix of professionally done photos to the mobile grainy photos - how is anyone meant to vote of the quality of the pics is questionable but I imagine the more ample entries will make it into the top 10. None of them are too remarkable anyway.
Next months FHM will have the additional Calendar for 2009, judging from the quality of girls featured over the year I imagine it will be quite poor, as it has been for the last couple of years compared to the other mags.
 More of Linda at Body-in-Mind |
A new photo shooot of Linda from Body-in-Mind. The set is titled "Test Shoot". Whether it's a retrospective early "test shoot" of her as a new model, isn't clear. We like this girl. The set is very simple, just a plain background, sitting and lying on the floor. There are plenty of good graphic archtypical images in the set. Sometimes the simplest ideas are the best. It would be difficult to improve on the set, without perhaps doing similar poses in some nice outdoor location. |
 More of Linda at Body-in-Mind |
The main girlie features are Adriana Lima and the cover shoot is Holly Willoughby. I always get a little suspicious of the shoots featuring in magazines around this time as it is usually the time most of the next year's calendars come out so the magazines tend to feature shots from them but that seems confined to the weeklys.
Firstly, to Adriana Lima... It's a decent enough shoot on the beach so bikini shots are the main feature here and she certainly fills a bikini in all the right places. We get a mix of colour and black/white shots. There is a couple of topless shots but nothing is revealed but the shoot has a bit of class about it and this girl is the definition of sexy. In any case, I certainly recommend you take a peek at her.
Next, Holly Willoughby's shoot... Seems FHM are leaving the studio behind as this shoot is also outdoors, in and around a swimming pool. Again, bikini shots are the main fare here also and again it's another girl who fills one in all the right places. You certainly can see why it's the only reason to watch that lame skating show on ITV. The pictures are bright and vibrant, in general a lot better than the usual in recent issues. Again, the shoot is worth a look but she's no Lima.
Another couple of page worthy of mention is the Hardware section. Here we get two pictures of a unknown model, modelling cameras in the nude. The camera are strategically placed sadly, and the model in uncredited but she pretty busty.
There is another shoot in the Incoming section of Charlene Rena (no, I have no idea either) but it is the usual underwear fare, just a couple of pictures and a bit bland against the other shoots in the issue.
I would certainly recommend a look at FHM this month in any case.
 More of Tanzi at Body-in-Mind |
A new photo shooot from Body-in-Mind. Tanzi, in flowers. The photos are by Iiuri Galmour, who also did the hammock photoset (reviewed below). There are 2 settings, one in a field of sunflowers (shown left), and another in a field of chamomiles(?) (shown right). These are excellent settings; it's very resourceful to be able to find these places. The girl is a bit slim in the boobs for our tastes, but still quite nice sets. |
 More of Tanzi at Body-in-Mind |
|
A reasonably original shoot from Chris Ruegge.
After a single garden set, he seems to have given up on the outdoor photoshoots, so this is an indoor shoot of Ashley. This girl is nice looking and has a great pair of natural boobs. This is the sort of girl we really like to see. Shes posing with a tin of paint, painting some abstract pattern on a wall. She puts the paint on her hands in some of the shots and suggests shes going to put them on her boobs, but doesn't. Why not? |
 More of Ashley at Body-in-Mind |
Nuts and ZOO 26th September Issues [Posted 25th September 2008]Near the front of this week's ZOO are 2 pages of pics from Amii Grove's 2009 calendar. There are 4 pics shown, all nudes, on location. Very nice. (You can see all the pics by clicking on the image at right). This is the best 2009 calendar that we've seen, and one of the few which comes up to the standard of classic calendars. The Sam Cooke 2009 calendar (reviewed in ZOO 2 weeks ago, see below) was another good calendar. We'll have to add something about these calendars to our classic calendars page.
|  Click to enlarge (This opens up an new window. By clicking on the image in the new window, it can be enlarged yet again.) |
|
The main feature inside ZOO this week is an 18-page collection of mostly full-page nude pics.
The best shots include a nice full-page shot of Seren Gibson and Emma Frain on a beach (see right). There's also a decent full-page shot of Sam Cooke, in the sea. And there are 2 full-page studio pics of Sammy Braddy. |  Click to enlarge |
| The cover of Nuts this week has Chanelle and Lucy Pinder. The main feature inside is an 8-page nude pictorial of the 2 girls (see sample right). The pics are OK, though as studio pics, they don't have the same class as the location pics in this week's ZOO. |  Click to enlarge |
 More of Ingrid at Body-in-Mind |
Photoshooots from Body-in-Mind tend to be a little bit like the proverbial buses, (and our own Photoshoots), in that you seem to wait ages for a good one, and then 2 come along at once.
This week Body-in-Mind have posted 2 Photoshoots. They are both of the same girl, Ingrid. The first is a set on some rocks (shwon left). There are 108 pics, all taken in good sunlight, and quite colourful. (Although we have seen girls on rocks several times before). |
  More of Ingrid at Body-in-Mind |
But more impressive is the second set, showing Ingrid in a hammock (samples at left).
A hammock may be slightly clichéd, but it produces some very graphic images. These pictures are all taken in good sunlight, and all have a very attractive warm colour tone. There are 101 images in this set, including lots of quite striking poses. This is a very good set of pics. We've got a hammock just like this one ourselves. We used it in Kimberley's photoshoot, but haven't used it very often, to avoid being clichéd. We might resurrect it. |
|
There's an article in the Sunday Times about a number of new female wildlife TV presenters. Article: New female wildlife TV presenters- Sunday Times
We had been struck previously, particularly by 2 of the girls mentioned in the article, Saba Douglas-Hamilton (shown right) and Charlotte Uhlenbroek. It's quite hard to find any decent clips on YouTube showing these girls doing their stuff. Here are a few: Charlotte Uhlenbroek with patas monkeys - YouTube
|  |
There's something else about Saba Douglas-Hamilton and co, which isn't mentioned in The Sunday Times article: they embody images of the tropical island girls, and goddesses, which are so important to us. They are maternal, benevolent, and at one with the natural world. These women come very close to being incarnate Goddess figures.
 |
Another fiesty and talented hottie we like is opera diva Anna Netrebko.
In performance: |  |
Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town [Posted 13th September 2008]There's an article in today's Times about life in ancient Pompeii. Titles of chapters in the article include: "Sex, shopping and chasing slaves", "Feasting and frolicking", and "Baring all at the baths".
Article:
The article is based on a newly published book "Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town", by Mary Beard (Professor of Classics at Cambridge University). Details of the book: |  |
Article:
Tall, tanned and young and lovely - Times
Nuts and ZOO 12th September Issues [Posted 11th September 2008]ZOO's cover caption this week is "Sexiest Calendars 2009". There are 18-pages of almost-full-page pics from 5 different calendars. The 2 best calendars reviewed are those featuring Sam Cooke (shown right) and Danni Wells, both shot on location in Tobago in the West Indies. The Sam Cooke blurb also mentions a shot with a water melon (which we haven't seen) which sounds interesting. Danni Wells' calendar is of similar quality, brightly-lit shots, in the sea and on a beach. Danni is topless in all the shots, and nude in half of them. Using classy girls in a classy location makes the world of difference. These 2 calendars seem significantly better than any of the other calendars featured this week, and in the past few weeks. This week ZOO also reviews calendars by: Channelle. This girl is too slim for our taste. A mix of location and indoor pics (though apparently not in the West Indies), and no topless shots. A calendar for dedicated Chanelle fans, but, for everyone else, one to miss. Then there are 6 pages of Tanya Robinson's calendar, all mediocre location shots, and all topless, and including 2 nude shots. But we don't care for the fake boobs. Sorry. Finally ZOO has 2 pages of Jakki Degg's calendar (a model popular on Page 3 many years ago). These are all sepia-toned indoor shots. She's wearing a top hat in the first shot, doing the finger-in-the-mouth-porno pose. A very poor calendar, in every respect. Nuts' cover caption this week is "Gemma 2009 Calendar". The main feature is a 10-page collection of pics from Gemma Atkinson's 2009 calendar. We're not big fans of Gemma (because of the fake boobs). The photos are all mediocre location pics, on a beach, and on a veranda with foliage. All pics are in bikinis, and are fairly bland. Again, a calendar for dedicated fans, but, for everyone else, one to miss. |  Click to enlarge (This opens up an new window. By clicking on the image in the new window, it can be enlarged yet again.) |
The shoot isn't too bad and at least worth a peek. It seems to have been shot in some kind of hotel surrounding, a couple of shots in a lift and bathroom. Most of the shoot she is posing in lingerie but nothing too daring in the way of nudity attempted. The Arena shoot she did some time ago now was far better. One image in this FHM shoot has Abbey holding a fag, a complete and utter turn-off. [SG says: we made a simliar observation about Sam Cooke, in a poor Front PhotoShoot, 2 months ago].
Other shoots include Amber Heard, a good variety of colour and black/ white shots with a couple of decent close-ups and is certainly worth a look. We also get a shoot of Kerry McGregor, we get a couple of shots here which are pretty bland. My major gripe about it she is has a fag in her hands. How is smoking considered sexy? Finally, there is one image of Kirsty Gallagher along with a few paragraphs. Just the one rather unremarkable image which FHM considers worthy to mention on the spine.
Another pretty mediocre issue to say the least.
Nuts and ZOO 5th September Issues [Posted 4th September 2008]Nuts is 99p this week. The cover shows Keeley Hazell, and the main feature is a 9-page pictorial of her (see right). These seem to be pics from her 2009 Topless calendar. It seems as though, like last year, there will be 2 Keeley calendars, one topless, and one not. On Amazon, one is called the "X-rated lingerie edition" (presumably the topless one), and one is called the "swimwear edition" (presuambly non-topless). The shots shown in this week's Nuts are all topless, though there are no nudes (as in some former years). The settings are all quite nice (inside by a window, on a veranda, and by a wall; so not boring studio shots). There is something odd about the reproduction, in many shots her skin appears grainy, and several images have a strange colour cast. Not sure if that is due to the printing in Nuts or problems in the original images. Not one of the shots is bright and clear, such as you get with outdoor shots on a bright day. It's different; though not as good as some of the location-shot calendars she did in former years, nor as good as this year's Sam Cooke or Danni Wells calendars. |  Click to enlarge |
|
ZOO's cover caption reads "Big Brother Babes Exposed".
The main feature begins with 8 pages of studio shots of Imogen Thomas, and then there are 8 pages of further grainy screenshots from the recent series of the show, all very boring. An article in The Times this week reveals how viewing figures for Big Brother have plumetted. The agent for a former winner describes the current contestants as "vacuous, boring people with nothing to say and no talent." "Top agencies that would have happily taken on Big Brother contestants five years ago are now steering away from them". Article: Big Brother 9 is least popular show ever - Times ZOO also has a 4-page pictorial of Emma Frain, on location on a beach in Ibiza (see right). We like Emma Frain (she's not right at the top, but near it). 3 of these pics are nudes, and quite nice pics. But the feature is really down-played in the mag. There's just one double-page shot, 1 almost-full page shot (the one shown right), and 3 small shots. And for some reason, the Emma Frain pictorial doesn't even get a mention on the cover of the mag. The pics are far better than any of the 16 pages of the BB feature. ZOO's News has a 2-page pictorial of Danni Welles in soccer tops (on a World Cup 2010 theme). How many times have we seen girls trying to pose in soccer tops? The problem is that it's almost impossible to find a decent-looking original pose, and these shots are boring. |  Click to enlarge (This opens up an new window. By clicking on the image in the new window, it can be enlarged yet again.) |
|
The main pic in ZOO's real girls feature this week shows a good looking girl called "Lilly from Worcester" (see right).
Very observant readers might notice the pattern of the rug she's lying on: haven't we seen that rug somewhere before?
|  Click to enlarge |
| The pic actually comes from a Simply-Gorgeous photoshoot she did some time ago (see further pic at right). |  Click to enlarge |
 More of Klaudia at Body-in-Mind |
We've been waiting all "Summer" to see a set of outdoor pics from Body-in-Mind's Chris Ruegge. This week sees a set of 72 photos, taken in a large garden or park (sample at left).
Chris Ruegge is based in Germany. We're not sure what the weather is like there, though last year they had a dreadful Summer, just as we did. The continuous rainy weather was widespread across Northern Europe. This new set of Klaudia has a quite similar look and feel to a set of Klaudia posted in February (see sample right). The February set was actually titled "Klaudia after the rain", and came with an apology for the technical quality of the pics, which is inevitable when shooting in less than ideal weather conditions. Pretty much sums up what we feel about this Summer! There's more about Chris Ruegge, and why we were looking forward to his outdoor photoshoots further down the blog, here: Chris Ruegge. And there's more about the soggy Summer weather just below... |
 More of Klaudia at Body-in-Mind |
| We started the 2008 season well, with 3 decent PhotoShoots. Then the rains began.
We're sorry we haven't been able to do any further Photoshoots this "Summer". This has been entirely due to the poor weather we've been having, throughout all of July and August, and so far, into September too. To do good outdoor pictures, it does need dry and preferably sunny weather.
More articles about our Summer weather:
A harvest disaster is bad news for farmers, though these days we can import grain. Our dependence on the weather for our food was more crucial in times past, and was partly responsible for the evolution of a complicated system of Goddess beliefs (see panel at right). We're still living in hopes of a late Indian Summer, and the hopes of getting some outdoor PhotoShoots done. |
The Goddess and our WeatherOur Inspirations Page has a lot about Goddess Philosophy. That page has are several references to A Midsummer Night's Dream, which is based around the ideas of Plato: Is the world we see "real" or a Dream (hence the title of the play)? These ideas also form the theme of "The Matrix" films which are familiar to many of us. Might the weather be related to some kind of psychological state? The question about the origins of the weather is raised in A Midsummer Night's Dream, where the Goddess Titania says: Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain, |
|
Time for the 6 monthly appraisal of the lads mags' performance, and yet again, sales of all the lads mags have plummeted.
Maxim's average issue circulation during the period Jan-June 2008 was 43,542 copies, down a whopping 60% from the same period last year. Maxim lost over half it's circulation in the 12 month period. And that's on top of big loses in each of the previous years (see figures in table at right).
Loaded's circulation for the past 6 months averaged 95,371, down 21%. |
Table showing how circulations of lads mags have declined
|
More details:
Maxim and FHM bear brunt of downturn - Marketing Week
Men's consumer magazines - Guardian
There's some speculation about the reasons and possible directions here:
Get your brains out for the lads - Guardian
From our point of view, many of the girls are very poor quality - non-entity reality TV cast offs (Big Brother); or silcone-stuffed "models" (Atkinson/ Lloyd/etc) who are not good enough to get proper modelling jobs on Page 3; or girls who we're sick of seeing (Pinder/Howard/etc).
The quality of the photography is normally very poor. (It's quite exceptional to find a shoot where we say "this is good"). We like some of Zoe McConnell's photography, but that's about it. The majority of "professional photography" in most of these magazines is dreadful.
We do occasionally glance at the non-girlie pages. These are even less interesting than poorly photograhed non-models. If there was anything worth reading there, we would. But there never is.
Why pages and pages of football? Isn't English football just a game for whingers and losers? Where are all those Olympic sports, that we're actually good at.
We'd like to see mags have more intelligent editorial material, so they might actually appeal to anyone not a brainless zombie, while keeping plenty of girlie content, and improving the quality of that.
Comment on the circulation figures, submitted by zanmato79...
Pretty woeful figure all round, more so for Maxim but it hardly surprising given the content of the magazine over the last 12 months. Obviously, the economic downturn will have a say in such figures too. I've kept buying FHM as in general it seems to offer the better content in all areas on average. There is, in my view, a couple of articles worth reading but certainly long gone are the days of when I read the magazine from cover to cover.One could argue that the introduction of the 'weekly' magazine have affected the quality of the monthly editions too. For certain, the quality of the photography has plummeted and the lower the class of 'celebrity' is the subject no doubt, due to the fees of hiring good photographers, studio time and celebrities/models time. Clearly the publishers are tightening the purse strings due to the loss of advertising revenue. Even FHM had girls from Shipwrecked in which was in my view was pretty desperate to find something girlie to put in the magazine. I'm sick of these girls from reality TV shows (apart from Chanelle Hayes), as the vast majority of them are actually quite awful.
I agree that we've seen enough of the same girls now populating mostly, the weekly issues and Maxim. As you said, it always seems to be Gemma Atkinson, Sophie Howard, Lucy Pinder and Danielle Lloyd - you see a running theme there? 18 months ago, Maxim was pretty decent because the Page 3 girls were pretty fresh but has seem to have got into a rut of sticking with a tried and tested formula which is now clearly failing them. Perhaps getting new Page 3 girls in will lift the magazine, and I mean 'new' like girls who have recently made the page in the past 6 months. Someone like 'Jenny' or 'Rosie'.
I for one would say - ditch the weekly issues and put the effort and money back into the monthly issues.
 |
Front's October cover girl is Rosie Jones, the fast-rising busty
brunette on The Sun's Page-3.
The main feature inside is a 18-page pictorial of Rosie. Just inside the cover is a full-page shot of Rosie, posing with her finger in her mouth.
On Page3.com there is a page giving advice to new models. It says "don't pose with your
finger in your mouth" (last paragraph on this page:
Page3.com Advice for Models).
Most of the pics in the pictorial are taken with flat lighting, some apparently against a wall, and some sitting on a bed. None of them are "flattering". One of the shots shows Rosie with some smarties. What's that supposed to signify? Also in the issue is a pictorial of another girl called Kaylee. She has a very young look, and all of her poses are with bubble gum. Young-looking girls with sweets, bubble gum and lollipops, is not a style of photography that we ourselves would feel comfortable with, although some people do, and there seems to be a market for that style of image. |
We haven't bought Loaded this month. Loaded's cover girl is Jennifer Metcalfe (a soap actress) and so we'd expect a predictably bland pictorial. We had a quick glance through Loaded in the newspagents, trying to find a pictorial of Lindsey Strutt, Loaded's regular girl, who would have been the only justification for buying the mag, though the quality of Lindsey's pictorials have trailed off in recent months. Maybe there is a Lindsey pictorial in there, but we couldn't find it. Has Loaded dropped its only worthwhile regular feature?
There are several examples of Lindsey's PhotoShoots in previous issues of Loaded further down the blog, here: Lindsey Strutt in Loaded.
It surprises us that Loaded doesn't have the sense to come up with a
feature on Rosie. Presumbably if Rosie's pictorial had been shot for
Loaded it wouldn't have been so tacky, and the reproduction would have
been better, Rosie would have been able to get some decent tear sheets
for her portfolio, and Loaded would have scored a hit with Page 3
fans, instead of having its issue left on the shelf.
Comparing the printing and production of Front and Loaded, Loaded is a
far glossier and "classier" magazine, if anyone could call Loaded
"classy"!
Its seems likely that Loaded is trying to respond to it's falling circulation by rebranding itself, to become more like FHM. If readers want a mag like FHM, why not buy the real thing - FHM. Previously Loaded did have a reputation of being more of a girlie mag. Readers who actually want a girlie mag will now find Loaded disappointing, and won't buy it. And what logic is there in trying to follow FHM - whose own sales are plumetting.
The cover of Nuts this week has the caption "Sexiest Naked Pics of
2008". The feature inside is a very good one.
There are 11 pages of original pics. All the pics are either full-page
or half-page (see samples at right). The pics are all nudes, and decently photographed. The
only slight moan is that there could have been a few more
pages. 11 pages of pics like these are simply not enough.
ZOO's News has an almost-full-page shot of Sammie Pennington, in
white stockings (see right). This girl defines what is meant by "photogenic": she always looks sensational. It seems very hard for anyone to take a bad photo of her.
And on a post-Olympic theme, ZOO has a 2-page pictorial of Sam Cooke,
wearing gold body-paint. The idea this invokes is not Olympics, but
Shirley Eaton in Goldfinger. It's an idea which was innovative 25
years ago. But today, it's not very exciting. To do a credible
Olympics pictorial, girls need to do athletics, Spartan-style. This
has been done for some preivous Olympics, but none of the weekly or monthly lads mags attempted anything like that
that this time.
"There will be offers, too, to repeat her recent photo shoot in which
she posed wearing nothing except her bike. It was a session that
raised the issue of whether a serious athlete had resorted to trading
on sex appeal. One respected columnist bemoaned her taking her clothes
off, to which she responds by asking whether the same was said of
Lance Armstrong, the seven-times Tour de France champion, on whom the
picture was modelled.
"I wouldn't have done it if I thought it was provocative or seedy or
anything like that," Pendleton says. "I thought it was artistic. I was
flattered that they wanted me to replicate a picture Lance Armstrong
did [see below]. There was another picture I did posing in a dress with my bike [see left]
and another journalist said it looked ridiculous.
"You tell me
which girl my age wouldn't want to be on the cover of a magazine? I enjoyed it and I looked good. If I
was tenth in the world and just trying to sell myself physically, I
would feel ashamed. But I am doing well and feel I have deserved it. I
wouldn't agree to do it unless I was winning."
"There is this nasty stereotype of what you should be like in cycling
and I have stepped beyond that. I am a different build and I have
shown it works. It is, like, 'Check this out.' Other girls my size
should be going for it."
Full article:
Victoria Pendleton Interview - Times
Apparently, among the cycling fraternity, Victoria Pembleton is regarded as something of a sex symbol.
The cover of Nuts this week carries the caption "Sexiest Calendars
2009". This begins with 3 pages of Chanelle. These are very bland
bikini pics, and not very inspiring.
Then there are 2 pages of Lindsey Strutt. This is more like it.
There's just one good shot here. Then there's Gemma Merna (she's a non-entity from Hollyoaks, appearently dressed in all the shots),
another one to miss. There's a topless pic of Kitty Lea on
a bed (which is uninspiring). Then a single pic of Malene (fake
boobs) Espensen. And finally a single pic of Eva, which is a decent
pic (but fake boobs again?) And that's it. With the exception of a
single shot of Lindsey Strutt, not very good.
Nuts News has a couple of pics of Wonderbra model Katie Green, in the
sea (shown right). Two quite nice, simple classic, poses here (and actually,
better than any of the shots in the calendar feature).
It's a pity they couldn't have thought of something more interesting to do in the way of poses, than just standing in a line, perhaps something along the lines of the "Wet Summer" feature in the 18th July issue of Nuts, described a bit further down the blog, here: Nuts 18th July.
The cover of ZOO this week has the caption "Bianca Gascoigne". The
main feature inside is a 10-page pictorial. The pics are technically
"competent" (but not fantastic), and the model is a bit boring.
ZOO also has a pictorial of Sammie Pennington and Amii Grove, nude on
a yatch in the Med (sample shown right). This is a concept which ought to have had great
potential, but the results seem to be a bit disappointing. The feature is
not mentioned on the cover, and there are only 4 pages inside, one of
which is mainly introductory text, so there are only 3 pages of pics.
Perhaps it was a very small boat and not easy to take pictures on.
The main feature in Nuts this week is called "Topless Babes on
Holiday". This is a 10-page pictorial of various Daily Star Page-3 girls, on
location, probably in the Med. This has a lot in common with the
Sammie Pennington/Amii Grove pictorial in this week's ZOO: it's a
potentially great concept, but the results are a bit disappointing. There's
a shot on a boat, where the lighting is almost completely washed out.
There's a full-length shot of Sammy Braddy and Lindsey Strutt standing
in the sea, but here, the background is completely washed out (maybe
it's entirely white sky) - but that shot looks simliar to a studio
shot with a white backdrop. In the entire pictorial there's only one
shot which is technically decent - one of Lindsey Strutt lying on her
back on a wet beach. The choice of models for the Nuts shoot also
leaves a lot to be desired. They have Lindsey Strutt and Sammy Braddy
(who are both "in"), but also Lucy Pinder, Malene Espenson (fake
boobs), and Sophie Howard, who are effectively baggage.
We fret about trying to get some sunshine for our own PhotoShoots in
this dismal Summer we're having here, yet, there are these girls in
the Med, in ideal conditions, and what they come back with seems to be
disappointing. Zoe McConnell's atmospheric shoot
of Charlotte McKenna in ZOO, 25th July, reviewed a bit further down the blog, shows how pics in Ibiza can
and ought to be done.
A few quotes:
"What you must realise about displaying your cleavage is that men will
look. This is a good thing and can be used to your advantage."
[make-up advice] "If you wake up with a huge spot on your chin, just
undo a few buttons and your self-confidence should return."
"Never, ever, wish to have small ones. The French say that a woman
without breasts is like a bed without a pillow, and they are right."
"As for men, never believe them when they say they prefer smaller
ones. They're just trying to be arty, nice to their girlfriends - or
there's something really wrong."
By Sophia Neophitou, Editor of "10", a fashion magazine:
"My colleagues say I have balls of steel when it comes to business,
but my secret weapons are my 34F breasts... The most important thing
about big breasts is to wear them properly... I don't want to wear an
industrial tit sling... I'm very conscious of necklines... You need to
see some skin..."
Full article:
What Women Think About Big Breasts - Times
The cover of ZOO this week has "Jennifer! Ace New Pics!" (who?,
what?), and "50 Hottest TV Babes". The main feature inside consists of
4 pages of pics of Jennifer Metcalfe, a soap actress. These are the
predicatably bland indoor shots in underwear. And there are
also 10 pages of predictable recyled pics, mostly thumbnails, and
mostly bikini shots, of various non-entities.
The mag is saved, by a separate feature on Sammy Braddy (see right). This consists
of 5 pages of pics (4 in the feature, plus 1 inside the back cover),
most fully topless, including 3 nudes. This are all nice pics. The
text says that her boobs are real, and, it says, size GG (H!!!). The
mag is worth getting for the Sammy pics.
The cover of Nuts this week has "Danielle Lloyd". You can guess the
subtitle - "Sexiest Shoot I've Ever Done". Yeah, yeah, yeah. The main
feature inside is a 10-page pictorial, which is, predictably, not even
topless. Even the technical quality of the pics isn't up to much -
seems to be quite flat lighting.
Nuts does also have a 3-page pictorial of Madison Welch, just 2 pics,
1 full-page, and 1 double-page spread (plus 1 thumbnail). The
technical quality of these pics is a lot better than the Danielle set,
and she's topless. But are those boobs real?
BBC3 has shown a program titled "Addicted to Boob Jobs". Magazine editors who like featuring trashy models like
Danielle Lloyd (and Gemma Atkinson, Jodie Marsh, etc) might have found
it worth watching.
The program showed an unscientific straw poll among a bunch of men,
which showed an almost unanimous preference for girls with natural
boobs.
The program also interviewed a couple of women who were about to have
boob jobs. One was a married woman who seemed to think she'd have a
career as a model (but you should have seen her, not in a million
years).
Then there was girl in her late teens/early twenties. She seemed fully
aware that lads do not find boob jobs attractive, and yet still wanted
to do the op, because she actually wanted "to look fake". She seemed
to be doing it as some kind of act of social defiance. The program
actually raised a lot more questions than it answered.
The main feature in ZOO this week is an 8-page pictorial of Charlotte
McKenna, last years FHM High Street Honey winner. These are mostly
full-page pics, all taken on a beach. A very nice set of pics, taken
by Zoe McConnell.
Then there are 4 further pages showing Charlotte McKenna
together with Lisa-Helen Ralph, FHM's 2008 High Street Honey winner,
nice shots, which look as though they've been taken around a villa in
Ibiza.
ZOO's News has an almost-full-page pic of Sammi Pennington in denim
shorts, a nice shot, though we've seen this shot several times now,
and it's about time she did a few more pics.
The cover of Nuts this week carries the caption "50 Sexiest Blondes".
The main feature inside begins with 3 pages of Big Brother's
Stephanie, all pics in black underwear, in very bland poses, and all
very boring. Then there are 8 further pages of recycled thumnails.
There's a very small of decent pics among this set, notably a 1/6th
page pic of Sophie Reade, a quarter-page pic of Rhian, and a 1/8th
page pic of Eva.
And Nuts' News has a 3-page pictprial of a girl called Erin McNaught,
a former Miss Australia, and now an actress in Neighbours. She's very
slim, but these are quite sultry-looking outdoor pics.
The feature inside is a 12-page pictorial, and for once, this does not
disappoint. Lots of really nice full-page pics, all in glorious
sunshine, with lots of sea. Nearly all the pics are fully topless, and
there's at least one full-page nude pic of each girl.
Well, it's different, and topical, and quite brave.
The cover girl is month is Ana Ivanovic, the Serbian tennis player.
Rumour is it that she could take up modelling when she retires from
the game. Judging by the shoot in FHM such a career move may prove
fruitful. The shoot itself is taken outdoors around a swimming pool.
If you were hoping for some swimsuit shots you'll be disappointed,
there is nothing too revealing in these shots. Technically however
this shoot has some quality about it and is worth a look.
The other main girlie feature is Richard and Judy Madeley's daughter,
Chloe. This shoot is in a studio and rather bland wearing a pair of
tights and a slik gown. The Telegraph considers it 'racy', ...hardly.
Still considering her parents she is rather easy on the eye.
Also, there is a couple of shots of a girl from C4's Shipwrecked
posing in her underwear. I didn't make a note of which one it is and
there is certainly nothing special about her or the pics.
This months supplement FHM2 also has quite a few pics of various
unnamed models posing in lingerie. You could go as far to argue that
the supplement is better than the content of the main magazine in
terms of the girlie content.
So, a better issue this month in my opinion with the Ana Ivanovic
shoot being the highlight.
The cover of Nuts this week has the caption "Chanelle and Pals Get Naughty & Naked!".
The main feature inside the mag begins begins with 5 pages of pics of Chanelle. She's nude in all the shots, which are all slightly similar to the cover shot.
The feature continues with single pics of a number of Page 3 girls, including Amy Diamond and Rhian Sugden (both shown right), Sophie Howard, Malene Espensen, Tanya Robinson, and Katie Downes.
There is also a large number of quite interesting readers' comments:
Amateur Photographer - Comments
Amateur Photographer magazine has taken a strong interest in this
issue. There's a series of articles indexed at the bottom of this
page:
Photography No Terror Threat - Amateur Photographer
The main feature in Nuts this week is a 12-page pictorial called
"Britain's Best New Boobs". It consists of a set of almost-full-page
pics of Page 3 girls - Eva, Katie-Marie, Lindsey Strutt, Sammie Braddy, and 2 new
girls - Sophie and Madison.
The set includes a double-page spread of all the girls
standing together in a line, and the the mag also comes with a
separate pull-out poster of the same shot.
Eva and Katie-Marie.
In our Glamour Girls review page, we nade some comments about the
respective quality of the girls and the photography in Playboy, and on
Body-in-Mind.
Last week, Page 3 girl Malene Espensen appeared in a photoset on
Playboy Cyber Club, and we posted a review of it here, on the notice
board. We didn't think much of it.
This week, Body-in-Mind posted a photoset of a new girl, Carmen, and
we thought it would be instructive to mention that here too. There are
47 images in this set (sample at left).
The Carmen set was taken by a german photographer, Chris Ruegge, as
have been several other sets on Body-in-Mind that we've picked out
over the months.
His models are all quite attractive and seem to have natural figures
(much like Playboy models of the 1980's). Some people might say that
his girls all look a bit similar - they do; but they are at the
opposite pole to Playboy's barbie/porno look, that we detailed in our
criticisms of Playboy on Glamour Girls.
His sets are all stylish and creative; they all tend to be different
to things we've seen before. Here are some more examples:
His lighting is always very atmospheric, with good tones and shadows
and texture.
Body-in-Mind uses other photographers too, who have their own styles,
though none as good as Chris Ruegge. We might flag up any others that
seem to be noteworthy, as they occur.
It's a set of 19 photos, standing and sitting, in front of a hearth,
in a lavishly furnished room.
The set commences with 9 shots in white underwear, then there are 7
shots topless (though 2 are from the rear and don't show her boobs),
and finally there are 3 shots which are full-frontal nudes.
Malene's got a great pair of boobs, well shown off in about 4 of the
shots.
OK, so it's Malene Espensen, and the pics are full-frontal. But the pics
lack any real impact.
The May 2008 issue features American celebs - Angie Harmon, Gabrielle
Union, Jill Scott, Zoe McLellan and Ana Ortiz.
Here's a short YouTube video about the Allure PhotoShoot:
Allure PhotoShoot - YouTube
Most of the video consists of the girls taking part saying a few words
about the experience of doing the PhotoShoot.
The video does include very brief clips of the final images. Unlike
the Peta images, which are taken against a plain studio backdrop, the
Allure images have an attractive country background and feel to them.
The Allure images (which are a lot more attractive) were also actually taken in a studio, using an elaborate country-style set, and not in the actual countryside.
You only get the real deal (real girls in the real countryside) with us!
Celebs taking part in the latest Peta photoshoots are Mica Paris and Susie Amy (shown here), plus Lisa Snowdon, the Cheeky Girls and Janet Ellis.
There are several further pics of all the women taking part, and
articles about them, here:
It's sad to see that the ciruclation of Loaded has been declining. Loaded has occasionally produced some very good features.
A really good example is the way that Loaded introduced and promoted Lindsey Strutt, who became quite popular on Page 3 of The Star.
Following her first Loaded appearance she seems to have got some sort of contract with Loaded, and appeared in most of its editions throughout the following year.
A few of the best are shown below.
Featuring another striking set of pictures of Lindsey Strutt...
Another 2-girl set, this time on a football theme with Rhian Sugden.
Another very nice set of pictures, although none of the subsequent photoshoots quite managed to look as vivacious as she did in the solo picture in her very first set (shown a bit above).
The program included contributions by most of the major players -
Alison Webster, Jeany Savage, and we heard from Keeley Hazell (who
looked very "mature" and serious), and Jo Hicks made an appearance -
softly spoken and delightful.
Everyone was keen to explain how competitive modelling for Page 3 is,
and how any girl's chances of making it to the top are very small.
Though it has its rewards. Alison Webster said that some Sun Page
girls can make £100,000 a year; and Keeley was said to having made
£250,000 a year. Jordan was also mentioned as being worth £30M
(though, she didn't make that money by appearing on Page 3, or through
modelling for any magazines).
The message for girls who do want to get on Page 3 ought to be very
clear: they should enter the Page 3 Idol competition, or E-mail The
Sun, or apply to one of the agencies who handle Page 3 girls - Girl
Management, or possibly Samantha Bond. But, that message was NOT made
clear in the program.
In fact, Girl Management (who now call themselves simply "Girl") and
who handle the large majority of The Sun's Page 3 girls, and who ought
to be the first point of call for any aspiring Page 3 girl, was not
mentioned at all. We found this omission very strange. (A similar very
strange, almost deliberate, omission also occured in the first episode
of Glamour Girls.)
The camera crew were meant to be following a girl, Chelsea White, from
her teen-modelling days for Bliss magazine, through to her considering
Page 3. The program explained that she needed to find a specialist
glamour agency. At one point, on a train, the girl, said "I've been to
see one agent so far. They've got about 15 girls on their books", and
they had advised her to come back in a year or so. The description of
"about 15 girls" sounds like GM, and that is probably the sort of
advice that they would have given. But this vital nugget of
information - the single thing that girls ought to do - apply to GM -
was almost glossed over. If this camera crew had been following all
the significant events in this girl's story - why didn't we see the
most important thing happening and the most important piece of advice
being given?
What we did see, was her then going to IMM (NOT the place to go if
girls want to get in The Sun; IMM's a reputable agency, but it's not
for Page 3). There she was actually asked if she'd been to any Page 3
agencies, and she replied "no".
We were very confused by this. This program was supposed to be giving
reliable informatiion to teenagers who know little about the industry
- what were they supposed to make of this?
Karsten Edwards of IMM did give the camera a good summary of the
girl's chances - he described her look as "generic" - there are a
large number of aspiring models just like her.
There were some contributions from Alan Strutt, who was The Sun's
photographer for 2 years, until Alison Webster took over. Alan Strutt
now mainly seems to do work for other publications, such as Nuts and
ZOO. We didn't hear anything about the weekly modelling competitions
being run by Nuts and ZOO, and which are currently prominent in
seeming to offer easy modelling stardom. In our weekly reviews we've
expressed doubts about how many of these girls are actually going to
get any regular work. Not a lot.
In her quest to get on Page 3, this young girl was then sent (with the
camera crew) to see another photographer photographing a model called
"Larissa Summers". She claimed to be a Playboy model. We didn't
recognise her, and a quick serch on Playboy Cyber Club doesn't bring
up anything. So what were we actually seeing here? She gave the
impression that it would be easy to get this girl loads of work. Not
for the first time in this program, we were confused.
There was no actual mention either of photographers who claim to
photograph girls for Page 3, but who are actually running adult
websites. And there are those producing "Page 3" pictures (for The
Sport!), and at the same time pictures for the adult magazines run by
The Sport group, and those producing pictures for the various
magazines run by the Paul Raymond group.
A girl who was featured in many of the lads mags during last year was
Cassie Sumner. She has also featured in Playboy a mumber of times.
She's recently written a book, and there were some extracts from it in
this weekend's New of the World, here:
http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/2704_cassie_sumner_reveals_all.shtml
That article seems to spell out some more things that aspiring models
might need to be aware of.
There are plenty of doors that easily open into places that it might
be best for aspiring models to avoid (or perhaps some girls might
willingly choose them). But these dangers/options were not spelt out
in this program. BBC3 is currently showing a series of programs on
such topics, so perhaps some of them may be aired in future programs.
The program was interesting, though it raised more questions than it
answered. It could have been clearer and more informative.
On the second day of the State Visit, the front pages of every single
national newspaper was carrying photos of Carla Bruni. One newspaper
compared her hypnotic effect to that of the late Princess Diana. Here
are a few extracts from an opinion article about Carla Bruni in The
Sunday Times:
"It would be a masterpiece of understatement to suggest that Carla
Bruni-Sarkozy is perhaps not a woman's woman. She is the kind of minx
who might sleep with your husband simply to annoy you, or to amuse
herself. Worse, the husband would then be in some kind of desperate
erotic thrall for all eternity. There are few women these days who
exude not just sexual confidence but also a dark expertise at the
amatory arts, and Madame Sarkozy is of their number. Afterwards he
would be insane with longing for a repeat performance but Bruni would
have moved on.
... Of course, Raphaël [one of her previous conquests] was history the
moment the possibility of being the first lady of France raised its
Sarkozy-shaped head. The possibility was made fact with dazzling
speed, since it seems that whatever Bruni wants, Bruni gets. She
reeled Sarkozy in like the expert she is and here we are.
Sarkozy can't keep his hands - or his adoring gaze - off his wife: he
looks like a man who simply can't believe his luck, who wakes up in
the morning and pinches himself.
One shouldn't love her, but I'm nearly as mad about her as he is. It's
not just the list of her conquests, which number Jagger, Eric Clapton
and Donald Trump. In this age of equality, we're not supposed to think
there is anything intrinsically impressive about dating successful and
powerful men but there is: what's sexy about failure or ploddiness?
Besides, it's not as if she wanted their money since, handily, she's
got plenty herself.
Bruni is like something out of a racy historical novel, except she's
real.
She is educated, extremely bright, speaks three languages fluently and
is cultured enough to record an album of poems by Yeats, Auden,
Christina Rossetti and others which she has set to music. Her
credentials are impeccable. She is properly, old-fashionedly
beautiful, with noninbred aristocratic features and good bones; so
beautiful that she makes everyone else look like a pudding.
Someone who was at the dinner at Windsor Castle last week told me that
it was maddening to be seated on the same side of the table as Bruni,
because even though the room and the pomp and the Queen were all eye-
poppingly amazing, all anyone wanted to do was stare and stare at
Bruni.
In the week before the State Visit, Christie's mischievously put a
nude portrait of Bruni from her modelling days up for auction. The
photograph is essence of Bruni: beautiful, not vulgar. Bruni was
disembarking from her plane in a perfect little grey Dior suit, even
though she must have known that half the country had had a good ogle
at her naked form in that morning's newspapers. She is exactly the
kind of person who would wear the world's most demure dress, but with
no underwear. Far from feeling anxious about her bosoms being on show
across the country's breakfast tables, she probably loved it.
Full article:
Carla Bruni - Times
But now both series are finishing we've come to like Collen's program.
There are some elements about Coleen's program which are surprising.
Coleen's castings are quite unrealistic. Coleen and her helpers get a
hundred or so girls all together, and provide cakes and sandwiches and
drinks, and there's lots of clapping whenever Coleen appears, and more
clapping as the selected girls are announced, and it's all a jolly day
out for everyone.
We do get to see a "real" casting towards the end of each show, when
Colleen's final girl goes up against some real models, in a real
casting. That's altogether a more serious, tense, and nail-biting
occasion.
The idea of Coleen's "instant portfolio" is quite ridiculous too. We
saw evidence of this in the final show, where Coleen's "portfolios"
created instantly were considered not good enough, and the client had
to reshoot Colleen's girls using their own photographer.
Very noticable is the large number of girls who turn up at the
castings wanting to get on the show. A second series is planned.
Following the success of the first series we can only guess that even
more girls will want to appear in the next series. And out of all
those girls, only one will, possibly, get the job on offer, and that
isn't guaranteed.
Just looking at a lot of the girls at those castings, a lot were very
good looking, and appeared to have gone to a lot of trouble with their
makeup, and might justifiably have had high expectations. But most
were simply overlooked. It shows how hard it is, statistically, for
girls to get anywhere as a model.
The level of personal disappointment seemed to be proportional to how
far girls had got through the competition. Girls who missed out on
selection at the early stages didn't seem too bothered. But as girls
got very near to the final selection, some were very disappointed to
be dropped at the final hurdle.
We saw how much girls enjoyed the process of getting made up and
posing and having their photo taken. That seemed to be universal.
We saw, yet again, how important it is for girls to be natural. In the
Pacha episode, one girl, who seemed expected to win, lost the job
simply because she'd had a boob job. Coleen's reaction to the issue of
boob jobs was fascinating: "I haven't got anything at all against
girls with boob jobs..." (She had to say that, as many of her WAG girl-
friends have got them) "...but this girl has got to go".
And we learnt how important it is for hair to be kept natural too (we
hadn't appreciated this before). Trying to find models for hair
products, it seemed important that girls had not bleached their hair,
nor tried to straighten it artificially.
The various companies taking parts as clients seem to get a good deal
out of the show. They get a couple of hours free advertising to a
prime girlie audience. In the hair product episode we learnt that the
company had a specialist product for this type of hair, and another
product for this type, etc, etc.
Coleen's intelligence (lack of) was occasiaonlly beyond belief. In the
Pacha episode it was important to find a girl who knew about the
values of the Pacha brand and who could identify with it. Most of the
professional models sent by agencies were rejected because they didn't
really know what the brand was about. The girl eventually selected
seemed to be the only girl who'd actually been there. Now thousands of
girls visit Pacha. Why not just stand outside, and Coleen would have
found loads of eligible girls.
We don't know how this series is received by professional models, but
anyone can guess. Coleen's girls are taking jobs away from them. If
professional models go to a casting, and Coleen and her camera crew
are there - oh no.
Overall, it was an enjoyable series. We look forward to seeing the
next one, and especially when we hear Coleen say "The Sun have asked
me to find a new Page-3 girl..."
It consists of several separate essays, by different writers, covering
a selection of aspects of this diverse and important subject:
"The Joy of Breasts" By Gemma Soames
Here they are:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/men/article2523607.ece
From the electronic progam guide the viewer might get the impression
that "2 Hot" is a repeat screening of Midnight Hot. In fact, 2 Hot is
much better than Midnight Hot. A lot of the padding features in
Midnight Hot are absent from 2 Hot.
2 Hot is consists of back-to-back photoshoots, mostly on location, and
mostly at least topless.
One of the photoshoots showing in the current program is a centrefold
shoot for German Playboy. It features a good-looking well-tanned girl,
on location in the South of France, or similar. There are plenty of
good striking poses. It's fully topless throughout, and also includes
some full-frontal nudity. And it's all served up with plenty of style.
7 of the 8 girls taking part were quite willing to do this, and they
seemed to enjoy it. Here are some of their comments:
Sherece: "I didn't actually think she meant fully nude. Then when she
she said knickers off I felt quite shocked. I just did it. I think I
did quite well. I felt quite comfortable."
Louise (nice looking with very good natural figure): "Nothing's going
to get to me. I'm going to pull off the best picture I can. It didn't
matter to me one bit. No worry. Not stressed about one thing."
Stefanie (did a good photo, standing full length in front of a
mirror): "The whole feeling was amazing. I didn't care that there were
other people there. I just tried my hardest to make it look beautiful.
I enjoyed the whole experience so well. It made me feel a lot more
confident."
Rebecca:"I gave it 150%. I enjoyed it. I'd do it agian"
Lucy: "You actually do just completely forget. There are a lot of
other things to concentrate on. It's only now and again you think Oh
Goodness Me, and you carry on. It was all right. I wasn't nervous."
Lauren (nice looking, did a nice photo): "When I walked on to the
shoot I was suprisingly calm. I was very proud of myself to go out
there and work it as calmly as I did."
Carly: "It didn't bother me whatsoever."
Just one girl was not happy about the idea, and she was very unhappy:
"I felt really uncomfortable. I didn't want to do it at all. I hated
it."
A surprising development occurred when, in order to try to make this
girl feel more at ease, one of the female presenters, Paula Hamilton,
spontaneously took off all her own clothes, and proceeded to do that
part of the program completely naked. Paula Hamilton is quite
obviously not shy and seemed to relish prancing around in front of the
male production crew. Unfortunately that did nothing at all to ease
the fears of the girl involved, and only made her even more nervous
and anxious.
It really ought to be made clear to girls who enter this competition
that a nude photo shoot may be required. Otherwise it can be a
distressing experience for the girl involved.
This was quite a notable episode in what has otherwise been a rather
bland and uneventful series.
We can also arrange private/confidential PhotoShoots. These involve exactly the same type of photos, in the same settings, but the photos remain confidential, and are not put on the website:
Girls must be aged 18, or over, for all PhotoShoots.
Simply-Gorgeous PhotoShoots Main Page
Maxim October 2008 Issue [Posted 30 August 2008]
October Maxim is featuring Alex Evans, the winner of the recent series
of Brtian's Next Top model. Featuring the winner of Next Top Model is
quite innovative. We like that idea. A proper Maxim shoot ought to be
part of the Next Top Model prize: it seems that's what girls want to
do. But these pics are not as good as any of the many
shots taken in the photoshoots during the Next Top Model series. The germ of a good
idea is there - but it needs to be executed with a lot more thought than this.
Nuts and ZOO 29th August Issues [Posted 26 August 2008]
Click to enlarge
The cover of ZOO this week has the caption "Celeb Babes".
The main feature inside ZOO is a 10-page collection of
recycled paparazzi-style pics, mostly thumbnails. Nothing of any
interest.
Click to enlargeOlympics [Posted 26 August 2008]
This was an excellent opportunity to see on TV many sports we don't normally get a chance to see. And some that we can win at too. We're disappointed that the lads mags don't give more coverage to these "real" sports, rather than the boring an very uninspirational diet of football, football, football. It seems that David Beckham couldn't even kick a ball off the top of a bus into a crowd of athletes, like aiming for a goal 100 years wide, without missing. Football seems to have become a game populated by whingers and losers. Bring on some winners.
Here's a post we did back in April...
Victoria Pendleton Interview [Posted 1 April 2008]
There's an interview in the Times with Victoria Pendleton, one of
our hopes for Beijing Gold. Amongst other things she talks about a
recent nude photo shoot she did:
As Victoria states in her interview, her pose (shown in wider view at left) is modelled on an iconic image originally made famous by cycling legend Lance Armstrong (7 times Tour de France winner), which is apparently also well known in the cycling fraternity (shown right).
Exactly the same pose has also been used, more recently, by Rebecca Romero, another Olympic Gold Medalist, in an advert for Poweraid (the image is used at the top of their Team GB webpage, and shown right). 
Nuts and ZOO 15th August Issues
Click to enlarge
The cover of ZOO this week has the caption "Seren's Summer Strip". The
feature inside is a 10-page pictorial, on location in a rustic
beachside setting, somewhere near Majorca. 3 nude pics in the set.
None of the pics really blows you away, though it's still a lot better than
anything in the Nuts features this week.
Click to enlarge
ZOO's News has a feature on the "Wet Summer" -
pics of models Hannah, Porchia and AmyLu in a garden in rain-wet tee
shirts.
Click to enlarge
Nuts and ZOO 8th August Issues
Click to enlarge
Nuts also has a 3-page pictorial of Rosie, a new Page 3 girl, who
appeared in The Sun for the first time a few weeks ago. The pics here
are OK, but not fantastic. She doesn't make the same impact here as
she did on Page 3.
Click to enlargeWhat Women Think About Big Breasts [Posted 2 Aug 2008]
There's a feature in the women's section of this weekend's Sunday
Times, which consists of a number of articles, all written by woman,
on the subject of big breasts.
Nuts and ZOO 1st August Issues
Click to enlargeAddicted to Boob Jobs (TV Documentary) [Posted 25th July 2008]
Nuts and ZOO 25th July Issues
Click to enlargeNuts and ZOO 18th July Issues
The cover of ZOO this week carries the caption "Hot and Naked!
Summer's Sexiest Shoot!", and there's a line-up of Page 3 girls Danni Welles,
Sammie Pennington, Amii Grove, Seren Gibson and Sam Cooke.
Click to enlarge
Back in the UK, and
taking advantage of the, er, "challenging photographic opportunities", provided by the current Summer, Nuts has a feature of Katie-Maire, and another girl, outdoors standing on a pavement by some huge puddles (see right).
Click to enlargeFHM August 2008 Issue [Review by Zanmato79, Posted 6 July 2008]
A better than usual fare this month from FHM, still not outstanding by
any stretch but certainly worth a look.
Nuts 4th July 2008 Issue
Click to enlargePhotographers' Rights in Gordon Brown's Surveillance Society [Posted 24 June 2008]
This one is for photographers.
Here's a piece from The Register, about the rights of photographers to
take photos in public places, which seems to have come under threat in
the past couple of years:
Amateur Photographer
Click to enlarge
Nuts and ZOO 13th June 2008 Issues [Posted 12th June 2008]
Click to enlarge
New girl Madison.
More of Carmen at Body-in-Mind
Body-in-Mind PhotoShoot - Carmen [Posted 8 May 2008]
We don't normally review photosets from Body-in-Mind, or Playboy.
More of Linda at Body-in-Mind
More of Linda at Body-in-Mind
More of Linda at Body-in-Mind
The poses in these
photosets are graphic and stylish, and in some case, quite innovative.
Playboy Shoot - Malene Espensen [Posted 2 May 2008]
Playboy's UK Cyber Girl this month is Daily Star Page 3 girl Malene
Espensen.
Hollywood Celebs Pose for Allure's Naked Issue [Posted 4 May 2008]
The May issue of US fashion magazine, Allure, is its annual "Naked
Issue".
Daring to Bare for Peta [Posted 4 May 2008]
Peta (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) is a well known
international animal welfare orgaisation. They regularly manage to get
plenty of publicity by persuading celebs who agree with their cause to
pose for photos without wearing any fur (or anything else).
Daring to Bare - News of The World
Loaded July 2007 Issue
This shot of Lindsey from that pictorial is a brilliant shot.
Click to enlarge
Loaded - March 2008 Issue
Click to enlarge
Click to enlarge
Loaded - September 2007 Issue
Page Three Teens [Posted 28 April 2008]
"Page Three Teems" was a BBC3 documentary,
about girls who want to get onto Page 3.
The Carla Bruni Phenomenon [Posted 2 April 2008]
The UK recently had a State Vist from the President of France,
Nicholas Sarkozy, accompanied by his wife, Carla Bruni. We had been
aware that Carla Bruni had been a former fashion model, but hadn't
known much else about her.
Coleen's Real Women (TV series) [Posted 24 March 2008]
We originally reviewed this TV series, when it first started, and
weren't that keen on it then. It stared at the same time as the
similar "Find Me The Face" on BBC3, and we thought "Find Me The Face"
was the more professional and realistic program.
The Joy of Breasts [Posted 17 October 2007]
Here's a feature in today's Sunday Times titled "The Joy of Breasts".
"Page 3 Stunnas" by Dom Joly
"Air on a B Cup" by Shane Watson
"Young Man's Fancies" by James Delingpole
"Keeping it Real" by AA Gill
"The Eyeful of the Beholder" by Waldemar Januszczak
"Breast Intentions" by Tom Stubbs
"Asset Management" by Michael Holden
"Thanks for the Mammaries" by Andrew Clover
2 Hot [Posted 13 september 2007]
"2 Hot" is a program showing on FTV (Fashion TV, Sky channel 272),
nightly, at 1am.
Britains Next Top Model Nude Shoot [Posted 31 July 2007]
This week's episode of Britain's Next Top Model features a nude photo
shoot. It forms the second half of the program.
Return to top of page
New Girls Required for Simply-Gorgeous PhotoShoots
We're keen to find more new girls for our Simply-Gorgeous PhotoShoots. No previous experience is required. Many of the girls in our PhotoShoots were modelling for the first time. If you are interested in getting into modelling, or would just like to have some good photos of yourself:
[Email: simplygorgeous1@hotmail.com]
[Email: simplygorgeous1@hotmail.com]
