#Monochrome aesthetic instagram highlight

[swimwear-sommer-swim]

Accessorizing Your Swimwear: Must-Have Accessories for a Complete Beach Look

A great swimwear look doesn’t stop at the swimsuit itself; the right accessories can elevate your beach style, making it effortlessly chic and Instagram-worthy. Whether you're sporting a swimwear bikini or a one-piece, adding accessories allows for a unique and personalized beach outfit. From elegant sun hats to delicate jewelry, here's how to complement your swimwear with the perfect accessories.

Essential Beach Accessories to Pair with Swimwear

Wide-Brim Hats for Style and Sun Protection One of the most versatile accessories you can add to your swimwear look is a wide-brim hat. Not only does it protect you from the sun, but it also adds a touch of elegance to your beach ensemble. Brands like Sommer Swim showcase how timeless a wide-brimmed hat can be when paired with stylish, minimalist swimwear Australia pieces. Whether in neutral tones or bold colors, wide-brim hats perfectly complement both vibrant swimwear bikini looks and understated monochrome styles.

According to Harper’s Bazaar, hats are a must-have accessory this summer, as they provide sun protection while elevating a beachside look with a sense of high-fashion flair.

Sunglasses: The Ultimate Beach Essential No beach look is complete without a pair of stylish sunglasses. Opt for classic aviators, trendy cat-eye shades, or oversized frames to match your swimming bikini outfit. Sunglasses not only protect your eyes from UV rays but also add a hint of mystery and sophistication to your ensemble. Bold, angular frames pair beautifully with minimalist swimwear styles, while softer, rounded frames work well with patterned swimwear bikini pieces.

For an extra pop of color, experiment with mirrored or tinted lenses. Vogue highlights sunglasses as an essential accessory for a polished, resort-ready look.

Jewelry That Enhances Your Swimwear

Minimalist Necklaces and Layered Chains For a subtle yet stunning beach look, add a delicate necklace or layered chain to your swim wear. Minimalist jewelry pairs well with the simplicity of shop swimwear, adding just the right amount of sparkle without feeling overdone. Opt for water-resistant pieces in materials like stainless steel or gold-plated options that won’t tarnish in the sun or sea.

Statement Earrings for Evening Beach Events If you’re heading to a sunset beach event or pool party, consider elevating your swimwear Australia look with statement earrings. Bold earrings in shapes like hoops or dangly shells add a touch of glam, making your swimwear bikini outfit stand out. Just remember to remove your earrings before swimming to prevent damage, as salt and chlorine can affect metal finishes.

Footwear and Bags: Finishing Touches for Swimwear

Slide Sandals and Espadrilles Slide sandals are the perfect blend of comfort and style, allowing you to walk easily on the sand while still looking fashionable. Espadrilles are another great option, adding a touch of Mediterranean flair to your swimwear look. Opt for neutral colors like tan or white that can be paired with any swimwear style, or choose vibrant colors to add a playful element to monochrome swimwear Australia pieces.

Stylish Beach Bags for Carrying Essentials A beach bag is a practical yet stylish accessory that completes your swim wear look. From woven straw bags to oversized totes, there’s a variety of options that not only look great but also hold your beach essentials. A classic woven bag pairs effortlessly with any swimming bikini, while a canvas tote with bold prints can bring out colors in patterned swimwear.

For more accessory inspiration, Elle covers summer's hottest beach bags and how they add an extra layer of style to your beach attire.

Creating the Ultimate Beach Look with Accessories

When it comes to styling your swimwear with accessories, think about your color palette and overall vibe. Are you going for a tropical look with vibrant colors or a minimalist aesthetic? Match your swimwear bikini with accessories that echo your chosen style, allowing for a cohesive look. Consider pieces that can be easily removed if you plan on swimming, ensuring that you stay stylish and practical all day long.

Accessories can truly transform a swimwear look, taking it from a simple beach day to a chic seaside experience. With brands like Sommer Swim offering high-quality shop swimwear options, you can pair classic pieces with accessories that reflect both elegance and individuality.

For a stylish and complete beach look, explore how swimwear Australia brands integrate luxurious yet eco-conscious options into their designs, ensuring you’re dressed for the beach with style and sustainability.

[artistjang]

25 black and white gothic heart instagram highlight covers, Monochrome aesthetic instagram highlight, Skull instagram, Covers for instagram

[goroaix]

〘 Jeno thought they were perfect and, as such, so was everything associated with them. 〙

Jeno x gn reader. Mentions of obsessive thoughts and unhealthy mindsets.

Jeno was enamoured, his heart fluttering as he saw their pretty face looking back at him, soft lips pulled up into a gentle smile with a visage that was lit up with happiness. He adored how well the sun lit up their face and how they were nothing short of perfect.

I must have looked through their Instagram account a thousand times, he thought before gasping to himself, his crescent eyed smile reflecting in the screen of his phone. What if they had noticed his profile from how he rewatched their highlights daily, was always the first to like their pictures. Jeno wouldn't dare call himself in love if he didn't feel the urge to check their pictures every few hours.

Their aesthetic was warm and joyful and this was consistent across every platform and social media they had. He supposed this was the reason why he, too, felt warmth flood through his chest at the sight of them - whether it be through the screen or from their odd few neighbourly interactions as they passed each other by in the corridors of the flat complex.

However, seeing them in real life was much more of a rush, a terrifying thrill of adrenaline as his heart pounded furiously against his sternum and he felt his hair stick to his forehead due to perspiration. They always smiled so sweetly and the way they greeted him with a 'how are you today, Jeno?' had him dizzy and faint.

Jeno wanted them for himself. Perhaps it was selfish to want their simper to only be for him but he didn't care. He wanted to cherish their grin, to love them endlessly as he poked their cheeks and told them how much he loved them and their honey like personality. He swore he could taste sweetness on his tongue the moment they appeared and it was wholly addicting.

Another swipe through their profile and his legs swung behind him. A new picture!

It was of the sun and their face tilted towards the golden rays, bathing their features in angel-like light that had him struggling for breath. They were so, so gorgeous. The main colour scheme was brown, their clothes a monochrome shade and he colour matched it before storing the code to his locked notes app.

Jeno grinned again, the corners of his eyes wrinkling once more. He desperately hoped they would like the room he was decorating for them. It had all the colours they adored, some of which he had heard of through the thin walls that connected to their bedroom. He wanted them for love it; anything less than perfection was unsuitable.

And the best features of all, Jeno thought, were the industrial locks on the door and the soundproof walls.

[monochromeofficial]

MONOCHROME MEMBERS OFFICIAL INSTAGRAM ACCOUNTS.

HYESUNG

It’s obsessed with having a perfect feed.

Takes a thousand photos, only publishes four.

Tries her best to have different content so it’s not just her face.

Her captions are either philosophic quotes or emojis.

Often gives behind the scenes and hard to get spoilers, once she literally posted an encrypted spoiler through emojis and expected highlights to understand it.

Sometimes she post short videos of her playing guitar covers.

Tries to reply as much comments as she can or at least leaves a like.

KISEKI

Soft, soft, soft. Did I say soft? I’ll say it again SOFT.

Her captions are full of support messages for highlights or asking them how they doing, pure wholesome content.

Uploads a weekly totoro (her dog) appreciation post.

Is the member that gives the most updates. Dear.us are never starving.

Comments on the girls post with cute messages. Except Stella, she gets light roasts.

She still has the youtuber.exe installed and relates her whole day on stories.

Everybody claims her cookies recipe is amazing.

PHOEBE

Her, that’s all.

Queen of mirror selcas, she posts one daily.

Before debuting most of the girls had to deactivate their accounts, well she didn’t. She wasn’t going to lose all her followers that easy, so she just deleted all controversial posts and continued with her life.

Sometimes she post a group pic with the girls. Emphasis on sometimes.

Flirts with every comment that calls her pretty.

She also post many ootd and other fashion related content.

Her captions are basically hyping herself up.

STELLA

Hates taking selcas with her whole soul.

She also tends to forget her password.

Let’s all thank her manager and Olivia for keeping this account alive.

Sometimes her captions has nothing to do with the photo at all, it’s just crack.

Always flexing her art.

Simps on other members comment section.

She was once banned from using instagram for a month after posting 32 stories talking about conspiracy theories.

MIRAN

She has no clue on how social media works.

After Hyesung gave her a masterclass she started understanding a bit more, she’s still kind lost though.

Rarely adds a filter or edits her photos.

What she does is post many aesthetically pleasing photos or videos of night views.

Captions look like: “Here’s a selca now stop crying” “I’m a boomer, i don’t do tech “Don’t be intimidated by my face is not my fault that i’m so pretty”

Another one who flirts with fans on the comments.

Reinforcing her womance with Hyesung by calling her my wife whenever she posts a photo with her.

OLIVIA

She’s not the group’s photographer for nothing.

Her posts are just so high quality and well edited.

A lovebot for the girls, her family and the staff.

“My friends are the prettiest you wished you could be this pretty” Olivia every time she post a photo with other member.

Roasting haters on the comments 24/7.

She’s that girl posts a selca and quotes poesy on the caption.

Last time they went to Tokyo she got lost and instead of using her phone to check google maps she went for a walk and showed of pretty places on stories.

[pinarworks]

Colonial Gaze Spotted Alive and Well in Eskişehir Last October, OMM, a modern museum in the city of Eskişehir in Turkey founded and run by one of the richest families of Turkey, Tabanca family, published a ‘photobook’ called The People Who Made OMM. It’s a book consisting of black and white, mostly close up shots of some of the workers who worked on the building's construction as plasterers, shovel men and brick builders. The text accompanying the announcement of the book read as follows: Consisting of short interviews and 18 monochrome portraits, some of the construction workers who made and transformed the museum building talk about their stories, craft, and the relationship they formed with the museum. (...) Highlighting the proximity of labour and artistic production, "The People Who Made OMM" celebrates the transcendent nature of works of architecture and art while immortalizing the construction team as part of OMM’s collective memory. I have looked and looked but wasn’t able to see any such highlight of the “proximity of labour and artistic production” nor any celebration of any kind. To my burning eyes, what these photos -shot by a “renowned art and fashion photographer’’ showed, was the abusive relationship between the proletariat and the rich elite. They lay bare the gentrification of class and memory and the attempt to capitalize on the workers’ already exploited labour, this time through the good old colonial gaze. Reading through the positive and grateful comments under the museum’s Instagram post about the book, I wondered if I was missing something: was this actually a ‘warm’ gesture which managed to equalize the great social and economic gap between those who came up with the idea for the book and those who posed for it? Of course it wasn’t. I emailed the editor and learnt that the workers were not paid in exchange for the content they have provided, they were instead “given books themselves and life-long free entry to the museum’’. However my follow up question asking if the photographer also was paid in free museum tickets was left unresponded. (Please note, a limited edition of 500 copies of the book were printed and are being sold for 140 TL each.) OMM is not the first rich institution/company to have come up with such a lame idea. It is only one example of the imperialist belief that the rich elite has the right to look at whatever and whoever they want, in whatever way they see fit. History of Western civilization is a catalogue of supremacist gazes disguised as warm gestures. Photography's relation to colonialism is historically recorded. It was the main tool that accompanied 19th-century European colonial propaganda, playing vital roles in the administrative, scientific and commercial justification of the invasion of “far away’’ lands. It was the direct agent in creating the Other for the “advanced world’’ to exploit. Documenting it through the eyes of the invader, building the narrative of uncivilized/savage/exotic, fascinating creatures in need of a helping hand. The hand of the white, allegedly good-intentioned colonial man. The infamous remarks Dominique François Arago made in 1839 before the Chambre des Députés: “everybody will realize that had we had photography in 1798 we would possess today faithful pictorial records of that which the learned world is forever deprived of by the greed of the Arabs and the vandalism of certain travellers’’ remind us the shameful role photography played in the heart of colonialism. As Ariella Aïsha Azoulay explains further in her book Unlearning Imperialism, due to the central role of photography within the colonial superstructure, it was never considered as being invasive of privacy. It was always about the photographers’ rights, not the photographee’s, simply because they did not have any. This right, naturalized as the innate freedom of photographers was never questioned. As photography developed and was adopted by many forms, including news, street photography and art, it maintained the unearned right to freely invade. Caring for no boundaries other than its own, photography brought potentials of more exploitation to the dominant elite. It also paved the way to continue doing this in alternative ways, appropriated by art and other cultural means. But in a post-colonial, white supremacist world, photography will always carry its history with it. This is why it is still important to examine who gazes at who and in which context. The right to photograph is still unquestioned because the eye behind the camera is assumed to be the universal eye. It represents the universal person who has the right to see everything. This right then becomes more important than the privacy of the person being looked at. The looker’s first crime is the assumption that there’s no privacy in the world that can’t be invaded. The self-appointed right to look at, the right to knowledge the gaze assumes, therefore, emerges as an act of violence. The saying “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”, implies that power accompanies the beholder. It's the beholder who decides what is beautiful. Looking at a photograph necessitates identifying with the camera: the audience adopts the perspective of the storyteller who creates a world through their framing, rather than simply reflecting the existing world. Gentrification of Labour In its supposed intent to immortalize the workers with the photographs, OMM exposes that it will only recognize the subjects of these pictures if they stay as objects. The position of the photographer and the gaze it dictates, reveal a hunger to capitalize on all forms of labour. In this case, the time workers spend posing for, hence creating the core content of the book - for free. This specific colonial gaze seems to make sure that the objects understand they are only recognized through their labour; either as construction workers or as models. This gaze invests in the workers for the pleasure of high tastes, who would see them frozen in time and forget about them but applaud OMM for its humane effort to immortalize the workers. The gaze only recognizes the workers as resources and treats them as disposable human capitals. As Franz Fanon suggests: “the supremacist gaze fixes its object and leaves no room for any ontological resistance to the white man’’. The gaze introduces an unknown species to its art-loving, educated upper-middle class audience. People they would never come face to face or recognize in real life. The People Who Made OMM does not dress the construction workers in special costumes, neither does it let them pose in their daily clothes. It photographs them in their natural habitat, on the construction site in their dirty work clothes. The black and white photos mostly consist of close-ups, focusing on the details of the faces or hands of the workers. This visual language uproots the workers from other aspects of their lives and romanticizes their labour by capitalizing on their personal, embodied histories. The People Who Made OMM is a performance for others. It invites the audience to become partners in crime by staring at the same scene together. In fact, the photos reveal some sort of relief on the part of the targeted audience as well, because they love to see contentment in the eyes of the workers whose shoes they would never want to be in. This gaze makes the spectator enjoy the scene without feeling guilty since the scene naturalizes social inequalities in a constructed, romanticized setting. These photographs do not celebrate the workers, they create objects out of them for the spectator’s pleasure. This objectification serves to ease the extreme injustice between the workers and the people who stare at them for pleasure. This is an attempt to change the narrative from cruel structural hierarchy to ‘natural harmony’, reminiscent of the narrative of “one big family’’ which is widely adopted in corporate lingo. We are a family in harmony, everybody has their own place and within a family, we only give happy poses to the camera, we don’t talk about class distinctions and other forms of discriminations within. The photos are also an attempt to domesticate, hence gentrify the workers’ relationship to the construction site and the museum. It reduces the workers' history to simple and empty Q&As which seem to be edited ruthlessly in order to not allow any negative implication to seep through their words and their looks. It prepares the perfect background for the spectator to free themselves of all responsibility. It naturalizes the existing hierarchy and pats itself on the back for doing the decent thing: Immortalizing the workers. Gentrification aims at getting rid of the abject through erasing both the collective and the personal histories of certain places. It aims at collective cultural amnesia. OMM’s photographs have a similar effect of destabilizing the reality of unpaid labour. The new narrative is also secured through the minimalist design of the book. The photos show the workers in fragments, as faces, hands, feet and always individually, never together with others. Zooming on certain body parts placed in wide white spaces in the pages, adds to the objectification of the workers through redirecting the focus to the aesthetic value of the book. Patricia Hill Collins’s concept of the controlling image suggests that those who control images, control stereotypes as well. These photos do the ideological work of masking the role of hegemony in structuring political social and economic relations. The interview questions, edited down to superficial one-line sentences amplify the violence. The answers are only there to fill up space, but they end up revealing the reality that OMM is trying to cover up: “What do you plan on doing when the building is completed?’’ asks OMM. 23-year-old Recep, master plasterer and painter responds: “If I find work in Eskişehir I’ll stay here, If not I’ll move somewhere else. We’ll have to see.’’ OMM does not care and will not have to see. Deregulation of Memory OMM is able to present its colonial motivations as art/goodness because it relies on neoliberal notions of profitable personal space and free time. This is evident in their disregard for the workers’ free time and space. These things can be invaded without feeling guilt or paying compensation. Unlike preceding forms of capitalism, neoliberalism prepares background conditions for the market to freely move in, rather than controlling market activities directly. So that regulation seems natural as life itself. With this facade of natural progression, it restructures daily life too. OMM’s photos are doing exactly this: through gentrifying the workers’ labour with a constructed fake setting and showing them temporary recognition, these photos deregulate their memory of the place. It recreates the museum as a utopian place where everyone loves each other and is connected in a way that transcends social conditions. With this attempt to cover any possible distasteful memory, the narrative of supreme benevolence emerges as a weapon to be used against ungrateful subordinates. The gaze as the sovereign’s narrative, erases all possibility of discord by magnifying the so-called harmony of warm moments. And yet, there’s no clean way to separate photography from its inglorious imperial history. The spirit of imperialism is always there and ready to show itself depending on the identity of the gaze and the spectator the gaze represents. These images do not confront a historical division, on the contrary, they secure it and shamelessly present it to the consumption of a certain class without sacrificing any loyalties. In a sense, these photos are re-performing the colonial lies of liberation. They seem like they have a sacred mission but in fact, all they do is reinforce their own privileges. Make no mistake: This book does not celebrate the workers that make OMM, it celebrates itself and its own superficial appreciation of the workers that made OMM. This book is OMM congratulating and talking to itself in the mirror while creating a paying audience for this narcissistic show. The workers do not need to be immortalised through these empty gestures. If institutions like OMM want to recognize workers' agencies and celebrate their contributions to the world, they should start with paying them the money they deserve. https://www.mangalmedia.net/english/colonial-gaze-in-eskisehir

[burkedecorshop]

Ideas For Beautiful Wallpaper Designs In Your Living Room

Wallpaper is a great way to modify the aesthetic of your living room, with anything from sunset views to florals, geometric designs to paisley prints. While the perfect wallpaper design may transform an average space into something timeless, doing it wrong can turn your decor into something unspeakably terrible!

Choosing the ideal wallpaper is difficult. Keep the following suggestions in mind:

· The ambiance of a space is determined by color. Warm colors like reds and yellows offer energy and warmth, while cool colors like blue and grey create a quiet, tranquil atmosphere.

· If your wall is uneven or damaged, choose textured wallpaper to cover the defects.

· Horizontal lines make the space look bigger, while vertical stripes make the ceiling appear taller.

· Try wallpapering only a portion of a wall, such as the center, rather than the entire wall. You may paint the remainder of the wall a solid color and put borders around the wallpaper.

· Avoid mixing and matching too many patterns in space since the impact might be overpowering.

· Choose from non-woven, acrylic, vinyl, fabric-backed, or fabric-backed wallpaper.

· Material that can be washed is more durable and cleaned with a gentle cloth.

· Without hurting the wall behind it, peel and stick material may be readily removed anytime you weary of the look.

· You may use downlights to highlight the wall and heighten the dramatic impact, especially if you're using textured wallpaper.

Patterns to Play With

Traditional prints are making a comeback. Oversized classic Bohemian elements create a bold statement with black, grey, and beige seats.

Classic Brick

The sleek, all-white living room is given a sophisticated gloss by brick-patterned wallpaper. Brick outlines, which are neat and properly proportioned, have weathered the test of time and will never go out of style.

Fancy Floral

Bold blooms are energizing and striking. The wallpaper is utilized just in the top panel of the wall, which is surrounded by deep grey wall paneling. The flower motifs are repeated on the cushions, albeit in a smaller size.

Forest Grove

The tiny bedsit, washable wallpaper with a Forest motif runs throughout the living and kitchen spaces. Geometrics and patterns in off-white and gray are explored in the area, with the use of color unifying the overall look. The kitchen space is easy to maintain since the wallpaper can be wiped clean.

Old-world charm

The vintage wallpaper screams retro, and it's an aesthetic that's making a comeback. Combine it with old armchairs and natural wood flooring for a feel-good look full of nostalgia and warmth.

Delicate prints

Metallic wallpapers with a high sheen, such as this delicate silver design, provide a luxurious, glamorous touch to your living area. Use bold, solid colors to create contrast, such as this deep blue recliner with vibrant red cushions.

Chevron Stripes

The futuristic motif of the chic loft is complemented with a bold green chevron wallpaper. The custom-designed table with distinctive legs and the brightly colored pillows on the sleek monochrome sofa are to be noted.

The bottom line

The correct wallpaper design catches the eye and produces a gorgeous background against which the rest of your décor items may quickly blend in.

Burke Decor Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/BurkeDecor/ Burke Decor Pinterest Page: https://www.pinterest.com/burkedecor/ Burke Decor Instagram Page: https://www.instagram.com/burkedecor/ Burke Decor Twitter Page: https://twitter.com/burkedecor Check out our reviews at: https://bit.ly/3uE4OiY

[thesocialbooster]

Design Your Instagram Feed With These Top 5 Tricks!

Instagrammers are everywhere today. Almost 8 out of 10 people are on Instagram either for commercial purposes or entertainment purposes. Unlike some social media platforms, Instagram is not just a content-sharing platform, but marketers around us can use this medium to promote their brands to drive traffic on their page and website. 

When any user reaches out to your profile or visits just for a quick lookup, the first thing that catches their eyesight is Instagram Feed. Since the first impression is the last impression, you should be very particular about how your feed looks. 

But,

WHAT IS INSTAGRAM FEED?

The page you discover you see when you visit someone's profile. You can see the information about the profile, and it simply depends upon whether it is a public or private account, or you are following them or not. Basically, the user follows such accounts that have a unique and attractive feed on their page. 

But, what are the

TRICKY IDEAS TO DESIGN YOUR FEED?

Here are some of the best Instagram Feed ideas:

#1 INSTAGRAM AESTHETIC: 

Being an Instagram marketer, it's very important to catch the eyeballs of users and increase your follower count. But, every user first checks out your feed to know your creativity level. So, being an aesthetic here defines, choose any style to design your feed, like Monochrome, Pastel, Bold & Vibrant, Minimalist, etc. 

#2 HIGHLIGHT YOUR IDENTITY:

Design and post content that clearly describes the products and services you offer your clients. For example, Instagrammer Kate Spade designs her feed with inspirational quotes and lifestyle photos to attract users and find it creative. 

#3 THE GRID LAYOUTS:

Designing an Instagram feed with grid layouts has been in trend for a long time now. You can even use the Instagram Feed Planner to design your grid feed. To look for more options, you can choose one like Puzzle Layout, Rainbow Feed, Checkerboard Feed, etc. It will help you save time and will add an extensive look to your profile page. 

#4 TYPOGRAPHY & FONTS:

Fonts play an exclusive role in highlighting your content to attract when you post inspirational thoughts and quotes. You can even use this idea if you compose any poem. So, for designing typographical content, you need to be a little more creative. 

#5 STORY-TELLING VIDEOS:

Videos can make you earn millions! Only if your videos are story-telling and spread a good message, including your brand. Videos grab more audience engagement than pictures and can also help your page to reach extensive height in the Instagram world. 

Well, I understand you might be in a dilemma. Like, why the feed, and how does it work? Let's help you out with the solution:

HOW DOES INSTAGRAM FEED WORK?

There are some of the factors to understand how it works, especially for marketers or influencers. Let's begin:

FREQUENCY:

How often do you post content for your brand on Instagram? Once or twice a week, or it's just random days? Moreover, try to upload content at regular or frequent intervals to reach your audience and increase brand value.

INTEREST:

Have you ever heard of Instagram Algorithm? Basically, it filters the niches you like and the type of content you prefer watching and then displays on your feed. For example, if you like a post, the Instagram algorithm will make your post appear on their feed and vice versa. 

FOLLOWING:

Following numerous users on Instagram will display a lot of trending posts and videos, through which you get an idea of how to upload eye-catching content on your feed. 

TIME: 

Time plays a significant role when you are an Instagrammer or any social media user. Being an alert user, you must be strictly aware of the best time to post on Instagram. It will help your content target the feed of your followers for better engagement. 

FINAL VERDICT:

So, design your Instagram feed with these tips and tricks to add an extensive yet attractive look to your profile page. You can even go for social media automation software to handle your profile more professionally. 

You can also watch: Socinator: The Best Social Media Automation Software

[ridingirlsblog]

Photoshoot of the Week: February 17th-23rd 2020 - Ducati Monster 821 & Stefania

These days, the best urban motorcycles are those that can navigate, cut through traffic, and place you at the head of the mid-morning rush with ease. Acceleration and speed are nice qualities to have, but they take a back seat to mobility, compactness, and fuel economy. When looking for the perfect inner-city cycle, you’ll need something that can fulfill all these elements with ease, while also offering you a bit more in terms of safety and manageable speed. Without any doubts cool Italian bikergirl and impressive socialite Stefania made the right choice: Ducati Moster 821. The smoothness and precision of this bike make it feel as though you are always in control. In the city, this bike is able to handle everything an urban rider can through at it. It is very balanced at slow speed and does not give you the feeling that it will topple. It steers with minimal effort and is able to avoid hazards and obstacles with very little effort. The Monster runs perfectly in the city, despite all of the “stop and go traffic” and endless idling. Besides, if you leave the city to head out of town, you'll be not disappointed, again. Just try out the touring setting: once set, it reminds you to let off on the throttle to engage the mode. It's like switching to a different motorcycle: the motorcycle immediately feels more responsive and the acceleration become more immediate. Everyone who tryed the Monster can tell you how agile this bike is in the twisties and how responsive it was on the straights: the touring setting highlighted the torque of the bike. Riding a Ducati Monster 821 definitely puts a smile on your face, as you can see from fascinating Stefania's posts on Instagram. I think that legendary actress Mariyn Monroe once said that "a smile is the best makeup any girl can wear". Well, I think that's so true, but such an amazing bike can also play its part! Am I right people? *** *** *** The Monster 821 pays homage to the legacy of the Monster 900, which over 25 years ago revolutionised the motorcycle world. Agile and featuring sporty performance, it was designed for maximum riding enjoyment, at all times and in all conditions. The Monster 821 range has been rejuvenated with a new stealth version: matte black livery, updated graphics and front fairing give a unique character to the naked Ducati par excellence. The standard equipment, which includes adjustable fork and Ducati Quick Shift up/down, makes it even more effective on the road. Now, the Monster 821 has been upgraded to include aesthetic and functional features first introduced on the Monster 1200: a more streamlined, agile look with fully redesigned tank and tail, an all-new silencer and a headlight that is both classic and contemporary. Also making its debut on the mid-size Monster is the colour TFT display with selected gear and fuel indicators, while available accessories include the Ducati Quick Shift up/down system. The Euro 4 compliant liquid-cooled Testastretta 11° engine delivers a maximum power of 109 hp (80 kW) at 9250 rpm. Thanks to its 8.8 kgm (86 Nm) of torque at 7750 rpm, the 821 offers exciting performance, easy riding and unmatched fun. A beefy front end, exposed Trellis frame, and tiny tail give the Monster 821 an all-up-front look that just accentuates its aggressive nature and makes it look kinda like a big cat about to pounce. Fans of the family will likely recognize the round headlight and fuel tank as the same used by the Monster 1200 with a very special detail in the tank clip that hails back to the family’s origins in 1992. A short-rise handlebar lets you push off for a near-vertical posture in a relaxed attitude with plenty of room to tuck in over the curve of the fuel tank for those times when you’re feeling a little more aggressive. The rear of the tank tapers to a narrow waist ahead of the deep-scoop saddle to form a knee pocket that pulls the leg in out of the slipstream and gives you a knee-hanger if you’re inclined to do a little pegdragging. An adjustable saddle gives you a choice in seat height with a 30.9-inch setting and a 31.8-inch one without having to change the seat or suspension components. Behind the pilot, a monochrome cover disguises the two-up nature of the seat with subframe-mount, flip-up footpegs to complete the pillion gear. Tubular-steel members make up the Trellis frame on the Monster 821 Stealth, and as you’d expect, the engine is a stressed unit that completes the assembly and replaces a significant chunk of frame in the downtube/cradle area to reduce weight. Aluminum is the material of choice for the yoke-style swingarm to minimize unsprung weight at the rear axle. Toward that end, a set of 17-inch, cast-alloy wheels round out the rolling chassis with a 10-spoke design and Pirelli’s Diablo Rosso III hoops to make the connection to the pavement. The hoops are typical of the genre at 120/70 up front and 180/55 out back, and they get all kinds of help from the electronics to make this a relatively safe ride. The Monster 821 Stealth comes with the Ducati Safety Pack that includes delightfulness such as the aforementioned ABS and Traction Control alongside variable power-delivery Power Modes and a Quick Shift feature that let’s you bang out clutchless shifts both up and down the range. An anti-hop slipper clutch couples engine power to the six-speed transmission, and it provides one final layer of protection for the rear contact patch. Said power measures in with some fairly impressive numbers. Ducati’s Testastretta pumps out 109 horsepower at 9,250 rpm with 63 pounds of torque that top out at 7,750 rpm. Twin, 88 mm bores run with a 67.5 mm stroke for a total of 821 cc and a sizzlin’ 12.8-to-1 compression ratio, and as usual, Duc’s Desmodromic valvetrain times the four-valve heads with a pull-closed cam rather than coil springs to seal the combustion chamber. The bike maintained it’s smooth acceleration, but it was undeniable that this machine has the heart of a racer. This is where the steel trellis frame highlighted the precision that is undeniably Ducati. With very little effort, I was able to pass slower traffic. At no time did I find that I was not in control of the bike. The Monster 821 played its role very well in allowing me to experience the road in a very exhilarating and fun way. It is a powerful motorcycle; however, it is very smooth and predictable as one would expect from a twin cylinder engine. The relatively flat torque curve and the 109 horsepower combined with the weight of this motorcycle gives it a finely tuned feeling that Ducati is known for. I would recommend the Monster 821 to everyone. It is an awesome machine that I hope to have a chance to ride again soon ... maybe with Stefania? #bikergirl #Monster821 #ducatiobsession #ducatilife #motorcycle #ducatista #ducatinsta #superbikes #ducativ4 #ducatimonster821 #ducatiSuperSport #ridefast #bikeracing #motosports #motolife #fastbikes #RidinGirlsBlog #racing #motorbike #bikersofinstagram #bikerfamily #biketouring #riderich #girlsonbikes #hjc #sportbike #sexybiker #bikerchick #bikerlady #desmo #speed #roadracing #ridingsexy #superbike #motard #ducaticorse #motorrad #ducati #motogp #moto #helmetporn #ducatimonster #ducatiracing #turin #monster600 #monster797 #v4

  Precious Memories *** Visualizza questo post su Instagram Ride day #endofsummer #keepriding #ducatinsta #monster821 #hjchelmets #alpinestars #bikersofinstagram #bikerchicksofinsta #bikergirl #ducatimonster #ridingtime #happiness Un post condiviso da (@stefidem) in data: 21 Set 2019 alle ore 8:54 PDT Read the full article

[gothify1]

Whether your winter plans include hitting up the holiday party circuit or celebrating the season with fancy dinners with friends, there are endless opportunities to try new makeup trends . After all, it's the one time of year when gold, glitter, and intense shine are not only acceptable but encouraged. We don't know about you, but we just can't pass on an opportunity to test out all the most intriguing makeup looks  we've been seeing on the internet all season. With all the makeup artists, A-listers, and beauty influencers sharing their best winter glam on the daily, there's a never-ending supply of out-of-the-box ideas. That's why we delved into our saved folder on Instagram to pull out the winter makeup looks that will inspire our beauty aesthetic well into 2020. From silver leafing to gold glitter and bold lips galore, here's our edit of the most impressive makeup looks we can't wait to try. Check out 17 winter makeup looks you'll want to re-create for yourself, and shop the must-haves to get the look. This bold disco ball eye look is guaranteed to make you the life of the party. Tightly pack this glitter balm onto your lids to replicate the silver foil look. A chasmic black cat-eye is an easy way to create an entire mood with minimal effort. Line the eyes in layers, gradually building to your desired depth. Be sure you focus plenty of ink along the lash line for maximum drama. This metallic rose eye can be perfected in 30 seconds flat. Using an eye shadow brush, lightly swipe powder all over the lids. Finish with a coat of your favorite mascara. All I want for Christmas is J.Lo's contour. Following your natural bone structure, contour the hollows and highlight the high points of your face. Be sure to blend out any harsh lines for the most natural look. Even if you're committed to neutral eye shadow shades, a metallic finish is a perfect way to add just a touch of holiday flair. Press the liquid formula onto the eyelids, using your ring finger to evenly distribute all over. Apply fewer coats for a more sheer finish, or build more product for a more opaque look. Who says Malibu Barbie pink is an exclusively summer shade? Swipe lipstick over the lips, paying special attention to accentuate the Cupid's bow. Winter is the best time of year to bust out a monochrome crimson vibe. Up the ante with a metallic finish. Using your fingers or a dense eye shadow brush, press the shadow into your eyelids for a full-coverage look. This ice-blue eyeliner is giving us major frosted winter vibes. Using a tapered eye shadow brush or an angled eyeliner brush, outline the eyes with blue shadow. Place a touch of champagne-colored shadow on the inner corners of the eyes to keep them looking bright and open. Sometimes all you need is the perfect red lip. A neutral mauve lip is an easy way to add a pop of color to an overall natural face beat. Swipe lipstick all over the lips. Wait a bit in between coats to allow each layer to dry down. Bring a holiday tinsel look to your makeup with glittering gold eyeliner. Using the included silicone detailer, fashion the glitter into a stark line along the upper lash line. Nothing says holiday season quite like a red lip-to-cheek moment. Using your fingertips, press the product into the lips, then into the cheeks. Go over the lips as many times as necessary to achieve the desired coverage. This spearmint eye is fresh enough to wear to work and sultry enough to carry you into a nighttime look. Using your finger or your favorite eye shadow brush, spread an even layer of pigment all over your lid. To add more drama, add a deep black cat eye on top. A deeper emerald-green eye shadow also reads merry and bright. Swipe the shadow evenly over the lids, creating points at the inner and outer corners. The power of Old Hollywood glam is not to be underestimated. After placing a heavy line along your lash line, finish the eyes with individual lashes to seal in the glamour. Bust out your best smoky-eye skills with this comprehensive palette. We love a multidimensional aqua eye, but the hero here is that highlight. No winter makeup look is complete without it. Add some luminosity to any winter makeup look by lightly swiping this highlighter across the highest part of your cheekbones. All that glitters isn't gold, but we're really into this bold golden liner. Create an exaggerated gold line across your eyelid. If you want a little extra definition, tightly trace along your lash line with black liquid eyeliner. Up next, five holiday gift set traps, according to a beauty editor who's tried them all.

[noxexistant]

drrr characters + social media headcanons

Izaya - favours instagram and tumblr - surprisingly, he doesn’t like talking too much online unless he’s playing a particular ���character’ - has countless accounts on each, pertaining to different interests and subcultures (pastel aesthetic, monochrome photography, various fandoms and pop culture trends, etc) - has a couple writing/poetry blogs which are rarely updated and have strictly no information other than text. his poems sometimes get very popular and are always attributed to “anonymous” - the accounts that are most “him” are actually the most popular, featuring nighttime/cityscape/urban photography and very brief posts about the restaurants and shops he visits while exploring, and all the food he tries - he sometimes uploads videos of him playing atop skyscrapers in first-person perspective, or videos of him climbing (with his face obscured, often by his hood and a black dust mask). he likes seeing people’s reactions in the comments, he finds it funny to watch them freak out - has several twitter accounts which he uses to keep up with goings-on as they occur without having to get too involved - some of his twitters pose as a devoted fan of various celebrities/fandoms, others as merely a concerned citizen, some are completely devoid of information about him (or any ‘character’) and are where he compiles info and contributes to rumours

Shizuo - has a lot of accounts on various things, but has little interest in anything - mostly uses his social media to keep up with ruri and kasuka - on instagram and tumblr, he mostly follows photography blogs with no text so there’s no risk of them pissing him off - he likes urban photography, and pictures/videos of animals (especially dogs), and posts about food - he follows several of izaya’s blogs without realising it - he likes to look through the pictures people (both citizens and professional photographers) take of kasuka and ruri, because some of them are nice and he likes to save them since they never really get the chance to take photos together - likes to watch food videos on instagram, but often feels slightly guilty while watching them because he never bothers to cook - he and kasuka send each other pictures and videos of cute animals whenever they can spare the time, it’s often the highlight of his day to see kasuka has sent him something - as frustrating as he often finds it, he enjoys social media because he cannot unintentionally/unthinkingly hurt anyone

Shinra - would have accounts on every social media in existence devoted solely to celty, if only she would let him - instead, he takes picture of the meals they cook to tumblr and Instagram. they occasionally feature a pale hand or shoulder in the corner, and all of his followers believe his ‘wife’ to be very beautiful and shy due to his captions - his accounts give the impression of a standard 'family man’, though he claims himself to be a stay-at-home husband while his 'wife’ works hard - has a gore sideblog, to which he often uploads his own photos. his followers decide better than to question where he gets them from. - most believe him to be simply very skilled at special effects makeup

Celty - she likes twitter and instagram because she enjoys watching humans live and interact with each other, and observe trends - is oddly fascinated by makeup tutorials, her favourites are standard 'modern’ makeup looks with bright colour schemes (especially yellows and blues) - often finds herself looking through posts about sightings of 'the black rider’, and finds herself amused by the teenagers who both idolise and fear her - follows a lot of celtic lore and aesthetic blogs on tumblr, but tries to ensure it doesn’t get her too caught up in the past or frustrated - also likes fashion blogs, particularly more minimalist monochrome styles (no matter how many times shinra insists she’d look better in the various lacy travesties he shows her) - she posts most often on tumblr - she uploads photos she takes, particularly ones where she is far outside the city or deep into the emptier streets and alleyway, though none of them are particularly high-quality - her followers believe this to be part of the 'aesthetic’ and appeal, and her photos often get quite popular - she tries to avoid talking too much, but often finds herself giving out advice or tangled up trying to resolve arguments between strangers

[flyingthecoup]

Yes. I’m going there.

Get an Instagram account and never stop looking at women and men that look better than you and are doing better in their lives than you are.

Forget that social media rarely ever show the full picture, and you only see what they want to you to see.

Start buying all of the makeup brands that they endorse or front and fail miserably trying to contour and highlight and whatever they tell you to do in those one-minute videos

Give up on Insta and start a Pinterest.

Incessantly pin ‘How-To’s’ and ‘Make Your Own’ that amount to ridiculous amounts of money being spent on mason jars and Wasi-tape then utterly fail at those ‘easy’ DIY projects…

 Then ask randos on the Internet what they think about how you look and act through Twitter, Reddit and YouTube and any other Internet based chat room.

Develop a self-deprecating outlook when those randos say you look ugly or slutty because they stay online everyday with you.

Give up and try a new aesthetic that’s sustainable.

Aesthetics are hard. They require so much effort that at times it seems like it’s not worth the time because most of us are messy and lazy. However, we need to be honest with ourselves: whether we’d like to admit it or not, the way we present ourselves to the world is the way we will be treated. Do you want to be treated like a businesswoman? A feminist? Non-binary? When it comes to our own upkeep, and one of the facets of personal self-esteem is a personalized aesthetic.

What is an aesthetic? It used to be a bougie word used to describe a visual scene that was typical of a certain culture, region, or place that had distinct color swatches, furniture, paintings, and so on and so forth. But now it’s basic girl vocab for like, your personal style. Why we needed to make personal style sound more bougie, I will never know but for now, it’s really big on most visual social media, as aesthetic not only describes the makeup of your house, or place of living but also to an extent your personal clothing style and personality.

And for girls, that means Kardashians, pastel filters, duck face and ughhhhh the dreaded motivational quotes on landscape images. Ugh, those are the stuff of nightmares. Quotes from aesthetics like “I have missed classes because I couldn’t decide what I wanted to wear.” are the reason why more tomboyish and just plain lazy girls like me avoid making a signature style. Most definitely, but they have started to lack in their individuality because of how over saturated they’ve become in media. Don’t get me wrong, they’re cute. Having a personal style is integral to having an identity:

Whatever your flavor, figuring it out can be difficult in your first couple of years of college. Believe me, I’m still trying to figure out my own style.

Questions to Ask before you begin

Who are you, personally? Too deep, too fast too soon? Then…

What’s important to you? What’s the most important thing you’re looking forward to in this stage of your life? Take for example college; are you there for the academics or for the guys?

What do you think compliments the most important thing right now? An organized planner, a cute and flirty manner, a calm demeanor?

How will you present this important detail in your life to other people?

After the questions….

Style Journal

Ex. Good-girl Tomboy

I am a college student who’s studious and likes the quiet. I came to Wellesley for its academics point-blank. Although it’s beautiful scenery and the generous financial package had something to do with it, I’m in college to get a degree and then head off to medical school.

That means precision, time management, and cutthroat to the point attitude. But something also important to me is looking like my parents’ daughter; you know the church girl that always has a positive testimony to present, even when everyone else’s life is falling apart? I’m that girl. Sadly.

But even with those clear goody-two shoe characteristics I have, I am lazy af. Maybe that’s because I have traditionally boyish tastes; I like superheroes and comics, sci-fi and science. I like calculation. I like my sweats more than my dresses, and makeup for me consists of chapstick and mascara if I’m lucky. I’m frugal, and it shows in my makeup collection.

The only place it skips a beat is my family and my hair. Although I’ve been natural for quite some time, it’s only recently that I’ve begun learning how to treat and care for my hair outside of protective styles. It’s been challenging, but I love it. Inspirations: Ella Fitzgerald, Strategos Six, The Natural Hair Movement

The Baes of my Aesthetic

Color Scheme: Navies, black, white, transparent and clear, dashes of monochrome color here and there.

A messy mind, a messy room.

Accents: Mason jars from Dollar Tree, post-its stolen from your dad’s office, thrift shop goods from sustainability sales and Primark, the cheapest basic girl store on the planet. I only get staples, denim jackets.

    Developing a College Aesthetic, the Basic Girl Way Yes. I'm going there.

[freelanews-blog]

Huawei P30: Nice Phone, Bad Camera

Huawei's 2019 flagship phone is smaller than the Huawei P30 Pro, and doesn't have as good a camera, but it's a solid step up from the Huawei P20. Is it something you should be spending your money on? Google's recent announcement that it won't be supporting Android on future Huawei phones is worrying, but if you pick up the P30 you know you'll have full access to the Google Play Store at least. What you won't get is any future Android updates – at least not until Huawei and Google (and the US and China) sort out their differences. The Huawei P30 is smaller, thinner and less expensive than the Huawei P30 Pro, but the phones are very similar in many other areas – from the teardrop display notch to the super-fast Kirin 980 processor under the hood. The main benefit of picking up the P30 Pro is that extra rear camera lenses, which means a massive 5x optical zoom that you don't get on the standard P30. If you can live with a very good rather than a great camera though, we think the Huawei P30 is a very appealing proposition. It's fast, it's well built, and it ticks a lot of the boxes you need from a flagship in 2019 (trade wars notwithstanding). The rear camera is the biggest difference between the Huawei P30 and Huawei P30 Pro, because you get an extra lens and 5x optical zoom thrown in – in the case of the P30, you only get 3x optical zoom, so the P30 Pro can get you almost twice as close to the action without losing any image quality. Huawei has always been passionate about the cameras on its phones, and this is once again in evidence with the Huawei P30. The camera systems on the P30 and P30 Pro have been rebuilt from the ground up, ditching the traditional RGB (Red Green Blue) sensors for RYYB (Red Yellow Yellow Blue): that apparently lets in more light. Switching to a completely different sensor setup from the rest of the industry is no small task, but add in Huawei's on-board AI processing, and we're pleased to report that the Huawei P30 takes some excellent photos. The 40MP f/1.8 wide-angle, 16MP f/2.2 ultra-wide, and 8MP f/2.4 telephoto camera lenses combine to create some fantastic results, no matter what the conditions. Low light performance is very, very good – perhaps not quite up to Google Pixel Night Sight standards, but close enough. There is one caveat: if you want to take advantage of the built-in night mode here, you need to keep the phone still for several seconds. You can take decent night time shots without it, but you get better shots with it enabled. The vast majority of photos we were able to take with the Huawei P30 were sharp and accurate, with minimal noise and plenty of detail. Colours are well reproduced, dark and light areas are well balanced, and images get captured in a snap – it really is an impressive camera setup and one of the best we've tried. The Huawei P30 Pro will certainly get you closer to the action and produce slightly better snaps – especially in low light – but there's not a huge amount to choose between the P30 and P30 Pro in the camera department, even with that extra lens (which is mainly to add extra zoom capabilities after all). If you don't mind a bit of a loss in quality, you can actually zoom in up to 30x with the Huawei P30, though we wouldn't really recommend it – you also need to dial down the photo size from 40MP to 10MP to take advantage of this. Unless you absolutely have to see something close up, stick to the 3x or below. The camera can record video at up to 4K at 30 frames-per-second too, as well as offering up a fun slow-motion video feature to play around with. The usual plethora of Huawei shooting modes are included too, from monochrome to light painting, which can help you capture snaps that stand out. In our testing there was never a scenario that the Huawei P30 did terribly at, and in most cases the images it captured were very good, even excellent at times. Thanks to the combination of optics and software, you can genuinely just point-and-shoot in a variety of scenarios to get some winning shots. That extra lens on the Huawei P30 Pro is missed of course, but perhaps not by as much as you would think. You still get a 3x optical zoom on this model, which can help everywhere from gigs to wildlife watching. Huawei has done a fine job with the design of the P30, building on last year's P20 to bring us a phone that's even more refined and stylish. That small teardrop notch really helps, as does the bright, rich 6.1-inch screen. The 1,080 x 2,340 is sharp and vivid, and actually offers up more pixels-per-inch than the Huawei P30 Pro. Whether you're watching streaming video or flicking through your Instagram feed, the screen shows off any kind of content really well: it's definitely one of the highlights of the P30 package, and you've got HDR10 support here too. We found it a snug fit in our hands, and 6 inches or a little bit above seems to be a sweet spot at the moment. When you're watching video in landscape mode, the notch is automatically blocked off so it doesn't impinge on your video viewing. You can also disable the notch in the phone's software settings if you like too, so you get a solid black bar across the top of the phone interface rather than a cut-out. With minimal bezels, an eye-catching screen, a choice of appealing colours, and a fingerprint sensor that disappears under the screen, it's a definite two thumbs up for the design and display of the Huawei P30. In fact, with the smaller size, it's one of the areas we actually prefer it to the Huawei P30 Pro. It might not look quite as stylish as something like the Samsung Galaxy S10 or the iPhone XS, but it definitely comes close, especially with those excellent colour choices. Nice touches such as the colour accent on the power button, and the positioning of the camera flash, add to the aesthetic appeal as well. The Kirin 980 and 6GB or 8GB of RAM mean lightning fast performance too, and you'll struggle to get a faster phone this year. It's definitely not going to be slacking in the performance stakes, and in everything we managed to put the P30 through – from the latest Asphalt racing game to AR filter effects – it passed with flying colours. Single-core: 3,267 Multi-core: 9,659 RenderSript Score: 5,890 Battery Score Estimate: 6,650 The Huawei P30 runs Huawei's own EMUI 9.1 software on top of Android 9.0 Pie, and it's a bit of a mixed bag. There's nothing specifically wrong with the software, but it's not as clean and intuitive as some other Android variations we've seen, like those from Samsung and OnePlus for example. From the rather chunky and old-fashioned looking cartoony graphics, to the plethora of Huawei apps and services loaded on to the phone, the OS is perhaps one of the main downsides of the Huawei P30. This being Android though, it's not too difficult to tweak and customise to suit your own tastes. Fast charging is included, and a 3,650mAh battery that in our one-hour-of-Netflix test dropped from 100 percent to just 95 percent – by some distance the best result we've ever seen in that test. That was backed up in daily usage, with a healthy 30-40 percent of battery life often left in the evenings after a day of normal smartphone tasks. The Kirin 980 has some serious battery optimisation technology built into it, Huawei says, and based on our usage and testing we can well believe it. It's a refreshing change to find a phone that's so big and powerful and yet which doesn't suck up battery life at a worryingly fast speed. Huawei has cut some corners on the P30 though. There's no wireless charging and no IP68 full waterproofing and dustproofing, which gives you two reasons to go for the Huawei P30 Pro instead. What we do get is a return of the headphone jack after it was dropped from the Huawei P20 phones, something that will please anyone with an expensive pair of wired headphones they want to keep on using. The in-screen fingerprint scanner is an optical rather than an ultrasonic one, which means speedy performance – something we can attest to – but less reliability in the wet. We didn't come across any problems during our time with the phone though, and definitely prefer this to having a fingerprint scanner on the back. Of course the Huawei P30 Pro is a better phone than the Huawei P30, but it's also a more expensive phone, and in terms of internal power and specs the handsets match up almost identically. Factor all of that in, and we think there are going to be a lot of people who find this the preferable option. Okay you don't get that extra lens and the extra zoom it provides, but you do still get a very good camera. Add in an excellent screen, superb battery life, and plenty of power under the hood, and you've got a phone that matches up well with the best handsets of 2019. Read the full article

[photomaniacs]

Why B&W is Still the Favorite of Street Photographers http://ift.tt/2t5VrXq

Black-and-white still remains the photographer’s favorite for street photographers, and with very good reason. Where in other genres monochrome has become a niche look, street photography is different. Why does B&W remain the favorite choice of street photographers, and are there logical reasons to go for it?

Black-and-white was naturally the first choice for photographers of old due to technical restrictions. Film wasn’t able to showcase color, and it took a long time until more and more street photographers explored new opportunities for color work. Nonetheless, it seems most modern street photography photos are still in B&W.

Modern technology is now more than able to capture colors of the real world. If necessary, editing makes it possible to change the look of colors in any direction you can imagine. And additional complexity like white balance becomes easier to deal with thanks to digital cameras offering RAW files that give photographers more flexibility to adjust the look afterward.

But the following are some of the possible reasons why B&W is still popular among street shooters.

Emulating the Masters

Documentary photography is one of the oldest genres, and a lot of street photographers try to replicate the look of classic photographers like Robert Capa or Henri-Cartier Bresson. Even until the late 70s, most icons didn’t make the transition but continued to shoot in B&W. Exceptions such as Joel Meyerowitz or Saul Leiter were pioneers with their beautiful color work, but they also had to fight a lot of criticism.

For interested photographers in the modern age looking to make their way into street photography, it is much more likely to discover the work of Vivian Maier, Robert Capa, or Bruce Gilden, who almost exclusively shot in B&W. Quite interestingly, Vivian Maier also had a collection of color images that have mostly remained unpopular.

For landscape or portrait photographers, there are icons like Sebastiao Salgado or Helmut Newton who put out impressive black and white images. But looking back, the past decades have been dominated by color work.

In contrast, street photographers never quite made the full transition and therefore beginners are more likely to try their luck with monochrome images first, following their idols.

Focusing on the Subject

There are also a few characteristics that make black and white advantageous in comparison to color.

Street photography is one of the hardest and most fast-paced genres, leaving little to no time for the composition. While studio photographers can often take all the time they want to create their image very carefully, street photographers have to react on the street very quickly.

This can be very difficult, and the composition doesn’t always come out like the street photographer had envision. Often, you observe a nice scene that really catches your interest, but you also face the problem of distracting objects in the background. Especially colorful objects can distract the viewer and sidetrack the attention.

To restore the original focus of the image, it can be helpful to display the picture in B&W. This way, the content becomes king and the look becomes less important. Since street photography often tries to show a story or the interaction of people, B&W can help to emphasize the content, by fading out distracting colors.

Dramatic Light

While beauty itself often isn’t the sole subject, the contrast of light and darkness is a frequently used subject. A lot of street photographs revolve around subjects being in the spotlight while a lot of the scene is hidden in the dark.

Often times it is more interesting for the viewer when not everything is revealed, but there is still room for imagination. This kind of image works very well in B&W. Increasing the contrast also adds to this effect. Colors often would be too distracting and take away from the mysterious atmosphere.

In the same vein, silhouette images work very well as monochrome versions. The picture becomes very minimalistic, but when done right can encourage the viewer’s imagination.

The Film Look

When I started my journey into photography, I didn’t want to invest too much money in a camera. A consequence was that ISO noise became very apparent, especially in low light situations. In color work, this can become very distracting and lowers the overall quality of the image. For B&W, some noise can actually work very well, because it resembles the old analog look. You don’t need a Fujifilm X100F to begin with. A Ricoh GR works wonders, even in low light situations when embracing the film look.

The $1,300 Fujifilm X100F (left) and the $659 Ricoh GR II (right).

Later on for me, the noise wasn’t an annoyance anymore but instead became an aesthetic choice. It is a lot easier to emulate old pushed Tri-X film than the ever popular Kodachrome. Color has to factor in a lot more variables which make it near impossible to emulate them perfectly.

This led to the development of free film presets like the Silver Efex package. So for the classic film look, monochrome has a lot more to offer and is much easier to replicate, than his colorful alternative.

Colors Have To Match

Just as light and darkness can become subjects on their own, colors play an important part in color images. Whenever the photographer decides to stay away from monochrome versions, the colors shouldn’t just be there randomly. In a way, they should make sense and really add something to the scene as if the photographer painted the scene himself. Otherwise, why should you include them?

Therefore, I feel that colors should match in some way. This could be that one color is very present in the image, or that different colors create either a very harmonic picture or tension. But including color just for the sake of not doing B&W doesn’t work most of the time. Color is too complicated, especially in uncontrollable situations like street photography.

Because of that, B&W is often the “easier” choice by reducing the complexity and difficulty of an image.

Is Black and White Easy?

One often misused misconception is converting a bad colorful picture into monochrome and hoping that it turns out better. I agree that B&W makes it easier to conceal mistakes, but a bad photo stays bad and doesn’t profit from monochrome. A picture that doesn’t work in color, because it lacks the depth of story or is badly framed, won’t be better in B&W.

In general, I’d advise you to think about which style you chose before you go out and shoot. Both variations are unique and aren’t interchangeable with a simple click in the post production. You have to observe the world very differently. With B&W, you will focus more on the light and shadows, while color requires you to have a look at every possible combination of annoying colors that could break your image.

Nonetheless, there is a huge amount of B&W released on the Internet very day. Standing out from the masses is very difficult when you can only show distinctions of gray. It is easy to get lost in the mass of mediocre monochrome images. Therefore, you have to develop a unique picture style that is distinctive from the rest.

Either way, try sticking with a style for more than only a few images and not switching back and forth. B&W might be a classic that will never run out of fashion, but with color street photography you could set the next highlight in your unique style.

About the author: Sebastian Jacobitz is a street photographer from Berlin, Germany, capturing the everyday life in the city. The opinions expressed in this post are solely those of the author. To see more of his work, visit his website, The Street Photography Hub, or give him a follow on Facebook and Instagram.

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July 10, 2017 at 08:03PM

[afridayhabit]

Taeyeon wants us to know she’s #FINE

Hey guys!

Back again with Taeyeon! She’s flooded the social media sphere with images, hyping for the momentous occasion of her first full solo album, My Voice. Let’s follow the journey through images (which you can notably tell were taken over a long period of time - probably from her cut to short blonde hair way back when RAIN was released in Feb 2016 to now, a year later, in Feb 2017). In this way, I can kind of respect the change in feeling and looks over the images, since, if you’ve checked out her album already (which I have through Apple Music), the album takes you (presumably) on Taeyeon’s life journey (probably through at least a year’s worth) of dealing with heartbreak and learning to live on her own two feet and move on. In the same way, I feel like I understand the reason as to why Taeyeon’s first full solo album is called My Voice. In actuality, I think Taeyeon in general has put a lot of thought into her solo music releases and put herself into the music. For example, all SONES know that Taeyeon was dealing with depression. It was brought to light during Girls’ Generation TTS first reality show on OnStyle, The TaeTiSeo (which is reportedly why Girls’ Generation likes OnStyle, because the producer of The TaeTiSeo really earned their trust). With her solo releases, I think Taeyeon is finally able to show the Taeyeon beyond Girls’ Generation’s bright image and I think that’s freed her and made her happier.

But enough on what I think, let’s check out the awesome album images of My Voice.

(As for the order for the photos, I’m going to curate it in how I think the photos should be experienced, in terms of my idea that the photos should bring you on a journey of a year’s worth of Taeyeon’s own personal growth. Look at this and hopefully you get the story I understood after looking at these photos and seeing the tracklist as it is.)

I wanna say people were saying that this yellow dress was unflattering on Taeyeon, because it made her look big, but I disagree. I think in general it just an awkward angle on the piece, but the piece looks nice and matches with the simple, monochrome aesthetic they were going for.

BTW, for this first part of the photoset, I love the highlighting of one key vibrant color. It’s just completely visually pleasing.

Okay, she wore this outfit in Fine the music video, and I absolutely love it! Especially the jeans, the jeans are so unique. (i’ll definitely due a separate post about my fav style points in her Fine music video!)

I’M IN LOVE WITH THIS WHOLE OUTFIT! It’s so fashion forward and experimental in perceived basics like a white top with jeans and flats. DEF need something like this is my outfit repertoire. 

LOVE THIS OUTFIT TOO!

FINE is full of fashion and beauty moments.

My Voice is really takes you on a journey. But this journey isn’t singular, but very multi faceted. Very obviously, the album takes you on a beauty and style evolution. My Voice also guides you through a story. So, even though the title track is called FINE, the main chorus line is It’s not FINE. But maybe that’s the best part about that. It’s pretty ironic that it’s that way, but this is Taeyeon’s first album. It’s okay that she’s not fully FINE just yet. The important thing is that she wants to be FINE, and finally she’s having days where she is FINE again. My Voice is about Taeyeon finding herself, the happy self she once had in the beginning of career, again. It’s about finding her voice again and letting her be heard (because for so long the media and the general public tried to ignore her pretty blatant statements from the past where she wanted people to know she was depressed but no one wanted to listen to her, because Girls’ Generation is bright, and Taeyeon being depressed, as the leader, face, and voice of the group, isn't quite bright). Happy for Taeyeon and hopefully people understand from FINE and the rest of My Voice that this is more than just another pop album. It was extremely well thought out and you can tell that Taeyeon poured a part of herself into the music. She really is one of the best South Korean musicians of today.

Check out the music video to her title track, FINE.

xoxo,

Alyssa

Check me out on Instagram: @afridayhabit

Also, look forward to more posts (such as my posts of London Fashion Week Festival, which are soon to come onto the sight!)

[artistjang]

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