Showing posts with label Nudes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nudes. Show all posts

Sunday, 3 October 2010

If I said you had a beautiful body would you hold it against me?

Yes, the cheesy title of this post is a reference to a song, which in a generally cheesy period of time, turned the cheese dial up to eleven. If the title makes you cringe, it did it's job because I'm going to be writing about a subject that makes me cringe.

I tell ya, I swear I'm allergic to country music anyway, it gives me a head ache and severe back pain (no kidding), but the song in question was a truly dreadful example, and it ensured that forever after, no man could ever tell a woman that she had a beautiful body without sounding like a complete twat.

Although you may try and avoid dRama on deviantArt, it cannot have escaped anybody's attention that for every camwhore, there is an army of... sad gits* who follow them, and whose idea of a comment is just as cheesy as 'You have a beautiful body', or 'you have great tits'.

So it kind of makes it very difficult to give compliments to a nude model with out feeling that you are sounding like a prick, and worrying that they will mistake you for a weirdo!

"Does my bum look big in this?"
But what woman doesn't like compliments? Many of the models (including the cam whores) are, I am sure, are itching to get some assurance that they aren't complete munters... or just that their arse isn't huge.

Society is telling women that they should be a size 8 (that's UK size) and that anything else is fat. worse still in my view, is that we are now telling them that their tits should be huge and look fake**. Who is actually deciding this is what a woman looks like?***

Chubby Chaser or boringly normal?
Personally, what I find attractive is a fuller, more rounded figure. I like boobs that are natural preferably large, and I like arses to be in proportion. But Who am I to say what women SHOULD look like? Women come in all shapes and sizes, and men like them in all shapes and sizes -- there shouldn't be a problem. But there is and I don't need to go any further into it, because the women that I'm talking about are saying, "I don't conform to the stereotype, this what I am, here I am naked, I can be beautiful too -- I AM BEAUTIFUL!".

This is a sodding important issue as far as I'm concerned. It is a social problem which is leading to eating disorders and self harming etc. But it's also an Art issue. Art should challenge social conventions, and good art should transform the viewer, or even the subject. When I'm taking photos, what I am trying to achieve is showing that beauty. I also want to mention that I damn well consider the model to be the senior partner in a collaboration too, especially when they have done all the hair, make-up (dieting, exercise), I can hardly take all the credit just because I pressed the button on a camera.

So why this long winded rant? Well, I saw a nice model, an new model. I commented that I hoped we'd see more of her. The photographer hinted that it was a possibility if the photos got some positive reviews.

I'm never wrong
Well, I may be wrong, but this could be one of those times that a model would like some positive compliments to know what she is attractive, beautiful, sexy even? (preferably from someone who doesn't appear to be a pervert)
If not, then I could point to half a dozen models off-the-top-of-my-head that who have straight-out said that by stripping off they are challenging the society's conventions -- basically saying a big woman can be beautiful too.

So here's where I stand.
I'm on dA for the nudes, for the erotic art. I love looking at beautiful women, and I like to see them naked -- when they are naked you see some of the most beautiful bits! If you think that makes me a pervert... then you need to see somebody about your hang-ups. I have nothing against porn, I like porn, I look at porn... I'm not on dA for soft porn, if I want soft porn, I need look no further than my bookmarks.
I AM NOT particularly interested in Fine Art Nudes, as I said I like erotic works, and Fine Art Nudes are usually anything but. (Aside from that, it's a genre that has been around since the invention of the camera and I feel it's a little stale).
And as I prefer erotica to fine art, I'm in no great hurry to convince anyone to strip down to their birthday suit, It's far easier to be sexy, saucy, a tease when you have some clothes on.

Now that I have covered that, I think I can finally say...
"You have a beautiful body, nice tits, a great arse and I enjoyed seeing you naked!"
And now... you can put your clothes back on if you feel you made your point and would rather do something else, thats fine by me. If you want to do more nude stuff, I certainly won't complain, let me know so I can add you to my watch list****.
But on balance, I'd like to hear that the experience gave you a more positive image. I hope it does.

That's all folks -- apart from the footnotes.

* I'm going to have to think of an abusive nickname for them. Suggestions welcomed.

** I was told by the owner of a large fashion chain that they stock size 8 and 10 because that's what the fashion world says should be the norm, even though they don't fit anybody. He said they then make their money selling accessories because a bag is a bag and will fit any ol' slapper. But he also told me that even the size 8s and 10s can't get into the clothes now because they are having boob jobs.

*** He gladly talked about menswear which was his thing, but when I asked him about women's wear he told me that he 'fucking hates women' even though, he assures me, he isn't queer. It did occur to me that this isn't the ideal kind of person to to have an influence.

**** This reminded me of a joke:-
An attractive woman goes to the doctor because her very large breasts are aching. The doctor asks her to strip to the waist but she is very embarrassed because her breasts are so large. The doctor says, "I am a doctor, a trained professional". She tells him again that she is really self concious. He says that she hasn't got anything she hasn't seen before, so she makes him promise not laugh or be surprised or to stare and he agrees. So she undresses and her huge full breasts flop out and the doctor yells, "Whey-Hey!".(Boys will be boys!)

Friday, 1 October 2010

GetWatchers.com

I have gone viral, but not in a way I would have liked. I seem to have some kind of nasty throat virus, I have a fever and I'm more sodding grumpy than normal, but I make no appologies, firstly because if I wasn't a grumpys sod I probably wouldn't have much interesting to say, and secondly because I'm going to have a go at cat lovers, who deserve everything they get.

So anyways, I signed up to GetWatchers.com. I'm loving it, it adds a whole new dimention to deviantArt. Yeah, it works, I'm getting lots of page views, comments, favourites, and a few watchers at a time when I'm not submitting new work and expect to be very quiet. But I'm not a pageview whore, and I wouldn't be doing it just for that... although I admit I am enjoying testing strategies and tick-tacks which I will keep to myself for the time being.

What I'm really enjoying is being exposed to a BETTER selection of works. You only see stuff by other people signed up for it, and obviously if they are taking the time to put their best 10 works forward, you are filtering out a lot of the blah. So as a general rule the quality is much higher than you'd get. And there is so much stuff on dA that normally I just browse the catagories I'm particuarly interested in, and there ain't enough hours in the day for that. But with GetWatchers, you get a nice selection of stuff although you can filter out a few topics so you can avoid all of the awful fan-art, Manga and vampire shite.

So yeah, I have seen some great stuff. The skyscapes are amazing, what's not to like -- I bet they are popular. And I love flowers and blossoms as you can tell by my blog (I am hetrosexual by the way). And some of the macro shots are simply mind blowing.

But what is with the fucking cats?
Okay, so we shouldn't be totally surprised, I remember as far back as about 1994 saying that half the pictures on the interwebs were of porn, and the other half were of sad weirdos and their cats. And you can expect 'sensitive' people to be both into cats and have delusions of being arty, so a disproportianate number of cats isn't a mind blowing revelation. But some of these pictures are by talented people!

As an example, a couple of times I have found myself looking at people's galleries and they have some really great work, often a wonderful variety of portaits, landscapes, skyscapes, night shots, macros, character studies... all of which I'd give and eight or nine (on a day I'm feeling less grumpy), and then there are a load of cat pictures! Don't get me wrong, they are well taken pictures, in focus and all that, but nothing special... it's as if having a cat in them is enough! It's like they love their cat, we should fall in love on sight also, and that is the point of the picture. Well, I frigging hate cats, as did my father and his father before him, evil bloody things that creep up on you and leave mice in your bed.

Frankly, you see one cat and you've seen them all. It's not even like you are showing us any funny LOL cats.

And then it struck me, isn't this what the APEs say about nudes? "Seen one, seen them all", "It's a pair of boobs, get over it" and "I don't want to see your body, how is it artistic?". I may be onto something, but I'd rather be highly sexed and into nude women than be a fridged cat lover, so I'm not going to waste any energy analysing it.

Anyway, GetWatchers.com is highly recommended, don't be put off by the cats.