¨Photography, as well all know, is not real at all. It is an illusion of reality wit which we create our own private world¨
Arnold Newman
Do: Leave your dress on as long as you can.
Don't: Party too hard at your reception.
With so many wedding possibilities available to brides these days, it's hard to know what's a "do" and what's a "don't."
"It's becoming more forgiving," says Lauren Brody, a deputy editor at Glamour magazine, whose June issue, on newsstands now, details the results of a recent Glamour.com survey in "45 New Wedding Dos and Don'ts."
Brody says an increasing number of readers are breaking with tradition in a bid to personalize their big day.
"I think some of that probably trickles down from the way celebrities have handled their weddings recently," she explains, citing pregnant Ashlee Simpson-Wentz's last-minute Alice in Wonderland-themed nups as just one offbeat example.
But, while trends for cupcakes instead of a wedding cake and professionally photographed save-the-date portrait cards are on the rise, other customs still hold fast.
"For the big decisions, our readers' taste is still pretty traditional," explains Brody of the survey results. "They don't want to just run off to city hall and they don't necessarily want to podcast their ceremony.
"The main thing that hasn't changed is that brides want their guests to have a wonderful time and that dictates their etiquette more than anything else."
TOP FIVE WEDDING DON'TS
1. Our readers told us it's definitely a "don't" to ask for cash instead of gifts.
2. One wedding planner's advice was, "Don't blow your budget on things that people won't remember or care about, like wedding party favors, which no one really remembers afterward."
3. Don't make your bridesmaids wear matching everything. It's one thing if you want your bridesmaids traditionally all in the same dress, but very few brides exist who still want their girls in the same shoes, hair and jewelry.
4. Don't drink too much. You'll have people bringing you Champagne all day. Just take a sip here and there, but pinch yourself to stay in the moment. You'll want to remember all of it. That goes for guests, too.
5. Don't worry. It's your day and things are going to go right and wrong. Once it's started, just go with it and have a great time. If you're having a good time, everybody else will, too.
TOP FIVE WEDDING DO'S
1. Wait as long as possible to take off the dress. Once it's off, the magic is over and the day is done. So, stay in that dress until the last dance is done and you've waved all your guests off, and make the day last as long as you can.
2. Do prepare if you're giving a speech and run it by a couple of friends. Remember, there are grandparents and even great-grandparents in the audience and they need to appreciate the speech as much as your college roommates.
3. For the bride, look like yourself on your wedding day. Only do red lipstick if you're a red lipstick girl, or wear your hair super-high if you feel comfortable. You don't want to look back at the photos and not be able to recognize yourself.
4. Save money by buying a white bridesmaid's gown as your wedding dress. We found a great Grecian-style long white from ThreadDesign.com for $375. That's a great deal for a wedding gown and no one will be able to tell.
5. Do skip major flowers. You could spend thousands of dollars on them and, the truth is, you can achieve an ethereal look with just a few flowers and candles scattered across the table in a way that's more unique.
RAISE YOUR GLASSES
The wedding toast is often one of the most nerve-racking moments of the day for those involved. Here, two Glamour readers share their favorite toasts:
The naughty toast:
"The groom stood up and announced, 'The bride is now off the market - if anyone has the keys to her place, now's the time to hand them over.'
"Then he put a bowl in the middle of the floor, and all the men started coming up and tossing keys into it. Obviously, he had prearranged it, but it was still hilarious."
The nice toast:
"My uncle said to his son, 'When I came to this country as an immigrant, I wanted to give you a better life than I had. And I know today that the woman you've found is going to do that.'"
Monday, June 2nd 2008
Brooklyn newlyweds Fishella Thomas and Joseph Williams cut their guest list in half to make their wedding last month more affordable.
Bride Fishella Thomas hoped to get married in a custom-made gown, but chose an off-the-rack model.
With the economy sagging, even the most dreamy-eyed couples are worried about how they'll pay for their big day.
Fishella Thomas, 25, had long imagined getting married in a custom-made gown. But as her wedding to longtime sweetheart, Joseph Williams, 27, approached, she decided to buy a dress off the rack at David's Bridal for $800, one-third the price of an original design.
That's not the only way this E. Flatbush, Brooklyn, couple scaled back on their wedding, held May 25 at Antun's catering hall in Queens Village.
The bride and groom, who are expecting a baby, cut their guest list in half, to 120. Thomas, an executive assistant at JPMorgan Chase, and Williams, a clerk at the American Museum of Natural History, kept their wedding budget to $19,000.
"We really had to cut back," Fishella said. "It's the economy and the new baby that's coming."
While affluent New York couples planning six-figure weddings are showing no signs of pulling back, budget-minded couples are thinking twice about overspending.
"I'm not hearing doom and gloom, but the business is not recession-proof," said Antun's owner, Joe King.
The health of the wedding biz is being closely watched by entrepreneurs who entered the bridal market in recent years and by others looking to get in.
Inspired by glitzy celebrity nuptials and themed TV shows, weddings have grown ever more extravagant, driving national spending to $73 billion in 2006 - nearly double what they were 15 years before, according to Conde Nast Bridal Media.
But a recent survey from the National Association of Catering Executives shows the appetite for lavish events is cooling. Of the execs surveyed, 48% said they've seen a decline in wedding spending.
The average price of weddings nationally is $28,704, down slightly from last year, according to the Wedding Report, a research company.
Given very high local costs, New Yorkers typically spend more: an average of $46,229 this year, according to theknot.com.
Eric Ostrow, director of sales and marketing at the Glazier Group, which owns such high-end Manhattan venues as Bridgewaters on Fulton St., said he has not seen a decline in business.
"We find most people have been saving for their children's wedding for years and still want the best," Ostrow said.
But E. 72nd St. florist Marian Kelly has seen couples become much more budget-minded - especially those paying for the wedding themselves.
"They want whatever is in season, which will bring the budget down," Kelly said. Choosing in-season flowers in June, such as peonies and lilacs, instead of lilies of the valley, can cut 50% from a floral budget, she said.
Candy Kantor, co-owner of RK Bridal on W. 39th St. in Manhattan, said she expects sales this year to match last year's. "I'm sure [the economy] is affecting a lot of bridal stores, but we have good pricing," Kantor said. Gowns at her store range from $200 to $3,000.
Last year, Amy Jacobs, a wedding planner in Park Slope, Brooklyn, introduced a lower-priced concierge service as an alternative to her full-fledged wedding planning. For $3,500 to $5,000, she provides couples with a game plan for their wedding, including budget advice and vendor referrals.
What they don't get is Jacobs handling all meetings and contracts with vendors, a service that would cost them 10% of the wedding budget.
The lower-cost option helps couples "afford a wedding planner without having to employ a full service," she said.
While there are still opportunities for entrepreneurs in the wedding business, they have to be mindful of budget conscious brides and grooms.
"I am seeing a lot of people who want to get in who don't have the experience or expertise," said Manhattan event planner Lindsay Landman.
"You need a fresh take," Jacobs added. "Brides and grooms are smart and savvy; they're going to give their money to someone who will work for them."
“Canale della Giudecca, 2007” in Venice as photographed by Sze Tsung Leong.
THE soft-colored photographs of Sze Tsung Leong capture contrasting landscapes: the verdant green of Germany; the mirage of shimmering towers in Dubai; the urban geometry of Amman, Jordan; the red tiles roofs of Italy. But always the eye is drawn to the distinct line where sky meets earth.
In Mr. Leong’s panoramic photographs of major cities and rural landscapes around the world, the horizon line consistently falls in the same place. So when his images are hung side by side — as 62 of them are now at the Yossi Milo Gallery in Chelsea — they create an extended landscape of ancient cities and modern metropolises, desert vistas and lush terrain.
“The horizon is such a basic way of comprehending the space around us, comprehending our basic relationship to the globe,” Mr. Leong said one recent morning over tea in Manhattan.
If the horizon seems to offer possibilities, he said, it also establishes a boundary. “In terms of looking, the horizon is the farthest we can see,” he explained, yet in terms of knowledge, it reflects “the limit of experience.”
For the last seven years Mr. Leong, a 38-year-old Chinese-American with a British accent and a Mexican birth certificate, has expanded his experience by traveling to unfamiliar cities, where his first priority is to find a sweeping view from an elevated position.
“When I’m really familiar with a place, it is more difficult to visualize it,” he said, citing New York, his home, as an example. “But being confronted with a new situation, I find that I’m more aware of things visually.” He traveled to Amman because he hoped the uniform construction of its buildings might cast an even pattern and tone across the surrounding hills, which would offer him distant vantage points. And the Roman ruins there attracted him as a reminder of the reach of the Roman Empire across national borders.
He often travels alone to new cities. Asked about his sense of isolation during his five days in Amman, he referred to his childhood in Mexico City, where he lived until his family moved to Los Angeles when he was 11. “There’s always a sense that was natural to me from the beginning of being an outsider,” he said. “I don’t think about feeling foreign, because that is the natural state.”
He studied at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, Calif., and then earned degrees in architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, and at Harvard. Perspective drawing fascinated him. “I was interested in figuring out the mechanics of how you represent space on a two-dimensional surface,” he said. “And of course the horizon line plays a very important part in perspective drawing.”
He points out the similarities between perspective drawing — in which divergent lines extend to vanishing points — and the flattened projection of an urban landscape against the ground glass of his 8-by-10 view camera. The grid in the viewfinder lets him compose images with matching parallel lines.
His panoramas integrate broad swaths of natural terrain, urban architecture and symbols of culture, and Mr. Leong said architectural history courses at Berkeley had a great influence on how he sees the built environment. “Their approach was to consider buildings and cities and their social and political contexts,” he said. “Buildings are the result of social forces and political power.”
Before traveling to Egypt, Mr. Leong picked up Max Rodenbeck’s “Cairo: The City Victorious.” “I read about this ancient trash heap that had been in use for several centuries, which had gotten taller and taller,” he recalled. “From the top you get this view of the old part of Cairo.”
He shot his panoramic image of Cairo from this ancient trash heap, now a park on a hill. He returned three times before the lighting conditions provided the tonal quality he sought. The best conditions for his preferred evenness of light occur either at noon, when the fewest shadows are cast, or when it is overcast. “When things fall into deep shadow, it is more difficult to capture a detail,” he said.
Mr. Leong photographed Dubai because “it is a new city created out of oil wealth,” and he shot his skyline panorama several miles away, from the surrounding desert. “I was afraid the film might get damaged,” he said, since the outdoor temperature was 110 to 120 degrees in the noonday sun. “The camera was hot to the touch.”
By contrast he went to Venice in January, when the winter sky was most likely to be overcast and the light would yield the finest detail. His picture “Canale della Giudecca, 2007” was taken at dusk from the mainland. The densely packed, sharply articulated buildings hover in a narrow line between water and sky.
“For this image the exposure time was about a minute,” he said. “So anything that’s moving becomes a blur or disappears. The water that is moving becomes a blank sheet. People sometimes ask if this picture is Photoshopped because of the blankness.”
Mr. Leong still uses negative film and makes all of his prints in the darkroom. He believes that light projected through a negative onto paper provides more continuous tone than is possible with the digital process. “If you blow up a digital scan, you’ll see it is made up of different squares, each one a different color, which corresponds in the computer’s mind to a numerical value,” he said. “In analog it will be a continuous curve.”
Mr. Leong acknowledges the influence of 19th-century photographers like Felice Beato and John Thomson, who photographed in China and India using a view camera. But he also cited the contemporary photographer Thomas Struth, whose technical precision Mr. Leong admires, as well as his images documenting cities. “You’re not only looking at what is depicted on the picture plane, but a kind of emotional context he is trying to describe,” he said. Citing Mr. Struth’s photograph of the Pantheon in Rome, he added: “There’s a heaviness, the weight of history and the weight of the light. A certain sense of sadness about it.”
It’s a sentiment that may come to mind when viewing an earlier series by Mr. Leong, “History Images,” which documents the vast rows of modern towers in China that are rapidly engulfing the country’s cultural past. The photographs were shown in 2006 at the High Museum in Atlanta, and Julian Cox, its curator of photography, called the work prescient in capturing what Mr. Leong has labeled the “erasure of history.”
Last year the Yale University Art Gallery acquired 15 of Mr. Leong’s panoramic images, and he worked with Joshua Chuang, assistant curator of photographs, on their installation at Betts House, the university’s center for international studies. Placed side by side, Mr. Chuang said, the images juxtapose modern industrial landscapes with those that are slower to change, like mountain ranges and bodies of water. “We’re left to contemplate, along with the photographer, how much longer these landscapes will look this way, and why,” he wrote in an e-mail message.
Another example of Mr. Leong’s interest in contrasting natural terrain with the constructed environment is “Victorville, California, 2006,” which depicts suburban sprawl between Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
“I wanted to include an image of the new cities in the U.S., cities that lie outside of the recognizable cities,” he said, adding that he was seeking an image to “communicate this sort of flatness and impending urbanization,” one providing a “counterpoint to the other images I had of natural landscapes and dense cities.”
The cul-de-sac in “Victorville” at first glance could be a pond. Only some of the newly built houses are occupied, and the picture was shot before any landscape planting had begun. As in so many of Mr. Leong’s photographs, the natural terrain is visible and vast, even as the architectural imprint of humanity begins to encroach.
Until June 22nd 2008
Photographs, paintings and drawings by Patti Smith, a veteran rock performer, have gone on display at the Fondation Cartier, one of Paris’s most prestigious contemporary art galleries. Small black-and-white Polaroid pictures dominate the display, which hangs in a basement gallery furnished with armchairs and carpets to resemble a living room. Gravestones are a favourite subject, as is Ms Smith's connection with other artists and poets (Arthur Rimbaud and Robert Mapplethorpe are important influences). Reading and performances by Ms Smith complement the exhibition.
Fondation Cartier, 261 boulevard Raspail, Paris 75014. See the gallery's website.
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Until June 30th 2008
Visitors to Paris this spring should not miss a splendid new exhibition on Marie Antoinette at the Grand Palais. The first large show in more than 50 years about the ill-fated queen, it traces her extraordinary life in displays that are both theatrical and evocative. The highlight is the section about the Petit Trianon, Marie Antoinette’s private court at Versaille, where she entertained friends away from the formal palace. Its atmosphere is conjured through musical scores and original furniture. The queen's final journey to the guillotine in 1793 is evoked in a dimly lit corridor, lined with brutal cartoons, poignant quotes from her letters and the chemise she wore in prison. “We wanted to give as complete a picture of her as possible,” the artistic director told Economist.com. Judging from the crowds at this show, it is a picture the French are keen to see.
Grand Palais, 1 Avenue Gén Eisenhower, 75008 Paris. Tel: +33 (0)1 44 13 17 30. Open: daily (except Tues), 10am-8pm (Wed until 10pm). See also the museum’s website.
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Until August 3rd 2008
Chicago has a thriving arts scene, but painting has often played second fiddle to music, dance and theatre. This thoughtful exhibition sets out to redress the balance, offering a century's worth of Chicago-based painters and work that ranges from figurative to abstract. Look out for Ed Paschke's eerie portrait of Leopold and Loeb, the famous Chicagoan murderers, and the artful 19th-century cartoons of Theodore L. Wust. Images of the city play a huge role in Richard Chance's forays into realism in the late 20th century, as well as in Jean Crawford Adams's abstract view of the skyline.
BRAND NEW and highly energetic seminar programme by two icons! Yervant from Australia TOGETHER with Joe Buissink of USA present: TWO VIEWS Each is renowned for his style and individual technique, BOTH are leaders in their respective corners of the world and now.... TOGETHER, they will present their individual views, approach and future direction in professional wedding photography internationally. Live shoot, each will show their way, light as they see it, angles they like, their communication methods, how each sees the 'story' of the day, then of course, Photoshop and finishing. Business and marketing which each utilise in their respective businesses and their plans and vision for the future trends of wedding photography worldwide. NEW repertoire from BOTH, Joe will showcase complete wedding coverage, Yervant will demonstrate his simple but all essential Photoshop finishing techniques on both his and also Joe's images.... Celebrities shot by Joe... finished by Yervant . Totally INSPIRATIONAL . 13 City seminar tour of USA and Canada Seats filling very quickly, BOOK now to secure your spot. For more information visit website.. http://www.yervant.info |
Google is not easing up in terms of search market share and acquisitions. I need not say it but Google is a formidable force that Yahoo and Microsoft are not going to overcome easily. Consider the following:
Recent search engine market share figures (May 2007) show Google with 57.4%, Yahoo! with 22.9%, MSN with 8.8% and Ask.com with approximately 3.6% of the search market. These are average figures for data collected by Hitwise, NNR and comScore.
Google’s last few steps, notably the purchase of YouTube.com and DoubleClick, will also prove to be scary for the #2 and #3 players in the industry. Google has taken some bold steps trying to extend its market lead to areas outside of search. Google’s purchases show the company is interested in a bigger piece of the branded advertising pie including banners, videos and other online graphical ads. Currently, Yahoo! is considered the leader in branded advertising and they’ve recently increased their stake in Right Media (a competitor of DoubleClick) to 80% (a $680 million dollar deal). MSN recently purchased aQuantive—also a DoubleClick competitor.
Given the above information, what can Yahoo and Microsoft do to compete? Will they stay their existing courses or implement completely different courses of action? In this article, I suggest a few scenarios that could roll out as the search engine wars get hotter.
Microsoft and Yahoo joint venture
For now, merger talks between Microsoft and Yahoo are off. In the words of a Yahoo! official: “A merger between Microsoft & Yahoo! would be like two large ships colliding." Merger talks may be off but there could be a strategic partnership in the works between Microsoft and Yahoo!. The two companies could combat the Google threat by launching a joint portal that would allow the companies to effectively pool their resources and stop wasting money competing against each other.
A joint venture could lead to other larger initiatives down the road. Smaller steps are probably a wise place to start given the size and ingrained culture of each company. This won’t be an easy feat but may prove to be a winning combination if they can successfully work out the details. Microsoft could provide technological know-how and Yahoo! could contribute media expertise.
The joint venture could also give the two companies a significant head-start in terms of branded advertising. Unlike Google, both companies are currently fairly well positioned to capitalize here. From 2005 to 2006, display and rich media ads grew 39% to 4.9 billion dollars (for more information, take a look at this IAB & PricewaterhouseCoopers report). Also, targeted online display advertising (behavioral targeting) will soar from $575 million this year to $1 billion in 2008, and the market will almost quadruple by the end of 2011, reaching $3.8 billion.
Yahoo & Google joint venture
Another option is for Yahoo! to get out of the direct search game and have Google provide results for Yahoo! search. In terms of dollars and cents, with the right distribution deal from Google, Yahoo! could make a huge amount money from search with virtually no headaches. The fact that they’re #2 in the game could come in very handy in this particular scenario. Depending on the partner, distribution deals can be very lucrative (sometimes 80% of revenues for the distributing partner).
Yahoo! could then capitalize on other areas of online advertising—notably branded advertising and/or social media. In terms of social media, Yahoo! owns both Flickr and del.icio.us and has recently tried to acquire Facebook. If this area is played well, Yahoo! could make a significant mark in social media.
This is obviously a scary scenario. With this, Google could potentially control over 80% of the market. For the industry to thrive and innovate, we need more than one significant player in the search arena. With huge growth expected in both search and display advertising, and the new Panama system barely out of the gate, it would be a shame to see Yahoo resort to this option so early in the search game.
Microsoft & aQuantive
Microsoft believes there’s plenty opportunity outside of search. And they’re placing bets on it—six billion dollars worth, to be exact. They believe the assets they’ll acquire through the aQuantive deal including the company’s ad placement service (Atlas) and the ad network (DrivePM) will allow them to take a leadership position in display advertising. “This really is a game changer for us in terms of what happens with advertising, as the display market explodes,” said Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft’s chief advertising strategist in a CNNMoney.com article.
There are also opportunities in search for Microsoft. They could roll search into many of their products to increase market share. Although, Microsoft is losing software share to Mac users and additional competing products, I think there’s significant opportunity for Microsoft. In my experience, conversion rates on Microsoft web properties are excellent. Their obvious issue is search volume. If they’re able to capture a larger share of the market, they’ll be able to more widely demonstrate their quality and Microsoft may grow from there. This may be a far-fetched scenario to some but things have been know to change very quickly in the online world.
There are obviously numerous more possibilities and scenarios. I welcome your input on what you think may happen in the search arena—please comment below.
Mona Elesseily is director of marketing strategy at Page Zero Media, focusing on paid search campaigns and conversion improvement. She's also author of Page Zero's Unauthorized Yahoo! Search Marketing Handbook. She is currently working on the Panama version of the Y!SM Handbook (forthcoming May 2007). The Paid Search column appears Tuesdays at Search Engine Land.
John L. Simson, Executive Director of SoundExchange®, has been involved in the music industry since his 1971 signing with Perception Records as a singer/songwriter. His career has included a ten-year partnership in Studio One Artists, managing country superstar Mary Chapin Carpenter (1988-1995), Steve Forbert (Geffen), Jonell Mosser (MCA), Mike Henderson (RCA) and others. Simson has practiced entertainment law since 1980, and most recently was of counsel to the firm of Berliner, Corcoran & Rowe from 1990 through 1999. Simson joined SoundExchange in March of 2000 and was named its Executive Director in June of 2001.
Simson served as Executive Producer of the PBS television special, "Mary Chapin Carpenter Live At Wolftrap," received an Emmy nomination for his music supervision of the PBS "American Roots Music" special, and also worked on Harry Belafonte's "An Evening With Harry Belafonte and Friends." His other television credits include: Sesame Street 30th Anniversary Special and a network special of the April '97 Presidential Summit, "Keeping America's Promise."
Simson has been very active in the Washington, D.C. Arts community and received the "Outstanding Volunteer Attorney Award" from Washington Area Lawyers for the Arts during its 10th Anniversary celebration. He was one of the founders of the Washington Area Music Association and served as its first President (1985-1990). Simson has also served as Vice President of the Steering Committee of the D.C. Bar's Arts, Entertainment and Sports Law Section and as a Board member and Legal Counsel to the Songwriters Association of Washington.
Simson was elected President of the Washington, D.C. chapter of NARAS (Recording Academy) in April of 2004. He was elected to the Recording Academy Board of Governors in 1997 for the Washington, D.C. chapter, and served three years as a National Trustee of the Academy (1997-2000). Simson has also served on the Board of the Alliance of Artists and Record Companies (AARC), the Washington Area Music Association, Institute For the Arts In Science Education, Inc., Video Culture, Inc., the Takoma/Silver Spring Thunderbolts and the 20th Century Consort. He is a member of the Folk Alliance, the Country Music Association and an alumnus of Nashville's "Leadership Music."
Simson is currently an adjunct professor of Entertainment Law at American University's Washington College of Law, and taught Entertainment Law for two semesters at Catholic University's Columbus School of Law. He has also taught Criminal Procedure at Temple University's School of Criminal Justice, Free Press/Fair Trial at the American University School of Criminal Justice and has lectured frequently on entertainment law and business.
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