48 SuicideGirls Sets in 48 Hours
2006 has been an extraordinary year for SuicideGirls...
We launched SG 4.0 this year, and the attention to and growth of this version of SuicideGirls has surpassed our wildest ambitions.
The SuicideGirls just wrapped up an opening slot for Guns N Roses, in which they played for crowds of up to 15,000 people.
The girls starred in an episode of "CSI: New York" airing on CBS to over 18 million people.
Both "SuicideGirls: The First Tour" and "SuicideGirls: The Italian Villa" can be viewed on Showtime currently.
The site celebrated its 5th anniversary with a star-studded party.
We expanded our newswire coverage and brought you weekly columns by Rob Corddry, Wil Wheaton, Marisa DiMattia, Jonathan Kesselman, Chris Gore and Brad Warner, as well as all the news that is interesting to you updated several times an hour.
We have had interviews with some of the most influential and thought provoking artists and minds of our time. Everyone from David Lynch to Travis Barker to Mister Cartoon have opened up and shared surprisingly honest and intelligent interviews with Daniel Robert Epstein and Marisa DiMattia.
Our radio and video podcasts continue to be some of the most subscribed to on the web.
We welcomed our 1000th SuicideGirl to the site.
We have been lucky enough to have talented new photographers and models from over 60 countries around the world submitting sets and joining our community.
We have some of the most interesting and intelligent members from around the world who are constantly bringing new ideas and perspectives to the community.
In celebration of the best year in the history of SuicideGirls we will be putting up a new set from some of your favorite SuicideGirls every hour this weekend. That is 48 sets, from 48 different SuicideGirls; one new set every hour starting this Saturday at midnight and going through the rest of 2006.
Thank you to all of the members and fans for all of your support over the years. We couldn't have done any of this without you.
Here is to 2007, and all of the wonderful things that it brings.
xoxo
-missy
Cindy Crawford in Over-Exposed Kiddo Controversy
Cindy Crawford outraged critics by allowing her five year old daughter, Kaya, to pose in a risqué photoshoot for a bathing suit company. The company removed from its website photos showing Kaya topless in swimsuit bottoms with a sweet tramp stamp on her back. The photos caused a firestorm online, with cries of kiddie porn and damnation.
Trendy Melissa Odabash beachwear - which has outfitted celebs such as Britney Spears, Uma Thurman and Pamela Anderson - yesterday announced it will pull pics of Kaya from its Web site.
One shows the 5-year-old daughter of Crawford and nightclub owner Rande Gerber posing topless, peeking over her left shoulder at the camera, with white shorts with a lower-back tattoo. Others show her in a string bikini.
"We've gotten calls from all over the place - from 'Access Hollywood,' all over the place," corporate flack Roberta Correia said.
"Unfortunately, we are not able to release any of the pictures or info on the Melissa Odabash shoot," she added in an E-mail. "The pictures are actually no longer going to be on the Web site."
Crawford meanwhile doesnt see a problem with the photos.
Crawford's PR rep initially laughed off the criticism. "Oh my God, that's ridiculous," she said yesterday. "It's a stick-on tattoo!"
Asked for a comment from Kaya's parents, the flack said: "Cindy's friends own this company. It was just a fun little photo shoot they did in Malibu one day. Kaya is not modeling."
You be the judge: would you feel uncomfortable if the photo below was of your daughter or little sister?
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Pinhole-a-go-go
Photography, regardless of your camera of choice, typically involves a lot of expensive equipment. While each commercial camera offers its own range of benefits and results, if you've got a little time to get more involved in the process, pinhole photography is a fun and cheap way to capture an image and learn about how photography works.
A pinhole camera can be made out of any receptacle; big or small, it's basically just a lightproof container for your film with one small hole (a pinhole) which is uncovered to expose your film to a flash of light. The light passes through the pinhole to capture a reversed image onto your photo paper, which will appear when processed. For a more accurate definition and scientific explanation, read photo.net's really, really long description. The results of pinhole photography are not usually predictable; the images tend to be polarized and distorted with light leaks. For best results, try many different homemade cameras to learn what works best!
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To learn how to make your own camera, although there are many methods, here's a fairly basic tutorial. The more lightproof your camera, the more crisp the results will be. For more consistent results, pick up a cheap Holga camera and make your Holga into a pinhole camera. Whatever your results are, be sure to share them with fellow photographers to learn about your camera and how your next can be improved. The SG photography group is a great place to start.
Travel-size Pictures
In a world where more people own digital cameras than Photoshop, email users everywhere are plagued with incoming hi-res image files from friends and family unaware of their enormous snapshots' power to crash computers. Tell everybody you know: here is a useful site to bookmark. Resize2Mail is a free, no-fuss web utility that lets you resize and crop raw jpgs or gifs with the click of a button to web resolution, perfect for email or even posting here on SG.
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For those who still would like to fuss a little, bookmark the advanced options page.
Have Reuters Been Using the Clone Stamp Tool?
Yahoo news is carrying this piece of photojournalism from Reuters.
It shows the aftermath of an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon, but take a closer look at the image. Notice the repeated patterns in the smoke and some of the buildings?
This is being seized upon by some right wing weblogs as evidence that the image was doctored.
Certainly, programs like Photoshop allow you to copy aspects of a photograph elsewhere in the image. To illustrate the point, here's the same photo, but with a few more smoke clouds added using Photoshop's clone stamp tool.
See Left And Right for further examination of this image.
Mag's Breastfeeding Photo Is Too Titillating for Readers
A parenting magazine is at the center of a breastfeeding controversy after featuring a nursing mother on the cover of its August issue.
BabyTalk, a magazine catering to new mothers, received hundreds of letters in response to the photo, with many readers calling it offensive and disgusting.
One mother who didn't like the cover explains she was concerned about her 13-year-old son seeing it.
"I shredded it," said Gayle Ash, of Belton, Texas, in a telephone interview. "A breast is a breast - it's a sexual thing. He didn't need to see that."
Another woman, whos in favor of breastfeeding, said she also wanted to protect her family from seeing unwanted breastage.
"I'm totally supportive of it - I just don't like the flashing," she said. "I don't want my son or husband to accidentally see a breast they didn't want to see."
Because, of course, they always tell her which breasts they do want to see.
The photo was meant to call attention to the current debate over breastfeeding in public. A recent poll found that 57 percent of Americans oppose public breastfeeding, while a new generation of mothers - "lactivists" - are advocating for a woman's right to whip 'em out whenever she needs to.
BabyTalk executive editor Lisa Moran said it's the first time a major U.S. parenting magazine has shown a woman's breast.
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Bad Tattoos
While definitely not wanting to step on the toes of fellow SG Culture Editor and tattoo expert Marisa_DiMattia, I must share the following link. I've been thinking about how great it would be if someone had a website cataloging funny tattoos ever since one of my best friends showed up at my house with a Christmas tree on her arm.
Bad tattoos pretty much needs no explanation. Some are random, some are hilarious, some are disgusting, but all are showcased there for a look and maybe a chuckle.
Photo Location. Clockwise: carrot tattoo on toe, lucky charms full back tattoo, scary clown on shoulder
Hat tip to Meathaus for the link. Clown hat tip to the weirdos who got these.