End of day one

Orientation was this afternoon and we got our little tour of the events centre and a general rundown of the week ahead. Some of the rules have changed, but pretty much all for the better. Like, we now don't have to submit 3 photos every day, but just a bunch AFTER the week is over, which is kinda nice - takes the pressure off a bit. We also now don't have to wear the official Samsung t-shirts all week, which would normally be a good thing, except I packed based on the fact we'd be wearing these supplied t-shirts all week. Dang it. Oh well.....might just have to go and buy some new clothes!! (Fraser, you should probably stop reading this now).

We've all been assigned our 'brand' for the week to submit 20 photos of to tell the brand story. I got given Stoli vodka, which is actually a pretty cool one, as it will be lots of people drinking, having a good time etc, and there is an official Stoli lounge where everyone can hangout in. Some of the other contestants got some tougher brands like Westpac, Sunday Star Times and Kohler (yup the kitchen/bathroom fixtures) so I was pretty pleased with mine. This is a separate competition and there's a Samsung telly up for grabs for this section.

The rest of the contestants seem nice enough. Haven't really spoken with many that much yet. Seems to be a lot of students and mostly girls.

It's a much bigger event than I anticipated. The smaller runway seats 400 pax and the main one seats 600 alongside the 30m runway. Plus there's 300 volunteers behind the scenes making it happen for the 40 odd designers that are showing. 

At orientation, we met Pieter Stewart, founder and chair of NZ Fashion Week, and she was pretty cool - very down to earth. Also saw Michael Ng who's the official NZFW photographer and is pretty awesome in the photography world. Our mentor for the week is another well known photographer, Steve King who is super nice and who's job is to basically look after us all week, and help out with technical, creative and allround NZFW advice.

Tomorrow's a day of rest so will spend it catching up on a few bits and pieces, while hanging out in my top storey of an Fire Station old water tower! Its pretty awesome, with some mint views.

Here's some visuals, nothing too creative - just from the ol camera phone.

Where the magic happens.....

Old fashion meets future fashion 

(I actually just think this old man turn a wrong turn and was trying to find his way out)

All access baby!!

One of the views from my 360 degree vista