angelic pretty really doesnt do photos like it used to huh :(
Appologies in advance to anyone who reads this whole ramble. I would say yes and no. The most recent catalog shoot is very subdued compared to the editing in older shoots.
However, I do think it's a little intentional? It's hard to get a model to look this cookie cutter in every image. I think they were going for a weird doesn't-quite-look-real doll thing.
That said, I also think that they are doing less for 3 reasons. One, a lot of what they were doing that was "more" wasn't for catalogs, it was for magazines, and it may have been the magazines doing the shoots. Two, I think they are doing a lot more online advertising than print catalog advertising these days and these "boring" images show the detail of the clothes off better when they are used as stock photos online. And third, the art direction for AP changed when Candy left and whoever has been handling it for sure has a taste for something much more simple.
I'm guessing this comment is based on this post I reblogged from JMagazines. So, that post just is captioned "Angelic Pretty - March 2013" and when I reblogged it, I remember thinking "mmm, I don't think this is all the information". So, I just dug through my books because I was certain I owned the magazine this is from, but I was also certain it wasn't a normal catalog, and it's not. This is from the Angelic Pretty Museum e-MOOK With Sugary Carnival Tote. The e-MOOK 宝島社ブランドムック (e-MOOK Takarajimasha Brand Mook) series was a series of Mooks that came with an item. A mook is basically a cross between a magazine and a book. They are bound like books and contain some information that is meant to be "timeless" as well as some information that is more time-sensitive (like the latest collections from specific designers), but the time-sensitive information is presented in a more artistic way so that even after the information is "expired" it's still enjoyable. Many mooks are published in serial like magazines, but it's not uncommon to see a mook published less frequently than a magazine (so where some fashion magazines are usually 12 or 24 issues per year, mooks are most often 2, 4 or 12 issues). Probably the Mook that most lolita are most familiar with is the Gothic & Lolita Bible series, or perhaps Larme.
Anyways, the e-MOOK Takarajimasha Brand Mook series would take a brand / IP like Angelic Pretty, Baby, Pink House, Disney, Madeline, Peter Rabit, and so on and do a collaboration with them (example on Amazon Japan). The peak years for these was like 2011-2014 IIRC. They would produce a low-cost version of an item featuring the brand's art, usually a tote bag, but there were also folding umbrellas, lap blankets, cosmetic cases, purses, and so on. And then they would make a book to go with it, and these two things would be packaged together in a book-shaped box and put on the magazine shelf in places that sell magazines. So the idea is that someone who maybe wouldn't buy an AP purse for retail price, might buy this mook for ¥1,500 that comes with a "free" tote bag.
This particular book was themed as the "Angelic Pretty Museum" and opens with an artistic photoshoot, which is what was in the post, here are a couple images for context. This looks very ETC in Spoon to me.
There is then a 4-page spread of the latest dresses. Next is the table of contents, which lists 11 items completly arbitrarily because they aren't the main content items in the mook. It has print galleries where it shows a swatch of a print with the name + some random items with info. It has a series of makeup and coord tutorials. There are street snaps and then some celebrities wearing AP + what they are up to right now, a timeline of AP's history, an interview with Maki and Asuka, a gallery of AP postcards, a gallery of novelty items, "reader" photos of people around the world wearing AP + letters and cards and other gifts AP was given, a gallery of collaboration items, and thena 2012 teaparty event report. It's presented overall as an artbook / fan book, and a lot of the jfashion e-MOOK Takarajimasha Brand Mooks lean really heavy on photoshoots + photoshoped page layouts like this. I assume it's because they fill space without having to write anything, and the brands just don't have a whole lot to write about. This particular one is honestly better than a lot of the ones I have content-wise. Some of them are very, very light on actual content. And the more issues they made with a brand, the more likely they were to run out of things to say / re-publish a re-write of the same timeline of the brand.
It's worth noting the photoshoot in the little staple bound booklet with the phone case they sold in a similar way the same year had pretty simple photos:
And while the summer AP catalog from 2013 uses a couple photoshoot sets like this kitchen, it also included normal old "there is a backdrop behind this model" photos.
I think in the case of the e-mooks it's really more of the e-mook art director trying to put together "content" and pushing the envelope on styling than it is AP actually producing these photos as "normal" AP photoshoots. If you go over to AP's instagram, there are also more poses for each of the photos for this current collection that didn't make it onto the gallery on the website. However, it does still feel very website-stock-photo-y to me. Which is weird, because Insta doesn't favor this kind of post, it favors video. Now, that said, Innocent World is doing almost the exact same thing, except they post a little video of midori and misako doing the same exact twirl in each set of dresses.
I do think Both IW and AP are shooting whole catalogs back-to-back with the same model(s), same backdrop, same hair and makeup now, which also suggest that they just aren't spending nearly as much time/money on the photoshoots as AP used to. Both brands are also selling out on a lot of their stuff, so, like, IDK, it might just not be cost effective to them to invest in elaborate photoshoots when they aren't publishing anything other than a catalog/lookbook and even that is selling out when it's "boring".
I do think the decline of print media is for sure lowering the quality / quantity of "official" photoshoots we are getting though.
