Day 4 of 9 - (two half days) Interiors and Product at Oodle Noodle

Today's post is going to be in chronological order.

6am: Wake up, got to bed last night at 1pm, so pretty early morning.  

7am-10am: Shoot commercial interiors for the public and catholic schools built by Bird / Graham. This has been a huge project for me, 18 schools across Alberta! The schools are slated to open on Monday, so we needed to get in today to shoot the last interior series for the Edmonton.

10:30am-11:02am: Stain wooden planks for the Oodle Noodle shoot at 1pm.

(eldon checking out the syling)
11:02am-12:04pm: Nap on the couch

12:05pm- woken up by the entourage Margo, Nat and Eva running around the studio prepping for their own things.



1:30pm -5:30pm Show up a few minutes late cause google maps sucks! Then shoot some great Asian food for Oodle Noodle with Eldon (creative director from Ignition Media).


(Because Oodle Noodle is going through a complete revamp and re branding they decided to have their dishes shot properly. My idea was to have an old Asian feel. I wanted to feel like the dishes were placed on old wooden tables (which is why I stained the wood before) with this light coming down from above like in an old Japanese temple. I didn't want it over styled, but I wanted the food to be "bathed" in light.

(Eldon and Sonny making sure that we are on track product wise)
The cool thing was Eldon really wanted the food shot fresh, right from the kitchen. So the owners literally cooked the food right there, placed in on the plate and we shot it right there in the kitchen.

(because the food was fresh we could actually sample it)

interiors of some schools...

6pm-7:30pm...download, post blog and Drive to Calgary to shoot tomorrow staring at 8am again!  Unfortunatly no time to process any of the images... but you get the idea.

Till tomorrow!
Enjoy!

Day 3 of 9

Day 3 of 9

Fashion spread for Derks magazine.

(I hate group photos... so why shoot a group entourage? Because I suck at them and shooting more its the only way to get better.. but im really happy with this one.)

Its 7:40pm and I have to be honest the end of Day 3 feels like the end of Day 8. Today began at 9arrival time to shoot at 11pm.

This shoot is for a bridal fashion magazine, but traditional bridal fashion is not really my thing. Im not into adding textures in post and calling it "fashion" either.

But when I heard Gay hooked up Kelly from the AB Ballet with this uber crazy (Elton John inspired gothic circus gone bad costume). Then I was really on board.

I wanted the shoot to feel like an Mature rated "Tim Burton version of the Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus"

I sketched some ideas last night after my other shoots and brought them to the location in hopes for approval. When I arrived I presented my sketches to Gay. She simply looked at me, smiled and said "Curtis do whatever you want, that's why be brought you on board."

(check out the sketch on the top right, pretty much exactly what I wanted)
We shot this series at Gay and Darryl Derks house. Although the Derks are cool people, I was a little leery a t first when I was told our location was their house.

(you dont see it here... but in my head im thinking WTF am I going to do with this group photo??)

When we arrived I quickly realized their "house" was actually a photographers play ground, complete with vintage furniture, gold painted walls, cool textures everywhere, huge ceilings, props and details around every corner and a back yard garden with slate flagstones!

(originally I was thinking treat him like a puppy...then this came up)
Darryl (also a photographer and owner of Derks formals) even had black out curtains to block light if you wanted to control the day light!

(This is without question my favorite picture)
It was seriously 100 times better than any studio I have shot in! They actually could have charged me a studio rental fee!

I ended up shooting 50%out side on a cool set built by Christina from ID Bohemia... Then I simply moved indoors to shoot against some of the gold walls in the house. I ended up using a complex outdoor light set up for me (two lights :))

Indoors on the golden walls I rocked my friend Curtis's Prophoto Ring flash. As soon as I saw the golden walls, I called Curtis T and asked to borrow his ring flash.

The walls screamed "photograph me with a ring flash" Then I sent my assistant off to pick it up from his place.

So heres what I came up with.

Day 4 of 9 begins tomorrow at 7am. Interiors - then on to product at 1pm.

Oh none of these pictures have been worked on in postproduction they are clean out of camera.

Enjoy!

C

DAY 2 of 9 Product on Location

No Transcend coffee this morning so the first half of the morning was a little rough.  

Today we basically shot the whole day (8hrs) for Matt Aubin over at Pure Vision.

(basically my view since 8am)

We shot a wide range of window products that proved to be quite a challenge and a long process to complete.

We shot on white seamless, but the product (large windows) were also white. So we really needed the dynamic range for PV's team to do their thing with the final images. I ended up shooting on the Phase One so the quality was there right from the start.

(nat cleaning windows, her view since 8 am)

Cant wait to see what the gang at PV does with the images!

Locations are always a challenge because you are basically bringing everything with you and you have to be prepared for everything. We shot on Elinchrom power packs and AC Elinchrom 600 heads.

8am-4pm then right to the studio to process the images.

Day 3 tomorrow, Fashion spread for Derks formals. 8am bright and early!

Black Eyed Peas and Product in Studio.

Day 1 of 9

Black Eyed Peas and Product in Studio.

apl.de.ap from Black Eyed Peas

Today marked the opening of my 9 straight days of shooting. I started the day at 8 am shooting product in studio for Pure Vision. But not before my transcend coffee.

(Taboo from Black Eyed Peas, I love shooting close in black and white... In my opinion rock stars should always be shot in Black and White)

Once I had my caffeine fix, I set up the studio which was pretty simple stuff, product  shot on grey seamless.

(my trancend cappuccino... http://www.transcendcoffee.com/ )

From there I headed over to Rexall place to shoot for the Los Angeles agency that represents Blackberry. Bberry was the main sponsor who brought in the music group the Black Eyed Peas to town.

(Trev putting in a solid 45 minute work day at the studio)

I arrived at 3pm set up go through security, sign off my first born child.

I did some coverage for BlackBerry for a bit then around 7pm set up for the BEP members.

The two band members Taboo and apl.de.ap  showed up for pictures. They hung out for a few frames did their thing (smile, frown, look cool) then headed back to their rooms. Althought the guys were cool,  It was unfortunate that Fergie didn't come out to, but hey that's the life of a rock star.

I then downloaded and turned over the images to the agency right there as per my contract. With the exception of these, which I have permission to use.

If any of you are interested I will be posting daily what will be going on over the next 9 days.

(Me looking happy at 9am)

(Because of the my contract I had to put my credit on the BEP pictures... I really dont like doing that I think its kinda tacky, plus Im too lazy to do it... )

C

Pleasant Surprises

Unlike wedding or family photographers one of the problems with shooting commercial is that you basically have NO control over the creative final output or media buy or the timing of your work being seen.

It may take months or even years for your work to make it into print, sometimes you actually never get to see your work in print because its released in another market or is used for pitches or internal purposes.

You could work 10 shoots in a month and never be able to share your work because of proprietary processes and branding and marketing considerations.



That said its always a pleasant surprise when you open a magazine months later and see your work in an AD the way you envisioned it. Other times you look at the AD and say "Hey isn't that my picture??" or "wow I didn't think the agency would use the work that way!"

This is kind of cool in a way because you as a photographer envision an AD one way, then a designer gets a hold of your images and does his (or her) thing.

I thought I would share a couple with you

The first is a Union Hall ad that appeared in Profile magazine. The shot was originally a huge band series because Union Hall rocks. When Ignition Media asked for this group photo I was kind of like ummm.. it's not that great. But when the designer cropped it that's when it all came together.

As a photographer I had no idea the designer was going to do this.

Next is an ad for Graham construction which has appeared in a lot of trade publications and places live Venture etc...

I shot this series at a plant under construction and we did two images of the Buggy and the Truck. Graham uses both. I really liked the picture of the Buggy.

It's cool, has presence and is composed well.

But the client obviously wanted to see their company logo, which is not seen on the Buggy, so I understand why they went with the truck photograph.


C

EXILES (Exclusive Page) www.exiles.ca

EXILES (Exclusive Page) 

Many of you may know from my Blog, I collect original high end comic art. I also read several graphic novels. So its safe to say I am well steeped in the Comic universe.  

 So I have been following an online web comic called Exiles.  

Exiles blends popular Vampire lore with current events and strong religious undertones (Check out the series and see what I mean) Its one of the most impressive stories I have read in quite some time.

The story and art are created by Paul LaRue who hails from Edmonton Alberta (which is super cool). I have worked with Paul before on several commercial projects so when he launched the web comic I followed it closely.

Since its first page hit the net I was very interested in the book. Very early on I was hooked. Last week Paul let me know about an exclusive page he drew as a three panel a mini sub plot, which I could post on my blog. This mini sub plot takes place shortly after pages 9 and 13.

Its about a CSI photographer who is photographing the crime scene.... I am super stoked because the photographer looks somewhat familiar to me... Hopefully nothing bad happens to the photographer if he ever pops up later in the Exiles universe.

I am told Exiles will eventually make it to print form in the near future. Im not sure about the details, just that eventualy its coming.

Check it out, if you like it you can sign up for updates.  

Exiles Comic



Make sure to check it out from page 1. But I promise you around the 30-40 there are some super cool reveals, which would be relevant to alot of people,  but you need to know the full story to feel the impact of the reveal.  

Enjoy!

C

Random Images

Here is kind of a random sampling of images.

The first one is of the former Premier of Alberta Ralph Kline. The portrait is a bit older but its strong because he makes such a bold statement on the page, which is rare for a politician. I am pulling the image from my archives to appear in an photography exhibit put on by Aaron over at three ten. The exhibit opens in September.

Another is of Ed Hervey a former pro football player who is now a pro football coach.

Here are also some interiors of I shot of Delux restaurant in West Edmonton Mall. I shot the interiors at 7am on a Sunday, which was way too early for me, but we needed to get in before the restaurant opened.

Delux is part of the Century Hospitality group whom I've been shooting interiors for the past 5 years. Century owns quite an array of restaurants http://www.centuryhospitality.com/.

Finally the last is a cover I shot for a national first nations magazine. The concept was show that the subject was split between his native and north American roots.

Enjoy!