Advertising / PotD / video

Moving Portraits

August 10, 2015

The whole of life is just like watching a film. Only it’s as though you always get in ten minutes after the big picture has started, and no-one will tell you the plot, so you have to work it out all yourself from the clues. ― Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]For all the many facets of photography there may be, portraits probably account, anecdotally, for 60-70% of all commercial business. Weddings, high school seniors, family, babies, and headshots dominate the commercial side of the business and can be financially rewarding for those who dedicate their efforts to doing them well. In fact, I don’t know too many photographers who don’t engage in some form of portraiture. Just yesterday, I sat in the floor of the studio with bubbles dripping on my head while trying to convince a tiny one to smile. Portraits may well be the heart and soul of photography as a business.

So, if we’re going to talk this week about the use of moving pictures as a marketing tool, and that is exactly what we’re doing, then it only makes sense that we look at portraits and how we might turn a simple, beautiful photograph into something more without sacrificing the integrity of the image. Right away, we are faced with a problem. Portraits are typically oriented with the vertical side being longer. Video, however, is oriented so that the horizontal side is longer. Try putting a vertically-oriented portrait into a video setting and two severe problems occur: the picture size has to be reduced to fit the frame, and large black borders dominate the screen.

Solving those problems means not only choosing a landscape-oriented photo, but cropping it to meet the dimensions necessary for final output. This information is not obvious when working with Adobe® PremierPro™. If there is a way to manually set the dimensions of the stage, or what photographers might think of as the canvas, I’ve not found it yet. Instead, PremierePro sizes the visual area according to the dimensions of the first visual media placed on the timeline. I assume this isn’t a huge problem when working with video, since the orientation there should match camera output, but with still photographs it means knowing to what output format you will export, and cropping the image to the dimensions of that format. We chose YouTube’s 1080p HD format as our final destination, so we needed to crop the image to 1920×1080 pixels before importing it into the project.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Video interpolates images differently than do printers, so we have to consider the qualities of our image very carefully before importing it into the project. Specifically, one needs to make sure the color setting is RGB, not CMYK, even if the image is black and white, which we will explore later this week. Clarity is always an issue, but here we have to be careful about using any sharpening tricks or filters because they can create lines that look jagged and pixelated when rendered for video. Our test is to zoom in on the image to 400% and look for, and eliminate, any flaws at that level.

For a portrait as delightfully wonder as this one, I didn’t feel that moving around all over the place served the image well, especially since we only have 30 seconds. So, for the majority of the time we see the full image. When we do zoom in, it’s to the places one’s eyes are naturally drawn: the flowers and the faces. We end with focus on the faces because, in any portrait, that is what is most important.

Music was a critical issue here as well and trying to find 30-second clips in the public domain is almost impossible. The soundtrack one chooses to go with an image is probably the most important decision one makes here after selecting an image. Music guides not only the emotion of the video but also plays a defining role in determining when movement takes place. The music and the animation need to match or the video format doesn’t work at all. Some minor DJ skills were necessary in clipping and overlapping the audio track so that the final guitar chord would occur at just the right place in the video. No one ever said this was going to be easy.

I like this one slightly better than I did yesterday’s video. It still took a tremendous amount of time to produce, though, and the learning curve here is extremely steep, even with already having some (limited) knowledge of video processing. I have little doubt my perspective on the whole issue of video is going to be different by the end of the week than it is at this particular moment. For the moment, I still prefer my portraits to be still, thank you. The original photo is below.[/one_half_last]

Flowers For Raven (2014). Models: Jenn & Raven King

Advertising / PotD / video

Experiments In Moving Pictures

August 9, 2015

Howard Hughes was this visionary who was obsessed with speed and flying like a god… I loved his idea of what filmmaking was. —Martin Scorsese

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]I have no idea what I’m doing. This week will either be delightfully interesting or a catastrophic disappointment. We are delving into an area about which I admit knowing very little but one which, it would seem, is necessary if one is to stay up to date with how best to present oneself as a photographer. Okay, up to date may not be the best term. Jumping the gun is probably more appropriate. Most people are still just fine posting still pictures. No one has told me that I need to change. No photographers of note have started doing anything differently than they always have. I’m responding to what I see as some “handwriting on the wall,” as it were, warning that we need to up our game if we are going to stay relevant.

What I’m responding to are changes in how material is viewed, and how often it is viewed, in social media. Whether one likes social media or not, and there are plenty of reasons to hate it, we cannot escape the fact that it is a dominant part of society, taking over the space that was once exclusive to newspapers and television. The good news is that, unlike newspapers and television, we can participate without it costing an arm and a leg. The challenge is that we cannot be successful with the same techniques we’ve been using since we first discovered the Internet.

We’ve known for quite some time that actually getting your pictures in front of the people on your friends list, or the people who have liked your professional page, is difficult. Facebook is continually revising their algorithms and other resources such as Twitter, Instagram, and Tumblr change what gets preference in being seen. Where once that preference leaned strongly toward photographs, it now tilts even more strongly toward video. In some instances, video is three to four times more likely be seen than a photograph without paying for additional promotion, something most of us are reticent to do. So, we need to find a way to create video without succumbing to actually changing the photographs we take.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Creating moving pictures from still photographs is nothing new. We’ve been able to stitch strings of still images together with simple video effects for several years. Videos in that format are extremely popular at weddings and family reunions. They have their place. But, when a photographer places a photograph on the Internet, it is primarily for promotional purposes and ten-minute-long videos of someone else’s family don’t quite make the cut for that purpose. We need something short, something distinct, and something eye-catching that convinces people to take some kind of action, such as visiting our web site’s booking page. Something that acts more like a commercial.

So, all this week we’re taking still images, just one picture per day, and turning it into a video of approximately 30 seconds (today’s is actually 32 seconds). We’re using Adobe® PremierePro™ for editing, and Media Encoder for rendering. We’re at least starting with the basic materials that come with each product, though I can’t promise we won’t look for other sources by midweek. We’re pulling music from Free Music Archive, and yes, music is important for projects like this. We kept titles minimal today, but that may change through the week as well.

Everything I just mentioned in that paragraph involved learning something new. This 32-second video took all day to produce. I’m really hoping I get better quickly. One of the first things I’ve learned is that planning is more necessary than ever. But then, sometimes one can’t plan if one doesn’t know first how to do something. Ultimately, the matter comes down to whether any of this is actually effective. Will more people see the video in social media? Will we see more traffic to our website? Do moving pictures actually help? That’s the purpose of the experiment. We will see.

The original photo is below because we still like images that don’t move.[/one_half_last]

Back to 55 (2012). Model: Allison Hublar

Advertising / Photography / PotD

Varying Effects

July 17, 2015

Drink More Tequila

Advertising may be described as the science of arresting the human intelligence long enough to get money from it. ― David Honegger

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Nowhere do the varying effects of Photoshop™ draw more criticism than in advertising. I understand why: people are inherently wired to believe what they see; we are not inclined to ask questions. Even with the Internet being over 20 years old, we still tend to trust what we see, especially if it is in print. Yet, if one thinks for a moment, where is the most logical place to manipulate images if it isn’t in an attempt to sell something? After all, there are some boring products out there and without a little pizzazz to spark some interest there’s no way anyone would ever just think to examine the product on their own.

Fashion, and any other ad that features women, draw the most criticism for how they manipulate an image, especially when it comes to body shape and size. Women have, for as long as there have been print ads, used the examples they see in magazines and catalogs as a basis for judging their own bodies and, subsequently, their own self-worth. As a result, for as long as there have been print ads (which originally had to use illustrations rather than photographs), there have been people complaining that the example set forth is “not real,” and “impossible to achieve.” Yet, while campaigns such as Dove’s “Real Women” at least try to move the industry, and women’s opinions, the opposite direction, years of sales evidence points to the fact that people don’t buy products when the image is too realistic. Sexy sells every time, even if it is totally a work of fiction.

What’s amazing is that we know better. We know that ads lie to us, that images have had varying effects applied to them, that claims are deceptive and that some bust-to-waist ratios defy the laws of physics. We have experienced these things our entire lives, we’ve criticized them in conversation, we’ve had countless studies done to prove the degree to which some industries lie more than others (Big Tobacco, anyone?). Still, at the end of the day, when the dollars are counted and the sales added up, the ads work.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]For the most part, I prefer to keep my images within the realm of reason and only apply varying effects that I feel aid the communicative qualities of the image overall. There are always exceptions to that rule, though, and today’s image is certainly one of them. With the proliferation of mobile ads popping up everywhere one looks, it is more important than ever to create images that stand out, that are different, and able to grab one’s attention at first glance. Sometimes, that means going for a more extreme effect such as those composited together for this image.

The original picture (seen below) is hardly recognizable by comparison to the finished product. If one were to drop the same copy over the grey/blue background of the original image, it would get lost. Even changing the colors wouldn’t help that much. As an ad, the original image doesn’t have what it takes to stand out from the crowd. On its own, sure, it’s a nice portrait of a lovely young woman. But if we’re selling tequila we have to apply a number of varying effects to create an image that gets attention. Reality isn’t a concern because reality isn’t our goal. We want an image that looks interesting. The copy, which is a modification of a quote by Ernest Hemingway, encourages one to drink for the specific purpose of leaving reality behind. So, we created an image that is interesting, with little concern for reality.

In our criticism of manipulated photos and all the varying effects applied to them, we forget, I think, that we’re really not interested in looking at reality. We don’t read novels for the reality. We don’t go to the movies for the reality. Even reality television is an over-edited caricature of reality (and the whole genre is losing popularity). We get our fill of reality when we look in the mirror. Fortunately, the varying effects of good photo manipulation hides reality just long enough for us to pull out our wallets. The economy works, we keep our jobs, and the world continues spinning. There’s reality for you.[/one_half_last]

You’ll Dream of Me (2014)

Art / Photography / PotD

Varying Emotions

July 13, 2015

An Artful Card

It’s much easier on the emotions when one sees life as an experiment rather than a struggle for popularity.― Criss Jami, Killosophy

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]How we feel when we look at a picture, that very first split-second glance, says a lot about how we will ultimately respond to the whole image. If one perceives a picture as flirty, sexy, or possibly even obscene, we are not likely to take seriously any message it may want to convey. If that immediate reaction causes us to feel happy, curious, humorous we are more likely to investigate further and pay attention to any communication forthcoming. Our first response to a photograph is based on emotion and to the extent we can manipulate an image to vary that emotion we change who finds an image appealing.

Dealing with other people’s emotions is tricky, of course, and there’s no guarantee that people will respond how we expect. The advertising world is full of examples, almost daily, of ads where the imagery is so totally off-point that one wonders how they made it out the door. Yet, we can be sure that an entire room full of well-educated and experienced people had looked at that picture and thought it conveyed the exact emotion they wanted. We can also be sure they are surprised to find out they were wrong. Playing with other people’s emotions is necessary, but can backfire in a huge way if not well-tested.

One of the biggest mistakes I made when starting out on my own was creating a two-sided business card that was too sexy on one side. One side was a fairly standard head shot; neat, clean, and well-balanced, nothing surprising or potentially offensive. The other side, however, was a picture of a very busty young woman wearing a white fishnet dress on a white background. She was crouched so that nothing too personal was showing, but there was no question that nothing was beneath the fishnet.

Watching how people responded to that card was an important lesson. If I handed them the card with the headshot side up, their response was generally positive until they saw the second side, at which point many cards were returned to me. Not only did they not like the picture, people didn’t want the card in their possession. If I handed them the card with the sexy side up, something I was careful about doing, more people actually kept the card but were still careful about letting others see it.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]Perhaps the most telling response came the night I happen to come across a very popular professional baseball player. Social aspects of the gathering put us in conversation together and eventually, after exhausting how wonderful a season he had just finished, he asked what I did for a living. I handed him my card, headshot side up, and he started to put it in his jacket pocket without looking at the other side. However, his wife caught a glimpse of the other side from across the room and immediately came rushing over to investigate.

Upon looking at the card she apologized for her reaction. “I’m sorry, I thought you were giving him tickets to a strip club,” she explained.

There were dozens of variations I could have applied to that card that would have changed the immediate emotion while still keeping the basic aspect of the image in tact but I went with what appealed to me rather than what experience told me would work. Not paying attention to the emotional content of an image as small as a business card caused a lot more trouble than I had anticipated.

Changes to today’s image weren’t many and didn’t take long, but totally change the emotional impact of the picture. The original (below) is flat, the colors dull, contrast is too soft, and the gradient between highlights and shadows is too flat. One’s first impression of that picture is likely to be somewhere in the range of dismissive. A few changes make the colors more intense, the highlights and shadows more extreme, and looks more artistic rather than borderline pornographic. Toss in the name of a salon, and the image becomes appealing to the salon’s primary audience. Emotional content has changed.

Varying emotions are easy to manipulate in a photograph. Getting it correct, however, isn’t always quite so simple. My best advice is to proceed with caution and never rely solely upon your own opinion. Test, re-test, and then test some more. Even then, be ready for surprises.[/one_half_last]

A Private Moment (2012)

Advertising / Photography / PotD

Wide Open Spaces

June 12, 2015

Before Leaving (2012)

“The irony of rule followers is they often quote a lot of people that do not follow as many rules as they do.” ― Shannon L. Alder

[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Creative people have never liked feeling they were limited in any way. Adventurous people are much the same. Chances are, if you’re a friend of mine, you’re not a fan of limitations, either. Breaking rules? Hell yeah!

There is a song sounding like it’s from the old west that says:

Oh, give me land, lots of land under starry skies above
Don’t fence me in
Let me ride through the wide open country that I love
Don’t fence me in

Let me be by myself in the evenin’ breeze
And listen to the murmur of the cottonwood trees
Send me off forever but I ask you please
Don’t fence me in

Cole Porter, who wrote the song based on a poem by Robert Fletcher, was nowhere near the “old west,” though. He wrote the song for a movie that was never produced. Go figure. Some ten years later, the song was given to Roy Rogers who made it a hit because, you know, horses and cowboys and those legendary wide open space were a big hit in post-war America. Interestingly enough, Porter never really liked the song all that much.

A lot of people feign amusement with the concept of wide open spaces, including space itself. Yet, when we find it, not too many of us are actually comfortable. Where space is truly plentiful, where there is an absence of things, there is also an absence of people, anyone with whom one might have a decent conversation, and from there matters quickly get boring. And lonely. And suddenly those wide open spaces aren’t looking quite as good as they did when one first arrived.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 10px”]When it comes to space, I live in a world of sometimes uncomfortable juxtaposition. A very basic rule of photography is to fill the frame; make the whole picture interesting, give the eye plenty to see, but make sure it’s all cohesive. At the same time, though, advertising needs space, white space, sometimes a great deal of space, for all the copy that goes into an ad. Some are simple, with little more than a product logo and copyright/trademark notices. Others, especially those having anything to do with medicine, can be quite extensive with a requirement for a full list of possible side effects. For those ads, there’s no such thing as too much space.

Today’s picture breaks the fill the frame rule. Maybe it’s still the ad person left in me, but I like the space. I like that there’s room for copy, a lot of copy, but no copy exists. In my mind, the space gives the mind room to create its own story, its own copy, to go along with the picture. We titled the image, “Before Leaving,” because the way in which her body is slightly turned gives one the impression that perhaps she is on her way out the door. Why? That’s for you to decide. Maybe she’s looking for pants. Maybe she’s about to take a shower. Maybe she’s changed her mind and doesn’t like you as much as you thought. Maybe she’s not a fan of the space.

Giving an image space, sometimes a lot of space, leaves a story open to almost endless possibilities. I like that mystery, myself. I’m not looking for a world all neatly bundled together and fitting nicely into a frame. I enjoy concepts that require thinking for myself. For me, space is a friend and I frequently break this rule, especially for portraits. Let this moment be endless, not boxed and framed and predictable.

Just don’t fence me in. Please. Whatever you do. [/one_half_last]

Photography / PotD / Social Commentary

Not Quite Naked: Implied

May 17, 2015

INTENSITY (2012)

“When I met her you could tell she was on the verge. She was a girl becoming a woman. We took those pictures and I thought she looked so beautiful and having a little bit of an edge to her. She loved doing the pictures, and she was made to feel bad for doing them.” Photographer Annie Leibovitz in LA Times interview with Steve Appleford, April 19, 2014. Annie Leibovitz talks Taschen book, Miley Cyrus, John & Yoko

[one_half padding=”4px 8px 0 4px”]In the world of television there is this annual ritual called The Upfronts. This is where networks show samples, sometimes whole episodes, of what they plan on broadcasting in the fall in hopes that advertising executives will encourage their clients to purchase ad time during these programs. Upfronts are a huge party with a huge payoff and networks typically spare no expense trotting out their biggest stars in order to impress the host of advertising and media bigwigs assembled.

So, it was with interest I watch as Adult Swim announced Miley Cyrus was going to be performing this past week at their Upfronts. There was no way this wasn’t going to be interesting and sure enough, Miley didn’t disappoint. In case you’ve not already seen the pictures, she came on stage wearing a giant set of butterfly wings and not much else. Her breasts were fully exposed, her nipples covered with butterfly pasties. She wore a pair of white tights as well, but under the stage lights seeing through those wasn’t terribly difficult. For all practical purposes, she may as well have been naked. What was obvious was the fact that Miley was having fun and the rather uptight advertising suits were more than a little uncomfortable, especially when she told them where to lick her.

All this brought me back to 2008 when Vanity Fair photographer Annie Leibovitz shot a 15-year-old Miley with only her back exposed. You would have thought she had shot Hanna Montana live on the evening news for all the furor it created. Annie was demonized by practically every outlet on the planet for daring to “sexualize” a young woman in such a way. Miley was forced to apologize (and then later recanted). Vanity Fair threatened to not pay for the pictures. Everyone wondered if Annie’s famed career was over and what would happen to Miley as a result of this “horrible abuse.”

Well, now we know, don’t we?[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 8px”]Americans don’t know how to handle the nude form. Little difference is made for efforts made toward being socially appropriate or artistically posed; Americans see bare skin and automatically achieve a state of hyper-hysteria that causes them to have difficulty breathing, blurred vision, and an unrealistic fear of judgement from the late Jerry Falwell. Just the notion that a person may not have been wearing clothes when a photograph was taken causes those who feel they must protect the innocence of the world to become absolutely apoplectic. There’s no attempt to understand, no regard for artistry, they’re just angry.

At least, until they think no one is looking. I watch with routine amusement as my website stats fluctuate from day to day. On days when the #POTD is a landscape, hardly anyone pays attention; numbers are in the cellar. Days when the #POTD is an attractive young person see a more respectable hit count based largely on how popular that particular model might be. Let me post a picture that hints at nudity though, even if it’s implied, and watch the traffic soar! This isn’t unique to my site but is an exact reflection of traffic patterns across the Internet. If you want attention, post a picture of someone naked.

Social media hypocritically decries nudity while at the same time enjoying the fact that even there a little skin increases their traffic. They’ve each re-written their rules over time to allow for as much skin as possible without actually giving into allowing “real” nudity. So, it is in deference to Facebook and other such sites that we’re focusing this week on photos that are not quite naked. You won’t see any nipples. For that matter, you won’t always even catch side boob. Our goal is to give one reason to think about the artistry of the human body and just how messed up society’s reaction is. We hope you’ll join us. We hope you’ll think.[/one_half_last]

Advertising / PotD

Sugar Cream Pie

May 2, 2015

7 Billboards You’ll (probably) Never See. Day Seven: Sugar Cream Pie

[one_half padding=”4px 8px 0 4px”]There’s no question that Indiana’s reputation has taken quite a hit in the past month because of all the political gaffes that managed to garner nationwide attention … and embarrassment. By the time all the talking and maneuvering and political posturing was complete, Hoosiers were left wondering who they could trust. Certainly none of the politicians are worthy. Bakeries took a hit. Pizza took a hit. Repair shops took a hit. Corporations threatened to pull out of the state. This was the time for the good people, the reasonable people, of Indiana, the ones who care, the ones who welcome everyone to their state, to do some deep soul searching about where to place their trust and what traditions were really worth keeping.

The answer is simple: Sugar Cream Pie.

Sugar cream pie is to Indiana what apple pie is to the rest of the country. This pie originated here, or at least that’s the story food historians are telling. Amish and Shaker wives of the 1800s would bake this sweet, simple pie during those times of the year when apples weren’t naturally available, such as early Spring. Often they would skim the cream directly off the top of fresh milk to make a pie that is rich, sweet, but uncomplicated in its taste. Ingredients were cheap and readily available year-round, making it a perfect dessert even in the most brutal of winters.

I’ll admit that I had to break my rule about using pictures from the archives for today’s image. I really thought I had a picture of sugar cream pie somewhere in the mix, but if I do it’s stuck someplace where I can’t find it. So, that meant I had to go find, and shoot, a piece of sugar cream pie. Oh horror of horrors, I thought with the deepest of sarcasm. I couldn’t give myself a better assignment. I already knew of a couple of places that made the sweet dessert, but they were both across town and require careful timing to get there before all the pie is gone. I asked around and food writer Jolene Ketzenberger suggested a few places she knew make a good pie. One was directly in the path of other errands we needed to run. Easy.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 8px”]Locally Grown Gardens is one of those places I’ve passed hundreds of times, especially when walking on the Monon Trail, but never actually visited, despite the constant aroma of deliciousness pouring from the place. Chef Ron Harris has created a country-style market most recognizable for its locally grown vegetables that sit out front. I knew they had sandwiches and meats that drew people from all over, but I wasn’t aware they had pie until now.

We arrived late morning, just as the early lunch crowd was showing up. I looked around, and there, behind the counter, sat one last piece of sugar cream pie. There was one person in line before me. I was worried. Glancing around, though, I discovered there were more pies waiting. Chef Harris was prepared. I ordered my pie and took it to the sun room/library to photograph, not really worrying that the other people already in the room might think I was nuts. Once I was certain I had enough pictures, I sat down and promptly devoured the object of my very-short-term affection. The pie was everything it promised to be: warm, sweet, simple, and delicious.

Sugar cream pie isn’t especially difficult to make and recipes are easy enough to find. Recipes, of course, vary and every Hoosier family that has lived here more than a couple of generations seems to have their own version. No matter where you find it, though, you know it’s going to be delicious. Sugar cream pie is a wholesome Hoosier trait more reliable than anything, or anyone, else. Sugar cream pie can be trusted.

This is the last in our series of Billboards You’ll (probably) Never See. I hope you’ve had as much fun with them as we have. Next week we take a look at photographs that remind us of songs. We hope you’ll join us every day. Remember, you can subscribe at the bottom of the page and get an email to let you know the instant we’ve published a new entry![/one_half_last]

Advertising / Mythology / PotD

Popular Mythologies

May 1, 2015

7 Billboards You’ll (probably) Never See. Day Six: Popular Mythologies

[one_half padding=”4px 8px 0 4px”]People have always created gods as they’ve had a need for them. My late father, a Southern Baptist pastor whose views he considered conservative now seem at the very least moderate compared to today’s denomination, frequently explained that the need for God was inherent in man because there was no other way to explain the things their minds could not understand. Prior to Galileo, humans thought the universe revolved around the earth because God had placed it at the center of the universe. Before Sir Issac Newton’s ponderings on why apples fall from trees educated people used God to explain what we now call gravity. Wherever there is a void in understanding, humans have filled the empty intellectual space with deity; sometimes a great number of them. When one looks at the process over time, it really is rather amusing.

Finding the very beginning of religion is difficult because its earliest traditions and stories were strictly oral. If one considers the remnants of ritualistic burial behavior, an almost-certain sign of religious activity, religion was present as early as 250,000 BCE. Those ancient mythologies were polytheistic with the number of deities varying dramatically from tribe to tribe. While tracking ancient Asian and Northern European mythologies is difficult, we know that by 5000 BCE semi-nomadic peoples along the Nile River, what would eventually become Egypt, had a very elaborate set of deities and as that society developed, their leaders, called Pharaohs, were assigned deistic power, beginning a long mythological tradition of god-men.

Around 3000 BCE, once language was largely codified in textual form, the number of recognizable mythologies seems to explode. Actually, most of these are formalized versions of more ancient oral myths, but setting them to print had the effect of universalizing the belief system so that it remained consistent from one location to another and also established a more firm code of discipline for those whose behavior put them outside their mythology. Religion was a critical part of keeping society together in this age and no one even considered questioning what was being handed down from generation to generation. They had no desire, no curiosity, to know about things outside the very dangerous and frequently lethal realities of the here and now.[/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 4px 0 8px”]Most of the religions we recognize now had their beginnings between 500 BCE and 500 CE. Everything from Buddhism to Zoroastrianism, Christianity to Islam are all born during or near this period (Islam didn’t actually begin until the seventh century). Religion during this period is cultural with belief systems giving definition to specific people groups. By the time Constantine The Great became emperor in 306 CE, religion’s political influence had grown to the point that it became a part of his government. Expansion of the Roman Empire under Constantine not only meant administrative and financial reform, but saw the first significant spread of a religion outside its base geography. One’s religious beliefs became more of a political statement than a matter of actual faith.

Education and travel led to challenges within the world’s major religions and by the 17th century Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism had all split into a number of different sects or denominations that reflected changes in social attitudes. People of reason, who had been hiding quietly amongst themselves began to loudly question the validity of a first-century god in modern society and fewer of them were being killed for their opposition. The concept of a secular government, as opposed to a religiously dominated one, took hold and fostered significant revolutions most notably in the United States but also in France and Russia, eventually spreading across much of Europe and Asia with the political concepts of socialism and communism.

We continue to morph belief systems to fit our social needs and fill the gaps in our understanding to the point those early founders would likely not recognize their religions today. Reason and dependence on science has developed into its own cult, sparring with more traditional belief systems. Present an idea, give it a snazzy title and a great website, and someone will bite. Today’s billboard isn’t anti-religion but a statement of the obvious. Some people will believe anything, which makes all belief systems suspect and none fit for government.

Maybe today’s billboard isn’t so unrealistic after all.[/one_half_last]

Behind The Scenes / PotD

A Moment To Relax

April 22, 2015

Behind The Scenes: Rosewood Cookies (2011). Model: Kristina

Long days of shooting multiple concepts is exhausting both mentally and physically. Different people use different tricks to keep going and that sometimes leads to behind the scenes antics that are more entertaining than what actually happens on set.

[one_half padding=”4px 8px 0 2px”]Models will quickly tell you that even under the best of circumstances, shooting multiple concepts in a day can be exhausting on every level. Wardrobe changes, location changes, makeup changes, and just trying to wrap one’s head around the different concepts, with different posing styles, requires a lot of energy and effort that doesn’t seem like a lot when divided into small segments but builds up over the course of a day. Given all that is demanded of them, it’s not too surprising that they each have different ways of coping with the stress.

Different studios and agencies have different rules, of course, and those rules have evolved dramatically over the past 30 years. When I first started, it wasn’t the least bit unusual for everyone to take a smoke break in the studio. No one ever gave a second thought to the health concerns that would soon enough force changes in smoking laws. Large clients would provide a Kraft services table that might contain fruit and vegetables, or bagels and cream cheese, and almost always coffee and soda. Occasionally one might luck out with a client that provided alcohol, possibly even champagne, but those were much more rare.

Over time, though, both clients and models became more health conscious. Many models now stick to drinking water on the set, with maybe a protein bar or some other healthy snack they’ve brought with them. Some models do yoga between sets, some walk the small dogs they’ve brought with them, and any more one is likely to find the model on her phone checking social media or posting a selfie if their contract permits. Everyone has a different way of relaxing and keeping the day from becoming too stressful. Stress inevitably makes for bad pictures, so whatever works to keep that away is often allowable. [/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 2px 0 8px”]Of course, there are stories of the whole relaxing thing going a bit too far. During the 80s and 90s, it wasn’t all that unusual for illicit drugs to be running around the set. Joints were as common on the Kraft table as were donuts and if there was alcohol there was probably cocaine to go along with it. Even harder drugs were easily available, all in the name of staying relaxed and having a good time. Tales of those who succumbed to addiction are legion and many models and creative staff have ruined careers and even lost their lives because of the problems.

On the occasion of today’s behind the scenes photo, it is simply a single glass of white wine giving our model a bit of a break. She had already finished four concepts and still had two to go, one of which involved being covered in cookie icing. While such a sweet task might sound like fun, it really is time-consuming, and even a little frustrating, to get the icing placed and shaped just right. Melting is also a factor, as natural body heat causes most icings to break down within a relatively short period of time. Revisiting the wine a time or two was necessary before we were done.

Ultimately, the concept, seen below, was deemed too racy and ditched in favor of one more family-friendly. Still, it made for an interesting shoot and a very provocative behind the scenes moment. These are the pictures that cause some people to envy my job, and yes, it is every bit as much fun as it looks.[/one_half_last]

Behind The Scenes / PotD

Watch Your Step

April 21, 2015

Behind The Scenes: Explore Wild Wear (2011). Model: Kathi

We don’t always like to admit that some of our best shots are not the ones we planned, but rather the ones resulting from some error occurring behind the scenes. For all the planning we do, sometimes fate takes over, and fate often comes with a sense of humor.

[one_half padding=”4px 8px 0 2px”]I never intended for Kathi to be inside the dumpster. On it, yes. Hiding behind it, yes. Inside the thing? No. That part was rather unintentional.

We were working on a series of mock ads that used seemingly careless situations to make a point. One had her standing in the middle of an intersection taking a selfie. Another had her walking into a street with a traffic cone on her head. Yet another had her “falling” off a mailbox. These came with tag lines such as, “Following your passion has challenges,” “When protection doesn’t fit, you’re doing it wrong,” and “Some moments are more exciting than others.” Each shot had an element of risk to it that we were able to mitigate through careful planning. At no point was the model in any serious risk of danger.

The shoot took place all over an urban neighborhood, encompassing several hours. This was one of those “you can’t believe what the photographer asked me to do” days and Kathi was a good sport going through multiple wardrobe changes and running from one set to another. We were both quite exhausted by the time we got down to the last concept, one which included a dumpster.

Dumpsters make for tricky props. First, they’re private property and therefore being in or on them technically constitutes trespassing; this is a safety issue to prevent people from sleeping in them and accidentally squished in the back of trash trucks. Second, they move which makes them dangerous and unpredictable. Third, one doesn’t always know what they’re going to find inside. Dumpsters have been known to attract both the disgusting and the bizarre. [/one_half]

[one_half_last padding=”4px 2px 0 8px”]Care had been taken to choose a dumpster that had been emptied earlier that day, served a business that wasn’t likely to be throwing away anything potentially hazardous or especially icky, and was facing the correct direction for waning sunlight. My concept originally had Kathi crouching behind the dumpster. Unfortunately, when we tried it the image lacked the punch I wanted. The dumpster was significantly larger than the crouching model, so the ratios appeared totally skewed.

After talking for a moment, considering the risks, Kathi agreed to try climbing on top of the dumpster. She felt certain that she would be able to balance along the side with no problem, something she was able to do long enough for me to drop five or six frames. Then, as she tried to actually stand on the edge of the dumpster, she lost her balance and chose to jump into the dumpster rather than risk falling. The shot of the jump itself wasn’t especially impressive, but this one, the moment she looked down and saw the rotting flowers on which she was standing, was perfect.

When fate intervenes in a photoshoot it often has a better idea. Kathi was a good sport and we ended up making the best of it as can be seen in the shot below. In fact, had she not jumped into the dumpster, I probably would have dropped this concept from the finished project. So, thanks to fate stepping in and gravity for doing its thing and giving us a shot better than what we had planned.[/one_half_last]

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Moving Portraits

The whole of life is just like watching a film. Only it’s as though you always get in ten minutes after the big picture has started, and no-one will tell you the plot, so you have to work it out all yourself from the clues. ― Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures

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Experiments In Moving Pictures

Howard Hughes was this visionary who was obsessed with speed and flying like a god… I loved his idea of what filmmaking was. —Martin Scorsese

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Varying Effects

Advertising may be described as the science of arresting the human intelligence long enough to get money from it. ― David Honegger

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Varying Emotions

It’s much easier on the emotions when one sees life as an experiment rather than a struggle for popularity.― Criss Jami, Killosophy

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Wide Open Spaces

“The irony of rule followers is they often quote a lot of people that do not follow as many rules as they do.” ― Shannon L. Alder

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Sugar Cream Pie

7 Billboards You’ll (probably) Never See. Day Seven: Sugar Cream Pie

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Popular Mythologies

7 Billboards You’ll (probably) Never See. Day Six: Popular Mythologies

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A Moment To Relax

Long days of shooting multiple concepts is exhausting both mentally and physically. Different people use different tricks to keep going and that sometimes leads to behind the scenes antics that are more entertaining than what actually happens on set.

Like this:

Watch Your Step

We don’t always like to admit that some of our best shots are not the ones we planned, but rather the ones resulting from some error occurring behind the scenes. For all the planning we do, sometimes fate takes over, and fate often comes with a sense of humor.

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The whole of life is just like watching a film. Only it’s as though you always get in ten minutes after the big picture has started, and no-one will tell you the plot, so you have to work it out all yourself from the clues. ― Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures

Share this:

Like this:

Howard Hughes was this visionary who was obsessed with speed and flying like a god… I loved his idea of what filmmaking was. —Martin Scorsese

Share this:

Like this:

Advertising may be described as the science of arresting the human intelligence long enough to get money from it. ― David Honegger

Share this:

Like this:

It’s much easier on the emotions when one sees life as an experiment rather than a struggle for popularity.― Criss Jami, Killosophy

Share this:

Like this:

“The irony of rule followers is they often quote a lot of people that do not follow as many rules as they do.” ― Shannon L. Alder

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

7 Billboards You’ll (probably) Never See. Day Seven: Sugar Cream Pie

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Like this:

7 Billboards You’ll (probably) Never See. Day Six: Popular Mythologies

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Like this:

Long days of shooting multiple concepts is exhausting both mentally and physically. Different people use different tricks to keep going and that sometimes leads to behind the scenes antics that are more entertaining than what actually happens on set.

Share this:

Like this:

We don’t always like to admit that some of our best shots are not the ones we planned, but rather the ones resulting from some error occurring behind the scenes. For all the planning we do, sometimes fate takes over, and fate often comes with a sense of humor.

Share this:

Like this:

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