This is a brief overview of the most common kinds of commissions I receive. Read more about them, and then see examples of each in the portfolio. If you have a project in mind you don’t see here, get in touch anyway—it’s always fun to shoot new things. And if for some reason I’m not a good fit for your project, I’ll do my best to give you a referral to someone who can help you.
BRANDING SUPPORT PHOTOGRAPHY
When you’re creating a new brand, or updating your existing one, strong commercial photography is crucial to getting your message across. Your audience is a visual bunch, and they’ll respond to aspirational photography that conveys a message about who you are as a organization. I’ll work with you or your design team to develop a shooting plan for creating images tailored to speak with the same “voice” as the rest of your brand.
FLOORING PRODUCT PHOTOGRAPHY
Shooting a floor isn’t like shooting any other commercial product. You’ll want to show the wide expanse of the flooring while also bringing out the details of the texture. You’ll want the composition to be dominated by the floor, but without the distortion this ordinarily creates. You’ll want lighting that creates interesting shadows and highlights without creating hotspots that change the apparent color of the product. And increasingly you’ll need to do it on a tighter budget than in the past. One of my first clients was a flooring company, and over the years I’ve photographed commercial and residential soft surface, broadloom and modular, solid hardwood along with engineered and laminate, and LVT. Thanks to Chattanooga’s proximity to the flooring industry, I can help you, too.
FOOD & DRINK PHOTOGRAPHY
You spend untold hours experimenting in the kitchen, jotting down notes about what works and what doesn’t. You research the best places to source your ingredients, and you take time to make the presentation on every plate perfect. But your guests can’t taste the results until they order it, and they can’t order it until they see it. Your photography needs to work as hard as your recipes to bring in new guests and guide them to the meal they’ll enjoy. I’ve worked with some of the best restaurants in Chattanooga, and photographed 4 cookbooks. I’ll work with you to make sure each dish looks its best in front of the lens, and together we’ll create a portfolio for your menu that looks as good as it tastes.
PRODUCT PHOTOGRAPHY
There are a lot of ways to show your product. Photographing the product in use by a model in your target demographic can help potential customers put themselves in the model’s shoes. Aspirational photography helps build desire by allowing the customer to envision the benefits your product can have in their lives. And isolating the product against a field of black or white creates an iconic impression of the product in the viewers memory. Shots isolated on white are also great for catalogs and shopping cart galleries. You can find examples of all of these in the Case Studies portfolio. Get in touch, and let’s talk about the right approach for your product.
PROFESSIONAL HEADSHOTS
Many people who inquire about headshot photos are envisioning a head-and-shoulders shot against a solid or patterned background—like a better version of your driver’s license. I can certainly do that if it’s what you really need. But I’ve found that most people are better served with a headshot where your movement, eye line, and background all serve to provide some context for who you are and what you do. This often means it’s better for me to come to your office and set up a time when we can do a dual shoot: I’ll spend part of the time photographing you and your colleagues “in action”, and part of the time setting up a series of more carefully structured and lit headshots, with the office itself serving as the backdrop. I’ve photographed Chattanooga’s mayor and his staff, CEOs and board members of major area businesses, as well as chefs, speakers, and authors.
ANNUAL REPORT PHOTOGRAPHY
How do you visually sum up the work of an entire year? What are the stories that made this year unique from the ones before? Who were the characters involved? Which members of your organization made a difference this year? I’ll meet with you or your design team to answer these questions and discover the best ways to illustrate them. Then we’ll work together to create the images you need to drive the story. See an example of an annual report I photographed for Chattanooga’s EPB in the Case Studies portfolio, and check out the live results of past projects here and here. I recommend including photography planning early in the strategic thinking process, so that we can make sure there are sufficient time and resources for the stories you want to tell.
ARCHITECTURAL PHOTOGRAPHY
Architectural photography has its own set of unique challenges. On one hand, the subject matter is too large to light artificially, so we must be strategic about planning the shoot in order to maximize the light. We must balance the ambient and artificial lights, and for interiors we must do that while preserving a sense of the space’s own quality of natural light. Finally, we must find a vantage point to create a pleasing composition that maximizes the structure’s best features while minimizing distracting elements from the surrounding landscape, all while avoiding the distortion caused by wide lenses. It’s a balancing act, and whether you’re an architect expanding your portfolio or a real estate agent with a great space to list, I’d love to help you find the right balance for your work.
STANDARD POST PRODUCTION
Standard post-production is included at no extra charge for every shoot. In short, this is the process of making the images we captured look their best. The first step is always to backup, backup, backup. Once the images are downloaded, two automatic backup processes begin—one creating a local copy in my office, and the other being sent to my data center in California. Next I perform the edit, also called culling, where I reject any outtakes and flag the selects. Finally I develop the selects, adjusting their tonality to bring out the best color for each image. When the images are ready for publication, I’ll send them to you via digital download. Most jobs are ready within a week from the shoot date.
Alternatively, if you’d prefer to make your own selections, I can send you an online proof gallery of your commercial photography to gather your feedback before developing the final images. Be sure to let me know in advance if you’d like this option.
RETOUCHING & COMPOSITING
I usually aim to create whatever results we need in camera, but for some jobs compositing is the only way to go. If your project needs to combine several elements shot separately into one photograph, or retouch imperfections on a prototype project, or otherwise recreate a reality we could put in front of my lens, that’s no problem. This extra service is billed at a lower rate than the shooting fee, so we can easily add it on to any job that needs some extra TLC.