Thursday, February 07, 2008

Stepping Out Of The Comfort Zone


I have to admit, I was a bit taken back when I got the call to shoot a fashion/product assignment. This particular client found me on the web and I guess by looking at my industrial work, they thought I was a perfect fit?

There is a fashion trend in South America right now that involves ribbon
bracelets which you tie on your wrist. Your suppose to tie 3 knots while making 3 wishes. When the ribbon ware off or brake off your wrist, your wishes are suppose to come true.

My client needed photos of kids and adults wearing these bracelets which are know as Brazil-ets. My day started with young children ages 2 years of age to 12 years. We than moved up to the high schoolers and than adults.

I really enjoy shooting subject matter that I don't normally shoot, I think it keeps me fresh and challenged. We must of had 20 or so people in the studio at any given time during the shoot. A few of those where there to try to catch a look at half naked women.

Here is a video of the photo shoot.


6 comments:

Karl Maasdam said...

David,

Great stuff as always, I am sure I will soon be buying these for my tween daughters soon

Glad your back we missed your post

Karl Maasdam

Will Foster said...

Very cool David! I will have to watch the video when i get home from work! Unfortunately YouTube and all over video services are BLOCKED! BOoo!

carlos benjamin - benjphoto.com said...

Next time you do a group jumping shot try staggering the group. One girl forward, one back, one forward..... I noticed some mid-air collisions on the video.

Glad you had fun. I can understand being puzzled as to why they'd call you since it's so far outside of your normal work.

Ryan R. Dlugosz said...

David -

Thanks as always for a great video and a look into your process!

Would you mind shedding similar light on the client contact/negotiation process? Personally I've gotten pretty comfortable & confident in my ability to execute the shoot, but it's some of the "pre work" that's still a bit of a mystery. I'd guess that many are in a similar situation.

I'd suspect that you had an overall creative fee for the shoot, plus expenses to cover your stylist, compensation for the various models, etc. After that, I'd imagine separate licensing based on the client usage of the images... Seems like they'd have a ton of different needs as a startup - magazine, catalog, web, press releases, etc. That's a whole lot of money - I can't imagine that they had budget to cover all of that, but perhaps they did.

Was this client aware of how the whole process works or did you need to do a lot of education? How'd you "soften the blow" on all those licensing charges?

I hear from a lot of smaller orgs/startups who haven't necessarily commissioned photography before - they're not only almost clueless as to how licensing works but often don't have much in the way of budget. :)

Thanks! -Ryan

Alex said...

Great post and great video! Thanks for taking the time to put it together!

Alexander Blacker said...

I just wanted to say that those ribons are actualy some what religous. They represt the saint of Bomfin and you got the facts right!