Architectural & Interior Design Photography, Corporate Commercial Photography, Advertising & Portrait Photographer | Ottawa | 613-558-7585 | justin.vanleeuwen@gmail.com
It’s been a while since my last blog post, and while this may not be the most exciting of projects, it’s the type of corporate photography I do that helps pay the bills. It’s high-volume, multi use, kinda stuff and it’s important for a company, and their brand, to showcase their talent and not just be another faceless company using standard iStock images available to the world. It’s custom stock; just for them, their team, and the people you’ll really meet and talk to when sitting down with a financial planner from Desjardins Financial Ottawa.
The lead image is a composite shot of the management team, we actually shot them all together, but with a few variances in pose and look I actually needed to select the different execs from different images and blend them together. I knew we had to plan for this so planned their “marks” carefully to avoid overlap by getting Alex to stand-in for them while we were setting up.
You may recognize the handsome man at the far right as Randy Little. Local Ottawa twitter star and one of my very first headshot clients. A few years ago I even wrote about doing headshots in a tight place using Randy’s photos. He’s a regular around here and I was thrilled we were able to extend this relationship to his entire team this year.
The most important part of our shoot was the headshots. We had 21 staff scheduled every 20 minutes for half of the day to come down to our in-office “studio” and get their portrait taken. 20 minutes is actually more than enough time for most. In fact, a few guys were done after about ten shots. But others need a bit more time to break down and get comfortable with me and in front of the camera. The portraits are to be professional, but casual and approachable enough that a potential client will feel comfortable with the staff-member just by looking at their image. I try to catch the moments away from the “fake” smile and we shoot pretty fast. Which actually lead to a gear-issue I don’t encounter much on smaller shoots.
See those “grey” background photos? They weren’t intentional. That was because my Elinchrom Ranger Quadra’s don’t recycle their flash-pulse as fast as I was shooting, or as fast as the plugged in light that was on the subjects. I was going to compensate for this by just slowing down my shooting, but a few of the subjects (including members of the executive team) liked the one-light look and said it was okay. I included them with my proofs and some of those made it to their final selects. A happy accident, but not one I was totally comfortable with.
One of the very reasons you hire a professional photographer is that you can rely on them producing quick and consistent results without wasting your time. While I believe I achieved that on this shoot I was, admittedly, slightly embarrassed by the inconsistency between frames; even if the client chose to keep them. I’ll be further investing in my location lighting kit over the next year. Adding to my battery-powered (but slow) Quadra’s with Elinchrom’s excellent ELC Pro HD 1000’s. I’ve already had a chance to test a pair and I was very impressed with the results. Not only do they fit my need for a faster, more powerful, strobe, but they open up some unique creative possibilities too.
And, for the record, we had a bit of fun on this shoot, despite it being super professional and serious.
