Tonight We Bowl

Monday August 1st, 2011

Recently, Andrew Maguire was contacted by Auxiliary Advertising and Design to quote on a project. Once he heard the specs of the assignment, he was intrigued. Andrew put together a quote and sent it along with his portfolio. He got the job and began work on a fun shoot for DV8—a new bowling ball brand geared towards the younger generation of bowlers.

Andrew was excited about the gig, especially since it allowed him to cast his own talent. Dv8 and Auxiliary were looking for hip young adults between the ages of 20-28 to showcase in ads and on the DV8 website. Hearing this, Andrew decided that they were, “more or less looking for me to call my college drinking and rockstar buddies.”

Andrew threw himself into the project and it’s concept—creating images that were edgy, raw, and young “that feel very human and relate to serious bowlers with the target age of 22.” DV8 is a creation of Brunswick Bowling, a brand typically used by the older bowling crowd. They wanted to change gears with the DV8 brand and were hoping to highlight this through Andrew’s photos. Brunswick wants DV8 to be the place for, “the serious, young, hip bowler who is constantly changing and aspiring to be cooler.” So with this vision in mind, Andrew set out to create the hippest/most tattooed/PBR worthy/plaid shirt wearing set of bowling photos anyone’s ever seen.

Andrew was lucky enough to have almost complete visual control over the shoot. He was able to take the concept and run, with free rain over talent, locations, and tone. He ended up mixing candid shots of bowling with bowling lifestyle shots to create a library of images.

However, even though the shoot was fun, it was not without it’s setbacks. Andrew explained,

Casting and coordinating a group of young adults who have little or no modeling experience is hard. Working around the different schedules was a major struggle. We got the OK from the bowling alley to have free reign of the center on a certain date and time from about 10AM -8PM. None of the other alleys in town were that accommodating so we took it and ran. Big shout out to the folks at Wengers in Grand Rapids.

But with full creative control, Andrew thoroughly enjoyed the shoot setbacks and all, and even learned a thing or two from the experience,

I think every shoot offers up new creative opportunities to try something new, but in this shoot I definitely learned how worth while it is to have a good producer! It’s worth every penny to hire someone to coordinate and put together the agenda for the day. It really allows the photographer to put full attention on the creative aspects.

Knowing the photos would be used in black and white, Andrew shot on both the Canon 5D MK2 and on Fujifilm disposable cameras, to add to the edgy, raw feel of the shoot. Everything went smoothly, that is until the end of the day when a huge fight broke out between some of the house bowlers just as Andrew was getting his last shots. “There was lots of commotion and police. My assistants were scrambling to gather all the loose gear that was in the alley. Never a dull finish to a shoot!”

- Maria