Web Ads: Art Directors Club
May 26th, 2011
by Peter Clark
For the month of May we hit up the über cool and elite Art Directors Club to place ads on their site. We featured six different photographers across three sets of ads. Here’s a description from the ADC site of what they’re all about:
…one of the most concentrated groups of creative talent in the world and is a gathering place for leaders in visual communication. ADC Members share the vision of our founder, Louis Pedlar, who brought his colleagues in advertising together in 1920 to dignify their profession and judge advertising art by the same stringent standards as fine art.
You can check out each ad animated here: Ad One, Ad Two, Ad Three. Without further ado, I present you with the work featured and the story behind each.
“I photographed this image as a part of a 14-page spread for the Spring issue of Runway Magazine. The only criteria was that the photo shoot involve lingerie. Besides that, the magazine gave me complete creative control. I thought it would be awesome to do a 1920′s-inspired shoot. I found this amazing mansion in Piru who was so kind to let me shoot there in exchange for an advertisement in the magazine. I had a great team of wardrobe, props, makeup, and hair people for the shoot.”
“I was looking for a project idea/ photo essay to pitch and I came across a small town in Southern Illinois (across the river from Padukah, Kentucky) called Metropolis. Turns out they are the self-proclaimed home of Superman. Every year they have a big festival know as the “Superman Celebration,” which for obvious reasons, I could not resist! I booked myself a room, and off I went. The image is from the children’s costume contest. The celebration feels part Comic-Con part county fair. It’s a funny place, but everyone there genuinely loves Superman. The boy in the photo is dressed as “Robin” — no one feels the need to limit themselves to Superman when dressing up. Although, it’s pretty great to be walking around town seeing Superman and the likes everywhere you go!”
“It was taken during a recent trip to Cairo, Egypt. Went there just for fun (a week before the recent chaos erupted), and told myself to enjoy it as an experience and not take any photographs. I failed within the first hour of being there. Regardless, this is the Ibn Tulun Mosque; that’s my wife standing there, just a candid moment, but really liked the scene as a whole - very peaceful, with a slight nod of hesitance and curiosity.”
“The photo is part of a larger body of work I created when my son Zach (now 7) was between 1-3 years. Before Zach started preschool we spent an enormous amount of time together. There was no separation for me between making photographs and taking care of Zach. He came with me while I photographed. Camera gear came with us to all the places toddlers and mamas frequent—playdates, the park, the beach, etc. This image was shot on Cape Cod at an amazing old playground near the beach. I thought the swings would be a nice shot and then Zach toddled over and leaned up on the swing. As my kids have gotten older the images of my life as a momma are often in my commercial lifestyle portfolios that I show to clients.”
“This image was personal work that I was wanting to do, but it took a while to come together because of props. I knew what I wanted in my head but as we know it, creating it to be exactly how your mind sees it is a little more difficult. My friend Jillian Rabe and her sister Megan Rabe (who did the hair and make-up) got together for a little play date in late April. When I got there, I was pleasantly surprised by a bicycle that they had pulled out of their mom’s garage to use as a prop. The icing however, was the retro umbrella and dress that they had. We didn’t quite know how we wanted the hair and make-up, so the three of us packed into their mom’s little bathroom and Megan went at it. We knew that we had to hurry because the rain was coming (surprise surprise, it’s Portland). I had three lights, a generator, a bike, camera bag, make-up and a hair kit. The only thing that we didn’t have was a location, which could make or break an image. So we set out driving around the countryside in search a spot. I knew that I wanted something deserted so I could set up my lights and a straight stretch of road that went on forever, but didn’t really find that. What we did get is what you see.”
“The German music magazine De:Bug asked me if I wanted to take photos of “the guy that made the famous music software Traktor“. To me it was clear that I did not want to take photos of him between computers or synthesizers or anything boring like that. But as there was no budget for set building, I had to find a place near his office. I found a gate and just asked him to stand there. As always I didn’t tell him what to do, just to see what he would come up with. After some minutes he began doing stuff like pushups on the wall and standing there with his head leaning against the gate. I loved it! We worked a bit on his posing and were done shooting after a few minutes. The photo editor liked the photograph [so much] that he published it as a full page. I believe the photo worked well because you have to check twice to find out who this is and what he is doing. You are forced to start reading an article about something “boring” like the programming of a DJ software.”
