Throughout the month of October, the kind people over at Feature Shoot ran a slew of Wonderful Machine ads on their site. Feature Shoot is a photography centered website run by photographer, photo editor and curator, Alison Zavos. Here’s a quick synopsis of what the site is all about from Allison:
Feature Shoot showcases work from up-and-coming photographers alongside established photographers who have completed a project or whose work has taken on a new direction. The site covers commercial and fine art photography, and is a resource through which photo editors, art directors, art buyers, and people with an interest in photography can discover new talent. Established in 2008, Feature Shoot has an archive of 800+ local and international photographers.
We ran a variety of both rectangle and skyscraper ads across the site, showcasing some great work from our member photographers. I asked each photographer to fill me in on the back story behind each image:
BragiJosefsson / Iceland “This was shot on assignment for Globe and Mail, which is based in Canada, for a story on the financial crash in Iceland. The couple are HugrunArnadottir and MagniThorsteinsson of Kronkron, shoe designers and store owners in Reykjavik, Iceland. The original idea was submitted to me by the director of photography at Globe and Mail, and is obviously a parody of the famous painting by Grant Wood, but in an Icelandic environment. The house behind the couple is an old turf house at the Reykjavik museum. The shot itself was quite straightforward, no extra lighting, but some careful post processing work for the color and tone.”
Michael Kohn / Canada
“This photograph was created for the Second Harvest organization in the Toronto area. The Second Harvest mission is to help feed hungry people by picking up and preparing excess fresh food and delivering it daily to social service agencies in Toronto. I was contacted to create an image for one of their major annual events. I had done this gig for several consecutive years prior to doing this image. The iconic theme was always about the glory and beauty of the harvest.”
Winnie Au / New York
“This was part of a shoot I did for fashion designer Charlotte Tarantola. My assignment was to create an image that showcased the brand and the fact that they make fashion for adults, kids, and now pets. My crew and I got the shots for that assignment (we created a “wealthy family portrait”) and then decided to shoot a separate fashion story with our same model and location as a personal project. This particular shot is part of that fashion story, which is about a bored young housewife living in an old brownstone—all dressed up with nowhere to go. It’s meant to be a subtle commentary about how having everything you want and not having to work doesn’t always lead to happiness.”
Patrick Kehoe / Seattle
“The “Man in the Party Hat” happened one chilly September morning a few years ago. I remember that I had shot an assignment the day before and had a bunch of lighting equipment to return to the rental house by 10 am. This was before I owned any lighting gear, so I recall wanting to be a resourceful young man and maximize on the opportunity by shooting early in the morning before the rentals were due.
I tend to use environments as inspiration, so I scout locations to help me formulate different ideas and story lines. I was drawn to this particular spot which was located just outside a train yard in South Seattle. The color palette was drab, gray and industrial, and I knew that I wanted a grumpy man in the shot. The idea of forced happiness has always appealed to me, so a party theme with confetti seemed to fit well with Ken Anderson’s (the actor’s) sour mood and to create a nice color contrast in the photograph.”
Lincoln Barbour / Portland
“I shot this image at BWI Airport. My camera at the time was a Nikon F3 and I shot it with a manual focus 20mm Nikkor lens. I was on my way to Las Vegas and it was the first time I was traveling with the intention of taking photos during my trip. While I was walking to my gate, I saw this gentleman sitting alone in the lobby area of the international wing. He was so colorful in this stark environment. My eye was drawn to him and I nervously whipped my camera out and fired off a few quick shots before I had to leave to catch my plane. It was a classic street photography moment. If I did this now, I’d probably get thrown into a security room.”
Chris Sembrot / Philadelphia
“This image of Shepard Fairey was something I shot for personal work. A follower on Twitter alerted me that he was to be in Philly for a few mural installations that day and that Fishtown was the first stop. My apartment is only four blocks from that mural outside of Rocket Cat Cafe. I simply approached him after he completed the mural and grabbed a few shots. He was pretty easy going and approachable. I also mentioned that we had a mutual friend, which helped to get his attention.”
Roberto Westbrook / Richmond
“I made this photo in the Buenos Aires Botanical Garden when I was living in Argentina. The park had become a home for abandoned cats and it was common to stroll through and find cats lounging. I made many photos of the park and those cats, but on this one occasion in the fall, I was walking home with my wife and I found this perfect arrangement. I just loved how the cat was balled up and surrounded by ginkgo leaves. I got out my widest lens and lifted my hands as high as I could to create this feeling of the cat being surrounded by leaves.”
PDN has just announced the winners of their Objects of Desire photography contest. Their newest competition set out to highlight the best professional photographs of, you guessed it, desired objects. Our very own director of photography, Sean Stone, got in on the judging action along with Kelly Penford, director of the photography division at Jed Root Inc, and Jason Hall, art buyer at Fallon Worldwide. Together, the three chose the top object shots including photos of “cherished items and individuals.” We’re pleased to announce three Wonderful Machine winners, who were, coincidentally, all chosen winners in the Food and Still Life category:
First Place: Steve Buchanan/Baltimore This is an image I use for self-promotion and as a portfolio piece.
Lauryn Ishak/Singapore This is a photograph of Nyonya Platter served at the Bon Ton Resort in Malaysia. The platter is a combination of Malay and Chinese cuisines: Prawns, fish tamarind, beef with peanuts, chicken with lime leaf, pickled lamb curry, lady’s finger sambar, pineapple, eggplant in coconut curry and mango and cashew nut rice are all served on a banana leaf.
Lincoln Barbour/Portland At Fuller’s Restaurant in Portland, Oregon, four strips of bacon sizzle on the flat top grill. This image was shot for a Portland Monthly feature on the best breakfast in Portland and art directed by Michael Novak.
Wonderful Machine portfolio reviews happen once a month, come blizzard or 100 degree heat wave. Jess and I braved the latter last Wednesday as we packed up portfolios and headed to New York. Once in the city, we made our way to one of my favorite New York high-rises, Hearst Tower, for our morning portfolio review at Food Network Magazine.
Hearst Tower
After making our way up to the 35th floor by way of the freight elevators, Jess and I met with Food Network Magazine photo editors Kate and Lynn. As we settled in around the conference table with a load of food portfolios, Kate and Lynn began to express their love for Wonderful Machine and our photographers. They use the site so often in fact, that they recognized the work of almost every photographer we presented. Lynn appreciated the updates Stacy Zarin Goldberg recently made to her portfolio, saying that it now better reflected her skills, while Kate discussed how much she liked Scott Suchman‘s naturally lit photos. Michael Piazza‘s book was complimented as well, especially his Taza Chocolate work and Jody Horton got a lot of attention for his quirky and unique squirrel shots.
The four of us had a good time chatting about food photography, celebrity chefs and Wonderful Machine before we packed up to go. Kate and Lynn happily took WM tees and shared the tidbit that their favorite promos are those that contain recipes, such as Dhanraj Emanuel‘s. Once out of the building Jess and I debated on whether we should walk or drive over to our next meeting. Seeing that it was only a 15 minute walk, we made the decision to get from Hearst Tower to the Conde Nast building on foot. In hindsight, this was not the best decision. By the time Jess and I made our way through the super hot and humid streets of New York, we looked a little worse for the wear and were in some serious need of water.
Luckily, the Conde Nast building—which is located in Times Square—was refreshingly air conditioned and we soon regained our composure before meeting up with the photo editors of Bon Appetit. A nice intern lead us to the conference room where we spread out our selection of food portfolios. The editors flipped through each book carefully. They wanted to know where each photographer was based and were happy with our diverse selection of locations. Lincoln Barbour was an instant favorite with his clean style while Jody Horton’s quirk caught this groups eye’s as well. They were happy to see a Denver food photographer in the group (Jeff Padrick) and commented on how much they liked the travel work of Ball & Albanese (we hadn’t brought their book but they’d seen their work on our site). The group chatted about the best Philly foodie spots as they browsed through the books—PE Alex told us that Monks is her absolute favorite! Alex also told us that she and her husband own the Brooklyn beer bar The Diamond. Stop by sometime for some free shuffleboard and a cold beer.
After we were thoroughly hungry from looking through all those food photos, we said our goodbyes and Jess and I stepped back into the heat-stroke-waiting-to-happen that was New York City. As we sweated our way back to the car, we people watched and pointed out interesting only-in-New-York sightings such as Scott Adsit (aka 30 Rock‘s Pete Hornberger) as he walked down the street.
Once back into the car, the A/C blasting, we drove out of the city. Our last meeting of the day was at Cline Davis & Mann‘s Princeton, NJ office which meant we were able to flee New York long before rush hour traffic!
We arrived in Princeton a bit early so we drove around Princeton University’s campus searching for a place to grab a bite to eat. We had salads and sandwiches at a little student oriented pizza shop before making our way to CDM.
Cline Davis & Mann is a pharmaceutical ad agency with clients such as Merck and Novo Nordisk. Their art buyer had contacted us the day before the review asking if we could bring some portraiture work. We happily obliged and brought who we felt was the most appropriate according to the brief they sent, along with some lifestyle/pharma centric portfolios. As we drove up to the CDM building we noted how different the office was to a normal NYC building, mostly because of the vast amounts of corn. That’s right—CDM’s office is in a corn field! That didn’t stop them from having some nice interior touches though, such as a projected wall of color and bright red chairs.
Princeton reviews are slightly different than New York...
We set up in their conference room with about 20 books laid around the table. Soon the creatives started pouring in and flipping through portfolios. One art director loved 808 Inc‘s motion reel while another commented on Sean Gilligan‘s striking Harlem portraits. Several recognized Mark Katzman‘s winning Communication Arts cover shot while Jonathan Chapman‘s BMW work was praised as well. Everyone loved Christopher Shane‘s homemade portfolio but the most attention went to Tom Cwenar and his portraits portfolio. One art director thought the style was so perfect for their upcoming project, that we let him keep it (no worries, we have several more back at the office).
So after a successful review with around 15 CDM creatives shuffling through and learning about WM, we packed up and headed back to equally hot streets of Philadelphia, a bit sweaty but satisfied nonetheless.
