So the family and I have officially arrived in Great Falls. We've been here a little over a week now and are starting to settle in. Great Falls has always struck me as one of Montana's underrated cities. Certainly, Billings is bigger and Missoula is an arts mecca and some of the Northern reaches of the state by Glacier are some of the most gorgeous places in the world but Great Falls has a little bit of each of these things.
It's growing. It's got a community backing it that seem to be interested in getting everything they can out of truly being a community. That's something that a lot of larger cities often forget. While they may have more going on, they appreciate it less. Great Falls is cool in that way.
In the future I predict that Great Falls will become an arts and culture hub for Montana. That's one of the reasons I'm excited to be setting down roots here.
I'm now going to be officially making myself available for commercial shoots, weddings, and portrait work all over Montana. In a few weeks I hope to be in talks with some local places about hanging my work. And July will be the first issue of Electric City Creative. We're going to do things big here. Because we, like Great Falls, like it when things are happening.
Soon, we'll be moving everything over to the Habein Studio domain and business name. This blog will stay put, and the website for YellowHouse Photography will redirect for a time after the switch. New home, new name, new clients, new fun.
Speaking of which,I've got my first client booked for a big family portrait session on the 8th. I'll put up some preview shots after that happens. Until then: appeciate what's going on in your city.
Thoughts from commercial, editorial, and people photographer, Tyson Habein.
Showing posts with label commercial. Show all posts
Showing posts with label commercial. Show all posts
Monday, June 28, 2010
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Wedding Cans
Recently I was contacted by a friend who had a favor to ask. She was looking for some pictures, primarily a portrait, for a project they were working on. The project was something they were calling "Wedding Cans." They were going to attempt to pay for their modest wedding by recycling cans. This wasn't possible by themselves, obviously. Even a modest wedding can cost several thousand dollars and I don't know of anyone who can consume that many soft drinks. Their plan revolved around the idea that people would gladly donate cans for the cause. In the process, via recycling of an estimated 400,000 aluminum cans they would completely offset the carbon footprint of their wedding. It was a beautiful thing, the idea of environmental activism and financial necessity coming together in a fun way. For the press purposes online and off they were going to need a few portraits.
It was a simple project and one that I was glad to help out with. In the name of serving the purpose of Wedding Cans, I was doing it pro-bono. A quick shoot, 30-45 minutes including conversion, color correction, and sharpening. In and out. No big deal.
The pictures we came out with the first go were not to my liking. I have certain high standards that I put out there, and that night, due to equipment malfunctions and freezing fingers in the sub 20 degree weather we walked away with images that I didn't consider good enough.
I immediately knew that I wanted to re-shoot. While I know many folks would have walked away figuring, "No big deal, free shoot. You get what you pay for," I just couldn't do it. It was leaving unfinished business on the table.
We got together again a short time later, this time at Andrea and Pete's house. We did another quick shoot. All told, I was in 30 minutes once again. But this time, we nailed it. We ended up with shots we were all happy with. I walked away thinking that I had done my part to help out, and didn't expect much more to come of the images.
That's when Andrea's ability to put out a marketing blitz took over.
Immediately the story of the crazy couple, paying for their wedding with aluminum cans was on a few blogs, along with the photos. Thanks to Andrea's knowledge of how things are supposed to work in the media world, the photos included a link to my website. If you're here because of those images, welcome. Have a look around. Let me know if you see anything you like.
It didn't stop there, though. Soon, a local news station picked up the story. They ran a video that included my still images. Andrea and Pete were interviewed by a local morning show.
Then the A.P. picked up that video. Then Fox News.com, the CNN.com, then a dozen financial websites and recycling sites and environmental sites. Then the national morning shows began calling up Andrea and Pete for interviews. Then national radio, and international radio, and more websites, and more news programs, and more websites, and on and on and on.
And a large number of them linked back to my website. My traffic went throught the roof pretty quickly. All from a free shoot that I decided to do over because it wasn't up to my standards.
Admittedly, not every free shoot we do for a friend who has a project that we'd like to support will end up this way. Not every friend working on a project is Andrea. Her ability to generate interest in this has not only been of benefit to their cause (as of writing this, Wedding Cans is up to 76% of goal. That means they've collected over 300,000 cans in a month) but to mine as well. But everyone has friends with projects. If it is something you believe in, or just something you think is cool, do your part. Help out.
And for goodness sake, never let a shoot end with you feeling like you didn't get the shot without rescheduling if at all possible. It's about producing the best work you possibly can in every situation. If equipment fails, that's not an excuse. If it's cold, that's not an excuse. Make it happen. Your "A" game is the only game that's acceptable. It's just that simple.
Besides, you never know where that simple portrait of a friend is going to end up, or who's going to end up seeing it. All it takes is one good impression.
Wedding Cans
It was a simple project and one that I was glad to help out with. In the name of serving the purpose of Wedding Cans, I was doing it pro-bono. A quick shoot, 30-45 minutes including conversion, color correction, and sharpening. In and out. No big deal.
The pictures we came out with the first go were not to my liking. I have certain high standards that I put out there, and that night, due to equipment malfunctions and freezing fingers in the sub 20 degree weather we walked away with images that I didn't consider good enough.
I immediately knew that I wanted to re-shoot. While I know many folks would have walked away figuring, "No big deal, free shoot. You get what you pay for," I just couldn't do it. It was leaving unfinished business on the table.
We got together again a short time later, this time at Andrea and Pete's house. We did another quick shoot. All told, I was in 30 minutes once again. But this time, we nailed it. We ended up with shots we were all happy with. I walked away thinking that I had done my part to help out, and didn't expect much more to come of the images.
That's when Andrea's ability to put out a marketing blitz took over.
Immediately the story of the crazy couple, paying for their wedding with aluminum cans was on a few blogs, along with the photos. Thanks to Andrea's knowledge of how things are supposed to work in the media world, the photos included a link to my website. If you're here because of those images, welcome. Have a look around. Let me know if you see anything you like.
It didn't stop there, though. Soon, a local news station picked up the story. They ran a video that included my still images. Andrea and Pete were interviewed by a local morning show.
Then the A.P. picked up that video. Then Fox News.com, the CNN.com, then a dozen financial websites and recycling sites and environmental sites. Then the national morning shows began calling up Andrea and Pete for interviews. Then national radio, and international radio, and more websites, and more news programs, and more websites, and on and on and on.
And a large number of them linked back to my website. My traffic went throught the roof pretty quickly. All from a free shoot that I decided to do over because it wasn't up to my standards.
Admittedly, not every free shoot we do for a friend who has a project that we'd like to support will end up this way. Not every friend working on a project is Andrea. Her ability to generate interest in this has not only been of benefit to their cause (as of writing this, Wedding Cans is up to 76% of goal. That means they've collected over 300,000 cans in a month) but to mine as well. But everyone has friends with projects. If it is something you believe in, or just something you think is cool, do your part. Help out.
And for goodness sake, never let a shoot end with you feeling like you didn't get the shot without rescheduling if at all possible. It's about producing the best work you possibly can in every situation. If equipment fails, that's not an excuse. If it's cold, that's not an excuse. Make it happen. Your "A" game is the only game that's acceptable. It's just that simple.
Besides, you never know where that simple portrait of a friend is going to end up, or who's going to end up seeing it. All it takes is one good impression.
Wedding Cans
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Advertising is Us
Awhile back I was talking to someone I know who is in their first year of college. She was lamenting the fact that she wasn't enjoying the journalism program at her school and didn't know what else to go into. I asked her what sort of classes she was taking that she did enjoy.
She said she was enjoying her art classes and some design-type classes that she was taking at the moment. Immediately, she followed this statement with a qualifier: "I don't want to do advertising, though."
This piqued my curiosity. As someone who intends to work in the realm of advertising photography, I wanted to know why she would be so adverse to the field as a potential career.
"Advertising is just so evil. I mean, the way they target people."
This brings up an interesting idea that has become more prevalent in the last 15-20 years: "Advertising is evil."
While I think blanket statements such as this almost always have poor reasoning behind them, the idea of 'advertising as evil' is something that has become fairly standard amongst a younger generation of consumers. I certainly do have my issues with the operating standards of many advertisers (corporations, and the companies that produce their ads, can at times be flawed, as they are run by people), but I think I am in the minority of a younger population in that I don't find advertising abhorrent.
The idea that targeted advertising is evidence of evil is an odd one to me. As a business, the name of the game is minimizing costs while maximizing income. This is the line that separates the profitable from the failing. Furthermore, targeted advertising is something that allows the consumer to sort through the much of the daily commercial world.
When I get up in the morning, I see advertisements in between segments on morning TV. As I leave the house, I hear advertisements on the radio in my car. As I drive, I see advertisements on billboards, the sides of buildings, and other vehicles. When on the computer, almost every webpage has advertisements of some sort. With advertising everywhere, isn't it useful for a consumer to know that, at least a small portion, of those ads are specifically chosen for them? Imagine a world in which all of the advertisements you saw were aimed at you. There would be fewer ads, to be sure, because the ads that were present would be far more effective. Advertising would be less scattershot and more pinpoint. This relieves me, as the consumer, of the overload that is so often complained about. This relieves me, as the business owner, of the massive cost of 20 ads. I can put out just 1.
The idea of evil in this likely stems from the ability to target. In order to generate a targeted ad, the advertiser has to have information about you. They have to have access to your Facebook profile and all the information therein. They have to know you are a 20 something who likes video games and beef jerky (but then, who doesn't?). This seems to still invade the sense of privacy that many people have held on to.
Privacy, or perhaps the desire for it, is what makes advertising evil. But in our modern world we've all but tossed privacy out the window. Your average teenager has a Myspace account, a Facebook account, a Twitter account, a traceable cell phone, a Google search history, an Amazon buying history, etc. etc. etc. For a new generation of consumers, the idea of privacy is, at best, an illusion.
But the fact that the perceived evil of advertising may be an antiquated notion is irrelevant. If there is one thing that a lifetime of looking at advertising has taught me, it is that perception is everything. Perception is truth. And if advertising that tries to sell you something is perceived as evil, then it is, at least in the eyes of the consumers you are attempting to reach.
The answer then, is to become smarter in how we advertise. A targeted sales pitch is no longer an option. Instead, we have to ingrain a brand in the day to day lives of our targeted consumers. We don't show the product and simply tell you how much it is and where you can get it. We show you the product in the hands of someone you admire who is having an amazing time, and oh, by the way... they just happen to be using this product.
It's not a hard sell that works anymore, it's not a soft sell that works, it's a non-sell. It's a sale by proxy. We buy products because they are a perceived part of the lifestyle we want to lead.
Perhaps as photographers, we can all learn something more from advertising than current trends and lighting styles. Perhaps we can all learn something from those photographers who aren't advertising in the same way anymore -- those photographers whose second job has become promoting themselves as a part of a larger community. Certainly, there is a magnanimous desire to help the community involved in this for most of these individuals. But no one can deny that people like David Hobby and Chase Jarvis have benefited greatly from their role in the photographic community.
The reason is this: when an art director looks to what is going on in the world, they are swayed by those who have great pull amongst a large group of people. If 10,000 people fawn over the work of Chase Jarvis, it must have some resonance with consumers.
At a certain point, to anyone who is interested in the field, Chase Jarvis becomes a household name. It's like a celebrity endorsement, except the photographer becomes their own celebrity.
As photographers who want to work in advertising, we have to understand advertising. We have to become advertising. In a modern era of peer networking, targeted advertising, and group thinking, advertising isn't evil. Advertising is us.
She said she was enjoying her art classes and some design-type classes that she was taking at the moment. Immediately, she followed this statement with a qualifier: "I don't want to do advertising, though."
This piqued my curiosity. As someone who intends to work in the realm of advertising photography, I wanted to know why she would be so adverse to the field as a potential career.
"Advertising is just so evil. I mean, the way they target people."
This brings up an interesting idea that has become more prevalent in the last 15-20 years: "Advertising is evil."
While I think blanket statements such as this almost always have poor reasoning behind them, the idea of 'advertising as evil' is something that has become fairly standard amongst a younger generation of consumers. I certainly do have my issues with the operating standards of many advertisers (corporations, and the companies that produce their ads, can at times be flawed, as they are run by people), but I think I am in the minority of a younger population in that I don't find advertising abhorrent.
The idea that targeted advertising is evidence of evil is an odd one to me. As a business, the name of the game is minimizing costs while maximizing income. This is the line that separates the profitable from the failing. Furthermore, targeted advertising is something that allows the consumer to sort through the much of the daily commercial world.
When I get up in the morning, I see advertisements in between segments on morning TV. As I leave the house, I hear advertisements on the radio in my car. As I drive, I see advertisements on billboards, the sides of buildings, and other vehicles. When on the computer, almost every webpage has advertisements of some sort. With advertising everywhere, isn't it useful for a consumer to know that, at least a small portion, of those ads are specifically chosen for them? Imagine a world in which all of the advertisements you saw were aimed at you. There would be fewer ads, to be sure, because the ads that were present would be far more effective. Advertising would be less scattershot and more pinpoint. This relieves me, as the consumer, of the overload that is so often complained about. This relieves me, as the business owner, of the massive cost of 20 ads. I can put out just 1.
The idea of evil in this likely stems from the ability to target. In order to generate a targeted ad, the advertiser has to have information about you. They have to have access to your Facebook profile and all the information therein. They have to know you are a 20 something who likes video games and beef jerky (but then, who doesn't?). This seems to still invade the sense of privacy that many people have held on to.
Privacy, or perhaps the desire for it, is what makes advertising evil. But in our modern world we've all but tossed privacy out the window. Your average teenager has a Myspace account, a Facebook account, a Twitter account, a traceable cell phone, a Google search history, an Amazon buying history, etc. etc. etc. For a new generation of consumers, the idea of privacy is, at best, an illusion.
But the fact that the perceived evil of advertising may be an antiquated notion is irrelevant. If there is one thing that a lifetime of looking at advertising has taught me, it is that perception is everything. Perception is truth. And if advertising that tries to sell you something is perceived as evil, then it is, at least in the eyes of the consumers you are attempting to reach.
The answer then, is to become smarter in how we advertise. A targeted sales pitch is no longer an option. Instead, we have to ingrain a brand in the day to day lives of our targeted consumers. We don't show the product and simply tell you how much it is and where you can get it. We show you the product in the hands of someone you admire who is having an amazing time, and oh, by the way... they just happen to be using this product.
It's not a hard sell that works anymore, it's not a soft sell that works, it's a non-sell. It's a sale by proxy. We buy products because they are a perceived part of the lifestyle we want to lead.
Perhaps as photographers, we can all learn something more from advertising than current trends and lighting styles. Perhaps we can all learn something from those photographers who aren't advertising in the same way anymore -- those photographers whose second job has become promoting themselves as a part of a larger community. Certainly, there is a magnanimous desire to help the community involved in this for most of these individuals. But no one can deny that people like David Hobby and Chase Jarvis have benefited greatly from their role in the photographic community.
The reason is this: when an art director looks to what is going on in the world, they are swayed by those who have great pull amongst a large group of people. If 10,000 people fawn over the work of Chase Jarvis, it must have some resonance with consumers.
At a certain point, to anyone who is interested in the field, Chase Jarvis becomes a household name. It's like a celebrity endorsement, except the photographer becomes their own celebrity.
As photographers who want to work in advertising, we have to understand advertising. We have to become advertising. In a modern era of peer networking, targeted advertising, and group thinking, advertising isn't evil. Advertising is us.
Monday, November 30, 2009
A Trip to Great Falls, MT in photos and commentary
My family, by-in-large is from Montana. My wife is from Great Falls, MT specifically. Usually a few times a year we make the drive to Great Falls to visit. This Thanksgiving, we did just that.
I had a few things that I wanted to do while we were in Great Falls, besides the obvious of eating far too much stuffing and pie. I wanted to get a few nice shots of the kids, including our niece Shiloh, and I wanted to visit some of the Great Falls art galleries.
Shiloh:
Grace:
Trips to art galleries are a regular happening while at home, (see: SPOKE(a)N(e) Magazine: ) but we had neglected it every time we've been back to Great Falls.
At A Hooker's Gallery, an older gentleman was sitting in the coffee shop area. He was listening to the football game playing on the radio. I asked if I could take his picture and he agreed, not changing a bit as I snapped a couple of frames.
While we visited several galleries that were pleasing, most using the multiple artists at all times format, the location that stood out the most to me was the Paris Gibson Square Museum of Art. Not only was there a large assortment of really nice pieces and bits of work in multiple rooms, the building itself was a work of art.
I was told by my mother-in-law that the building was blown up in the 60s for a movie and then re-built. I'm sure CGI is much cheaper, but you've got to admire that level of dedication.
Specifically in the Paris Gibson Square, Harold Schlotzhauer had some wonderful pieces in a show titled "Objects in Motion". He has a great sense of modern graphic design with digital prints on a variety of materials, from plastic sheeting, to skateboards. Also at Paris Gibson, was the piece "Three-Thousand and Counting" which includes dog-tags for every American soldier killed thus far in the Iraq war. A moving and beautiful piece.
There was a room full of tree branch statues. Ranging from cowboy's to unknown creatures, these pieces had a bit of the creepy, and a bit of the humorous. Worth seeing based on the skill of the artist to find a "face" in a piece of wood, alone.
The last night we were in town we did the classic Great Falls thing, and went to a bar called The Sip n' Dip. At the Sip n' Dip, besides having Piano Pat (an older woman playing such classics as "brown eyed girl" at an electric organ) there are mermaids behind the bar. Most evenings, as you enjoy your beverage of choice, a mermaid swims in the hotel pool visible behind the bar. Patrons leave tips in a jar and taped to the window for the mermaids. It's an experience I haven't ever heard of anywhere else.
After the Sip n' Dip, diner food is almost always a necessity. As such, Tracy's is the place to go. Tracy's is a diner seemingly unchanged since the 1950s. Mini-jukeboxes at each table, coffee as black as night, and a white shirted cook behind the counter, Tracy's begs for a photoshoot to go down there. I'm told, more than 1 movie in town has used the location.
Overall, it was a good trip, and I'm going to be sure to hit up the art galleries every time I'm back in town from now on.
I had a few things that I wanted to do while we were in Great Falls, besides the obvious of eating far too much stuffing and pie. I wanted to get a few nice shots of the kids, including our niece Shiloh, and I wanted to visit some of the Great Falls art galleries.
Shiloh:
Grace:
Trips to art galleries are a regular happening while at home, (see: SPOKE(a)N(e) Magazine: ) but we had neglected it every time we've been back to Great Falls.
At A Hooker's Gallery, an older gentleman was sitting in the coffee shop area. He was listening to the football game playing on the radio. I asked if I could take his picture and he agreed, not changing a bit as I snapped a couple of frames.
While we visited several galleries that were pleasing, most using the multiple artists at all times format, the location that stood out the most to me was the Paris Gibson Square Museum of Art. Not only was there a large assortment of really nice pieces and bits of work in multiple rooms, the building itself was a work of art.
I was told by my mother-in-law that the building was blown up in the 60s for a movie and then re-built. I'm sure CGI is much cheaper, but you've got to admire that level of dedication.
Specifically in the Paris Gibson Square, Harold Schlotzhauer had some wonderful pieces in a show titled "Objects in Motion". He has a great sense of modern graphic design with digital prints on a variety of materials, from plastic sheeting, to skateboards. Also at Paris Gibson, was the piece "Three-Thousand and Counting" which includes dog-tags for every American soldier killed thus far in the Iraq war. A moving and beautiful piece.
There was a room full of tree branch statues. Ranging from cowboy's to unknown creatures, these pieces had a bit of the creepy, and a bit of the humorous. Worth seeing based on the skill of the artist to find a "face" in a piece of wood, alone.
The last night we were in town we did the classic Great Falls thing, and went to a bar called The Sip n' Dip. At the Sip n' Dip, besides having Piano Pat (an older woman playing such classics as "brown eyed girl" at an electric organ) there are mermaids behind the bar. Most evenings, as you enjoy your beverage of choice, a mermaid swims in the hotel pool visible behind the bar. Patrons leave tips in a jar and taped to the window for the mermaids. It's an experience I haven't ever heard of anywhere else.
After the Sip n' Dip, diner food is almost always a necessity. As such, Tracy's is the place to go. Tracy's is a diner seemingly unchanged since the 1950s. Mini-jukeboxes at each table, coffee as black as night, and a white shirted cook behind the counter, Tracy's begs for a photoshoot to go down there. I'm told, more than 1 movie in town has used the location.
Overall, it was a good trip, and I'm going to be sure to hit up the art galleries every time I'm back in town from now on.
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