Cade:
I’ve been working with Fedde for a number of years now on CGI and retouching projects – not all projects but we find each other quite often. Clients seem to enjoy our chemistry and how we approach projects. We are usually on the creative, chemistry calls and I think we have a nice way of talking through our approach as well as working through the projects and collaborations.
Every project is different as is our approach. As most projects, I am approached with a brief and asked to bring the concepts to life. Fedde and I are very solution-oriented and move straight into the “how” portion of the project. Flexibility, comfort level, and openness have been the keys to our success.
I think relationships are still the best way to keep working in advertising photography. My reputation with prior clients and agencies, production and post-production teams is vital. That’s a thing you can’t fake, it has to be authentically cultivated over time, by being a professional and treating the work and the people you work with and for, with respect and care. It’s always exciting to forge relationships in a creative space.
Fedde:
We work very closely together as a team, using and building on both our expertises to bring the project from a concept to a final product.
Usually we start out with creating a rough placeholder scene / visual in which we do a lot of sketching with CG and try to visualize what the final visual could look like. Cade lovingly calls this “going to the Bat Cave” and this process basically means that we work for 2-3 weeks per-visualizing the various shots (assuming it is more than one).
After this creative process, we usually have a good work in progress version that Cade can use for his photography, getting things like focal length, distance to the subject, height of the camera, light direction, etc, etc. from us, so he can (partially) reconstruct the scene in the studio.
By doing this, he can then completely focus on his creative process in the studio, in which he gets the talent to act great, look great and then seamlessly integrate them into the visual!
This allows the client to see quite well how the image is taking shape and also see how the talent will not just work on set but also already see how it will work in the final visual.
After this we continue working on evolving the visuals to a great looking final product!