Double Vision: Harnessing the Strength of a Photographer Duo to Create Powerful Imagery (and a lot of it!)
We shoot as a team. This is a powerful dynamic that offers several advantages: efficiency, quantity of images, and two unique perspectives. We work together and separately, united in our creative vision while individually shaping and documenting the stories we see.
With both of us shooting it enables us to capture a wide variety of shots, including wide, medium, and close-up angles, in any given scenario. This allows us to beautifully showcase the essence of the subjects, their stories, and the emotions involved, resulting in a diverse and extensive collection of imagery.
We like to shoot with one camera always thethered and one that gets “to Roam”. Shooting tethered and untethered allows for images with different energy. While we are reviewing images on the monitor from one camera, one of us might catch a candid moment from the talent when they let their guard down. Maybe one of us is capturing a wider shot of the whole scene while one is close up capturing a product shot or completely different angle altogether.
Here’s an example of what we mean. These two images were shot a minute apart. One by Jeremy and one by Claire. Withe the two of us shooting we could move around our small crowd of pretend sports fans and focus on completely different things happening without having to change set-ups and move people around. This not only keeps the momentum going and the energy high but it also really lends itself to getting complete surprises none of us were planning going into the shoot.
We share a style but we don’t always share an angle!
Through Their Eyes: Capturing Spontaneity and Connection Through Documentary Photography.
We work closely with our talent to really help them understand the role they are playing and the stories we are crafting for them. Our goal is to create photographs that feel unstaged, authentic and natural, as if it’s a moment in time as opposed to a staged photograph. The same approach happens with our films because we are capturing everything at once.
We think the best visuals feel spontaneous and happened-upon, so we immerse ourselves in the moment with the talent, capturing the action as it unfolds. We want the photo to feel like it was taken by someone sharing the same moment. By a participant, not an observer.
.
One of the motion pieces we directed from these shoots playing on the Barclay’s Center…
Shooting these campaigns over the years also made us accustomed to shooting with very specific post-production treatments to be aware of. The hero of the photo always had to be able to fit into the logo of the credit card. We would have a mask overlay on all images as they came into the computer so we all had piece of mind we were getting exactly what we needed.
There were also some wild formats to fit as well so we made sure to have a great plan going into the shoot to make sure we met all the different final layout requirements.
The Energy is Everything. Realness is key.
Shoots like this are ALL about keeping the energy up and making it look as real as possible. We learned the hard way many years back of how NOT to handle the crowd and have really perfected ways to make it look completely authentic. Tricks like tools to keep everyone’s eye-line looking the same way, how to make sure the whole crowd of main talent AND the background keep similar expressions so it doesn’t instantly look fake.
It’s so common to see these types of shoots where you see the hero talent over excited looking in one direction and the rest of “the Crowd” seeming bored and looking another way. It’s also very common to see everyone over the top with fake excitement the whole time and that doesn’t always feel real either. There are more moments to a game than just everyone screaming their lungs out. Some can be overly excited while others are not.
Below is a photo we shot on a golf course. It’s a crowd of 15 extra and two heroes at a fake golf event. You can see in the out of focus background talent that people can be reacting differently and still feel very authentic.
A little peek behind the scenes.
Check out this video of us simultaneously directing the TV spot and shooting the stills for a Vegas hotel. It was at 10am in an empty dance club with us, our crew, 4 main talent and 12 background talent. Here’s some final stills and some BTS of it happening.
And a couple more of our photos,..
