LocationsSpain seem to work pretty often with Andy Glass. This is James’s 3rd time working now with Andy, and Bill has worked several more times with him, and just before this job had started we were already preparing our next job together which all being well should begin shortly after this one finishes. 

This particular job was for a company called Champix, and for those of you who haven’t heard of them (of which i was one), they have developed a drug which helps people to give up smoking. The shot was of a family on a summer vacation climbing up steps at a tourist destination, being followed by a smokey figure. So some pretty nice looking steps were found at what is a tourist resort (the steps were leading up to the Cathedral in Girona). The only problem was that all the models and the extras were to be running around in T-shirts, and general summery attire, and it was decided it should be shot in January. And it was freezing, although Spain is generally associated with the sun and a warm climate, it does still get pretty cold in the winter…… and as it turns out wet. But as luck would have it, and for some reason we have our fair share of luck with the weather (i’ve cursed it all now though), the day it decided to do most of the raining was the day when Andy was shooting in the studio. The studio shot was needed to capture enough smoke so as a re-toucher could later mould it into the smokey figure that is following family about. Although this was supposed to be an anti-smoking campaign (and not a single member of the crew smoked) we certainly got through the cigarettes and tobacco. I think something like 100 cigarettes and a packet of rolling tobacco was used to create an authentic looking smokey figure. 

So with all eyes on the skies we moved on to the outdoor shots of the family running up the Cathedral steps. We walked from the Hotel to the location, and the ground was covered with ice…. we were supposed to be recreating summer, we all started to feel a little for the poor models. But the sky was clear, and the sun was out so with a bit of luck it would warm up a little. Also we had the luxury of shooting right next to a cafe (so many shoots are done in the middle of nowhere that this was a huge bonus) which meant there was somewhere for people to duck into to get warm during shots. From watching Andy shoot i get the impression that the most important thing is to capture the location, which he does all throughout the day giving him as many different lighting variables as he can possibly get. I guess the thinking is that the only reason you are shooting on location is for that specific location, so you make sure you capture it well. Most other things such as models etc. when given to the right re-toucher can be captured in the studio and dropped into the image at a later date. For obvious reasons this isn’t the best way, but it is always possible in emergencies. In this instance though everything (as it always seems to when shooting with Andy) went very smoothly, and he captured the models in the location. Fortunately although it was freezing the models had to rather energetically run up and down the steps, so even though they were wearing just T-shirts, they still managed to keep pretty warm. After the models were shot in the location we wrapped the shoot, and the next morning we all headed to the airport, apart from Bill and James who had a 9 hour drive home.

See Andy Glass’s images here – andyglassphoto.com

Behind the scenes - 

 

An unusual job for LocationSpain this one… In fact it wasn’t strictly speaking LocationSpain, more just Bill and James working together on the job by chance. For various reasons it became clear that the job could not be done under the usual jurisdiction of LocationsSpain and would have to take place in the state of Georgia, USA. Bill was asked specifically to stay on the job as the producer, and because James has been good friends with David for a long time, he got asked to be David’s assistant. And so it transpired that the LocationsSpain team were headed off for Atlanta Georgia.

We were heading into Georgia with the idea that we were going to spend the better part of the week shooting outdoors virtually everyday…… During hurricane season. The view from the plane all the way from London to Atlanta was pretty much solely of cloud. However the hopes were high when we landed in glorious sunshine, and rightly as everything went better than planned for the first 2 days, and we put ourselves a day ahead of schedule. But that was when our luck ran out. Swirling above our heads were the clouds that were caught up in the outer band of a huge hurricane who’s centre was 400miles away (Hurricane Gustav). Which led to their being 2 days of torrential rain. This was the period when we were supposed to be shooting bees, and apparently bees are particularly bad tempered in the rain. Fortunately we got a break in the weather one evening (literally for just 2 hours), so we went off with our epinephrine (just incase the bees turned nasty). As it turned out, the bees were in an especially good mood, and we managed to get the shot just as the heavens opened once again.

This then gave us some time to capture the last shot, which as it turned out was time that we very much needed. But after several attempts we finally got what we wanted on the last morning. The hurricane gave us a spectacular sun rise and we packed our bas and caught the flight back to the UK happy with what we had achieved.

More of David’s work can be found at www.davidryle.com

Production pics -

 

LocationsSpain like jobs in the desert, people shoot in a desert so as they can get a clear blue sky and a hot arid looking landscape. Which is easy, you go to the desert and that’s what you get…. Wrong. That is what you want, and what you want is not always what you get. We arrived in howling wind, after it had been pouring with rain for a week. It looked as if the desert had had rivers running through it just the day before. It was certainly a most uninspiring place for the type of shot that Morgan was after. After the reccie and watching them film the tv ad for the same commercial we headed off to the hotel very somberly. The only thing that we had to cling onto was the fact that the wind was blowing a gale and that that may help dry the place out a little. When we woke up the next day sure enough the sun was out (albeit there were one or two clouds too), and the wind had pretty much done it’s job. It was a long way from perfect, but it was still a far cry from what it had been. So with spirits raised we left the hotel and headed back out toward the rocky desert. 

When we arrived, there was a little bit of hanging around for costumes and extras, as the bad weather had delayed the commercial they were filming at the same location, so they were all still being used. This however gave Morgan a little extra time to go over the landscape and find a spot that he felt comfortable with. Then all of sudden we had the props and the extras and it was action. Morgan had a very clear idea of how he wanted the finished image to look, and was very comfortable and confident shooting to achieve that, this is in part because he has excellent knowledge of retouching so was aware of exactly how he needed to shoot the scene. A few hours later he was confident that the background image had been captured, and with the weather looking as though it may change we decided to do the hero shot back at the hotel ideally outside, but we had arranged a large room to convert into a studio if the weather made that impossible. As it turns out this precaution was unnecessary as the weather looked good when we arrived back. Colourama was set up on the lawn at the hotel, and the hand-model was in for a good few hours lying on his back pretending to hold the can which although was supported is a pretty tiring job, but fortunately we had a good model who didn’t mind. Morgan lit it up to match the background that he had just taken, and did a few variations, then felt again like he had enough to complete the shot. Although, we did go out and shoot more general landscapes with him so he could have more options and depth to the shot if needed.

It was great fun and a learning experience working with Morgan, more of the excellent work that Morgan creates can be found at www.morgansilk.com

Behind the Scenes Pics -

 

So then, this was job number one for James working with LocationsSpain, and job 1,230,095 for Bill. The shoot was for Mazda and the photographer was Andy Glass.

The general idea for the campaign was to have a Mazda car driving on a road that was underwater. So the location brief for us was to find roads with scenery that could be passable for an underwater landscape. Also as there was going to be 2 days where Andy was shooting models of coral underwater we also had to find a deep enough swimming pool so as we could sink the models and still have space to shoot around it in scuba gear.

There were various pools lined up, but in the end we used a privately owned pool that was plenty deep enough, in-fact it was so deep that you had to equalize in order to get to the bottom (something James only found out once he had already damaged his ears). The house was set on top of a hill and had some amazing views. It was probably the perfect place to kick the shooting off because everyone was in a relaxed mood with the sun shining and the pool to jump into whenever, and we knew the car landscape would be a little less civilized so we made the most of it whilst it was there.

Once the underwater shots had been completed we moved onto the early mornings, the cold winds and the late nights. In other words we started shooting the cars outside in their environment.

Thanks to everyone involved in the shoot, the teamwork and the comradery made it a great shoot to be involved in!

See more of Andy’s work at www.andyglassphoto.com

Behind the scenes:

 

The Sony shoot would take place in two different countries over a period of almost a week. The photographer on the job was Todd Antony. We had worked with Todd before, but this would be the first time we had worked with him whilst he was the photographer.

So we begin…. and we begin in the desert. Normally when you tell people you are off into the desert they will instantly think of a place with intense heat, no water, large sand dunes, and the wind constantly blowing dust into your face. Well this wasn’t the case for us (at least not entirely any way). We were heading into a photographer friendly desert. Not too far from civilization, plenty of water (mostly in cool boxes), and the clincher that keeps virtually any photographer happy…… the virtual lack of dust! The reason being this particular desert appeared to be made of large slabs of dried mud/clay, although there was no sand, it still undulated in a very dune like fashion. It covered the entire landscape in what was described as Rhinoceros skin.

So for a few days we spent most of our day in this bizzare landscape. We were shooting cars, so it was the normal very early morning starts, and the usual back to location for sundown affair. Once we left the strange landscape, we would head back to our equally weird looking hotel. The hotel was on the edge of the ‘desert’ and it had looked like someone had dropped a load of shipping containers onto the ground and hey presto there’s a hotel.

When we had finished with the desert, we headed off to France where things were decidedly back to kind of normality. Or objective in France was to capture a classic looking car on the coast at sunset. We reccied and Todd agreed on a location very early on. So all we had to do was make sure that everything was ready for sundown. We tried once, it looked as though it was going to be spectacular, when all of a sudden cloud blew in from nowhere, and covered the bottom of the sky. Attempt 1 had failed. The second attempt, we headed out to the location well before the sunset was due, again it was going to be a great one… that was until it found out we wanted it to be. It was almost a carbon copy of the previous night. The only difference there was between the two evenings was that on the second night we managed to attract an audience, a crowd of onlookers gathered around us to see why a bunch of people needed so much equipment just to take a picture of a sunset. So we were now 2 attempts down, and we only had 1 full day left of the shoot, the weather day, everyone had their fingers crossed. We headed down even earlier because we were also taking the risk of moving the set-up along the coast to a lower position. Everyone was watching the sky looking for the low cloud that had ruined it for the last 2 night. It didn’t rear it’s ugly head, we got an almost perfect sunset. It was the perfect finish to a great shoot.

The celebrations began that evening, and the whole crew was relieved that the weather decided to come good for us.

More of Todd’s work can be found at www.toddantony.com

Behind the scenes pictures from the Sony Shoot: