LESSONS LEARNED // IT'S BEEN A YEAR, LET'S TALK ABOUT SOME SHIT.
WHAT UP Y’ALL? IT’S BEEN AWHILE.
Over a year in fact since I’ve sat down and poured my heart into one of these. I wish I had a more concise way to explain my absence, but I don’t. This is going to be a long one. Grab a glass of wine, take a seat, and buckle your fucking seatbelt.
Last time we met I was jumping for joy over the fact that I had signed on with the good dudes over at 8183 Studio as a roster shooter, and we had just completed my first book shoot with an Infiniti. There was an overwhelming sense of excitement, pride, and potential as I felt like I had finally gotten the door open that I’ve been knocking at for quite some time.
Later on in the year the team got back together for a studio collaborative project that combined everything from product and lifestyle stills with a killer motion piece to flex our muscles on what a full campaign done in house would look like. This too brought a large amount of excitement, pride, etc. etc. This project would also be a tipping off point for me as I’m finally entering the early stages of learning how to take ideas out of my head and put them into the real world, something I’ve been struggling with for as long as I can remember.
There’s a pretty serious in depth breakdown of this project, if you’re interested in reading about the process, seeing the motion piece, and a shitload of BTS check it out HERE
It was somewhere in the post production of this project that I had a strong urge to become fully aware of what everyone else was doing, and do the exact opposite. (this is where it starts to get deep, you might want to refill that wine before we dive into this next part)
I was making the drive from Kansas City to St. Louis to visit some friends for the weekend. I kept looking at the stale, boring, and repetitive billboards that I’ve seen well over 100 times plastered in the sky from city to city.
“REPENT”
“BIRTH IS LIFE”
THOUSANDS OF BOOTS”
“YOUR WIFE IS HOT”
Somewhere along i-70 on that 250 mile drive I realized how much I fucking hate advertisements,
which is a funny thing considering I’ve devoted my life to making them.
I started to think about our recent studio project and as I was reflecting on the day it occurred to me that instead of hanging images in the studio I should be hanging images in the city. I started breaking down the current trends in marketing and this all made PERFECT sense, AND tied in directly with my newly discovered ethos of thinking differently.
When thinking about all of the things that make marketing great in the digital era we think of things like websites, social media, email blasts, direct marketing, etc. Billboards are becoming a lesser desired end result for the work that really stands out in the field- and is commonly home to the watered down, minimal, and direct language used in order to be easily consumed and retained by the general public. Usually while traveling in a vehicle of some sort.
What’s crazier to me is the fact that the average joe scrolls through a web page or instagram at something like 60mph, making our average view time of 2.4 seconds on still imagery decrease rapidly. This shit is bananas. Images that are taking hours to compose and create are being absorbed at such a rapid pace that the creation process of certain assets is severely diluted to be in line with its final presentation.
Our markets are shifting to becoming more “good enough” markets instead of “best it can be” markets. This process is becoming more of a norm in avenues aside from just web/social media as we see the attention span of our average consumer dwindling day by day.
With large amounts of effort being focused towards the screens held by consumers, I decided to focus on the canvas that floats above the city- The language for the concept went something like this:
”instead of marketing to people looking down, let’s make them look up.”
I was really into the idea of treating a billboard/city background as an art gallery. So I went and found my favorite view of the skyline (which was also right above my favorite set of train tracks) which also happens to have a perfectly placed billboard that is almost directly at eye level. It was perfect. This particular billboard also had no lights- which is even more perfect because not only does my image have beautiful placement and limited duration of existence, it also has a very specific window of viewing. Making this something you either stumble upon throughout your workday, or something you have to specifically go look at.
There is also the large possibility that some people will never see it which is probably my favorite factor at stake here. With graffiti one of my favorite things was spending so much time on something simply for the act of doing- it was widely understood that everything I ever painted would potentially be covered up at some point. Much like a monk creating a sand mandala- we’re in it for the process. Not the end result. This level of intent is the type of shit I get insanely hyped on. ART IS FUCKING COOL GUYS.
OKAY TRAVIS COOL YOU PAID FOR A BILLBOARD, OTHER PEOPLE ARE DOING THAT ALL THE TIME. WHAT ARE YOU GETTING AT HERE?
I’m glad you asked! I’m definitely not the first to think of billboards as the perfect canvas for my work, and being in advertising our work shows up on billboards across the country quite often. HOWEVER- I have yet to see other advertisement photographers in my market use a billboard as a canvas for their personal work. Mainly due to the fact that putting my image up in the city cost me upwards of $1,200 for 4 weeks, and I didn’t put my name on it so there was no way of tracking any kind of ROI. Most shooters with any amount of common sense would call me crazy for spending that amount of money on something so disposable, but in my opinion that was a low cost to swallow for the amount of possibilities it unlocked in my brain.
Interestingly enough, this idea of creating specific viewing experiences for my photographs is just a way for me to stick to my roots of graffiti. The planning and execution process hasn’t changed, I’m just spending more money by purchasing the real estate instead of taking it from someone else. In fact- I’ve learned more about advertising through graffiti than I have from making advertisements. Life’s weird man.
*side note- A representative from Sony Alpha Universe reached out to me earlier this year and we spent some time on the phone talking about a bunch of things (including graffiti) that turned into articles-
if you’re into reading about any of that stuff here’s some links:
https://alphauniverse.com/stories/the-pro-files--authenticity-and-instagram/
https://alphauniverse.com/stories/the-pro-files--take-an-old-school-approach-to-attracting-clients/
There were a lot of other very important things that happened in 2018 that allowed me to unlock a certain part of my brain that was much needed to think deeper, clearer, and more technically. One of them was a pretty serious burnout that knocked me on my ass pretty hard. If I’m being honest this left a pretty heavy scar and is the reason I’ve shifted directions almost entirely.
For those of you who know me- you knew that I was pursuing the niche of studio product and was super into highly technical shoot styles, heavy retouching, etc. After giving it a decent fight and a few years of dedication I’ve come to realize that I wasn’t built for that type of production, and after being so engulfed in composites, revisions, long shoot days, long retouch days, etc. for a representation of something to live on a white background I became insanely bored. Where’s the purpose? Where’s the story? AGHHH.
Don’t get me wrong- I find immense joy in studying a product, understanding the engineering, and making sure I can properly represent someone else’s hard work, but to do a disservice and put that shoe on a white background is almost heartbreaking to me. Someone designed those shoes to be worn, to be used, to be functional under hard conditions, to withstand the elements, to take a beating. THAT is what I want to show. By taking the technical understanding of a studio shooter and applying it to the real world use of a product in the environment it was intended for, I believe we can make some seriously powerful shit. It was this mindset that made my portion of the studio’s Bose project so successful, it was also this mindset that has attracted attention from brands such as Cadillac, Mini Cooper, and Garmin for example.
Since we’re kind of doing a bit of a recap here- earlier this year Garmin shipped me out to New Orleans to shoot the tail end of a global campaign. As you can imagine this sparked loads of excitement for me since this was a substantially larger milestone for me as a newer shooter. Not to mention this was one of the last check marks I needed to reach just about every goal I’ve ever set. We’ll get into that later.
I’ve been doing my best over the last several months to put myself in front of the people I look up to. In doing so I’ve been able to get the answers I’ve desperately needed to make the majority of my decisions when it comes to what I’m doing and where I’m going. The best piece advice I have ever received was that anything worth doing, was worth overdoing. (thanks dad) So I’m overdoing the hell out of educating myself on everything from industry past and present, cameras, software, communication, etc. There’s so much to learn, and to be honest if I had any idea what it was going to take to do something like this I would have probably been scared off and pursued a stable career path that included shit like insurance, consistent paychecks, and casual Fridays.
I’m so fucking glad I didn’t take that route.
Another recent trip to St. Louis put me in front of some of the top people on my list of inspirational humans, and after speaking with the good dudes at Bruton Stroube (Brandon Voges and Jake Potts) ProEDU (Matt Seidel), and Portland based Retouchers- Sef McCullough/Earth Oliver I was able to express my current frustrations with a variety of things including the ad industry, ad agencies, industry demand, importance of concept, and boredom. Several amazing conversations were had, and these dudes educated the hell out of me. ALSO- I was genuinely shocked to hear that even the people at the top of the game think the majority of the work we get to do sometimes can be pretty boring.
This is where I figured out that I’ve been looking at everything the wrong way.
The problems I’ve been having aren’t with advertisements themselves, but with how I’ve allowed the process of creating them to influence my overall view of them.
….and the insane amount of pressure I’ve been putting on myself.
I’m still trying to fully figure a lot of shit out in this region of things.
Good progress has been made, and the thinking process has shifted…sort of.
OKAY TRAVIS, SO YOU LEARNED SOME SHIT. GOOD JOB MAN.
HOW HAVE YOU PUT THAT KNOWLEDGE TO USE?
Well- due to 2019 turning into the busiest year to date I haven’t had a ton of time to dive into projects per say, but what I have been able to do is refine my definition of intent in my industry, and while it’s not 100% there just yet- I’m feeling really good about where I’m at and what I’m doing. Hopefully I have more on this one for you in the coming months.
If there’s anything that I want to be taken away from this novel, it’s that I’ve stumbled upon a clear understanding of what it takes to properly sustain in this specific industry, and that I have what it takes to make some great shit happen. For the last few years or so the bigger fish in the pond have been making me work really hard, it’s my dream that in the coming years I’ll be able to return the favor by making them work a little harder when it comes to making dope shit for dope companies.
HEY WHAT WAS THAT SHIT YOU WERE SAYING ABOUT REACHING EVERY GOAL YOU’VE EVER SET?
Damn, I was kind of hoping you forgot about this because it’s pretty difficult to translate into something that can be properly understood.
BUT I’ll try anyway.
Somewhere around 2014-2015 I made a small list of internal goals that I wanted to reach in the next 10+ years or so. I was almost dead certain it would take longer- but I was very wrong. The small list consisted of things like working on national/global advertisement campaigns, and having a functioning studio, all of which I’ve technically had accomplished since 2017. There have been slight variations to those goals over the years, but when I look back and remember thinking how out of reach a lot of that stuff was it’s messed with my brain quite a bit, and threw me into a little bit of an unexpected funk.
You’re probably thinking: “Just set some higher goals” which is very rational and fair of you, but my problem is that I don’t know how. Those are the biggest goals I’ve ever had. I suppose I could go into more specifics like “land a 100,000+ job” but thats putting me in a position of setting a dollar amount on fulfillment- something I have a very large issue with.
There are a lot of constant developments happening in this area right now, and my mind shifts pretty drastically almost every day. The good news is that there are enough practical problems that need solutions to keep my brain occupied for awhile, but every couple of weeks or so this creeps back and throws me for a pretty serious loop. Y’all ever deal with this shit? Let’s talk about it.
ANYWAY LETS MOVE ON TO SOME SHIT THAT IM VERY HYPED ABOUT.
There are loads of things to be excited about as I’m doing my best to mold and adapt to a large amount of variables. Project wise I’ve been trying to think deeper and with more intent. So far I have just a couple of things in the works enough to share with you. Keep in mind these are still flexible concepts and ideas and very much works in progress. The end results that come from these might look lightyears different- at least I hope they do.
THE TRANSACTION
Irish immigrants, whiskey, crooked cops.
The concept for this project actually started early last year after talking with a local distillery owner about a 1947 paddy wagon that they’ve turned into a mobile bar. I remember hearing that they were doing a full restore on this thing about 6 months earlier, and after seeing it in person I was hyped as shit about it. There were a few conversations kicked around with what exactly to do with that thing, and I can’t remember who said it but there was a suggestion to use it in a way to tell some kind of story.
I have no idea what was in the air that day but I went back to the studio and wrote out a full story about an Irish immigrant who was illegally housed in New York City by his sleaze-ball of a cousin who was in debt to some crooked cops, and somehow they struck a deal to trade barrels of this family Irish whiskey for the immigrants freedom. Our scene exists once the police arrive to the warehouse where the immigrant has not produced enough product to meet their demand.
Developing this project as if it were a movie opened a shitload of doors to ideas I would have never considered including in a stills shoot. I’ve included things like a script, character traits, backstories, a specific date/time, etc. All to give everyone involved more context to be able to play with when it comes time for capture. There are also several small details that I’ve included such as my family members’ names (we’re hella Irish) and my dad’s birthday/birthplace which is where this whole story takes place. *below are some pages of the treatment for context
Other details include the police officers being Irish- which is historically correct and ties everything back to the origin of the “Paddy Wagon” that they are driving. If you’re unfamiliar where the term Paddywagon came from- (This is a quick and dirty explanation that leaves out a shitload of details, look this up if you’re interested) Back in the day in Ireland people were crazy and would cause issues and need to be arrested in groups. They’d throw all of the “Paddy’s” or Patrick’s into the back of a truck and take them to jail. Fast forward to when the Irish settled in America and became a large number of the operating police force. Now the “Paddy’s” are driving the trucks to throw groups of people in jail, thus we get the name Paddywagon. Boom. History bitch.
ANYWAY. It’s my dream that by putting in this much attention to detail, hiring actors as talent, and going through the process of making this as period correct as we can- the moment we yell ACTION this story can come to life. I have a vision of everyone becoming so absorbed into this moment that we’ve briefly forgotten about the production and are able to exist inside the world of this project. I just got chills thinking about it. This is so damn cool.
We’ve explored a lot of various capture ideas- everything from a wet plate 8x10, to twin lens medium format, to using old shitty lenses, expired film etc. The reality is that we’ll probably shoot a bunch of shit on some kind of 8x10 or 4x5 film (hopefully) paired with some medium format digital backups. There will probably be all kinds of cameras on the table for this one to create a shitload of different looks. The possibilities are virtually endless and I’m hyped as shit about it.
THERE. ARE. NO. RULES.
Deliverables for this project would ideally include a lookbook, various character ID cards, and potentially other tangibles paired with a rebranded whiskey to reflect a product developed around a story. Rebrand assets would include bottle labeling, packaging, a smuggler’s language breakdown, and other brand elements. Final presentation would include a website case study on the digital end. Physical presentation be a wooden shipping crate with the lookbook and bottles of whiskey that are disguised under straw packaging protection. The crate would be nailed shut and something would be written on the outside such as “RED DISHES” which would translate to “WHISKEY” if you spoke the smugglers language. Making this a narrative driven product experience from start to finish. This shit is so cool to think about.
I have no idea when this project will come to life, but I’ve spoken to a lot of people about it and loads of changes have been made to the original treatment. Hopefully one of these days I’ll be able to nail down a final gameplay for this one and execute accordingly.
ANAGLYPH
3D glasses, twins, cool shit.
Earlier this year sometime I had an idea to try and shoot things in 3D. Again- not a new idea by any means, but another thing that I haven’t been seeing other people in my market put any effort towards.
I’ve gone in several different directions with this idea so far, and when trying to figure out how the hell I would shoot something like dirt bikes jumping sand dunes with 2 cameras attached to some kind of linear rig my head starts to hurt. Its definitely possible- it just seemed like something I might need to lean into in case I mess some shit up out of the gate.
SO. After messing around with only 1 camera and 3D glasses I started to combine images that can be separated by color channels. This is interesting as hell because in theory we can create 3 different versions out of 1 image. Confused? Don’t be- this shit is VERY simple.
For the example below- we shot 2 images. 1 of Carmen and one of Bones. By keeping the camera at the same height/distance we can very easily overlay the images and isolate the red/blue channels. The resulting image is pretty interesting looking and sort of looks like we’re just showing an interesting portrait of Carmen with a skeleton beneath her. BUT once we isolate the red channels by looking through the red glasses we see only bones. Isolate the blue channel and we only see Carmen. VERY simple but holy shit thats interesting! Try it for yourself if you’ve got some red/blue 3D glasses laying around! (it also works with red/blue color gels)
After this initial round of testing I got to thinking how this could be put to better use. Right away using twins seemed like the best fit. Two things that are seen as the same, but live separate lives, have separate personalities. Twins are SO interesting. What better way to make a singular portrait of two people than by splitting them into channels? DUH.
We were lucky enough to snag Erin and Meredith for our first go around to see if this would actually work. Turns out it worked better than I could have imagined! We set up a very basic portrait background and got to work- when the overlay process was happening I noticed that their faces completed the RGB spectrum and created a full color image. THIS BLEW MY FUCKING MIND.
It makes perfect sense actually- since they’re twins they have identical faces. All of my previous tests have had two totally different objects so this result never occurred to me, and makes me love these images even more. To go even deeper now we have a full color representation of what the world sees as identical, and through our color channels we can reveal the characteristics that make Erin and Meredith each their own individual person. ALL WITHIN ONE IMAGE. GUYS ART IS SO DAMN COOL!!!!
There are a lot of ways this project could go, for example: mother daughter, father son, brother sister, fraternal twins, etc. etc. Right now I’m doing my best to think of the different ways to experience this work. So far there are no for sure plans, but the idea of a large scale gallery show has been kicked around pretty heavily. I’m also exploring different ways to implement the red/blue overlay into the framing of the images to provide viewers the ability to control which parts of the image they want to reveal. These images don’t really properly exist without some type of viewer interaction. I love that shit.
Diving in further I’m looking at ways to present the work in a space that would give viewers the opportunity to experience both images as they move passed a specific viewing window. My current favorite idea is finding the perfect billboard along the KC Streetcar route and installing a red/blue split window film that would allow whoever is looking out the window to witness the image change on their commute. I’m very into the idea of the viewer stumbling upon how to view these works, again- this is just graffiti for me. There are no fucking rules, and I’m hyped as hell.
Typically it wouldn’t make sense to share project concepts/ideas until they were finished, but as I’ve stated in past blogs- These are aimed at my previous self. It’s important for me to track my progress with this kind of shit. It also could potentially show y’all why there hasn’t been a ton of recent work from me in the last year, and give you a little peek of what the inside of my head looks like. The process is my priority. The results are just a bonus as far as I’m concerned.
For the sake of length- There are a shitload of other things I’m leaving out that are regularly happening that do contribute to the process of understanding why I’m doing all of this shit, but I’ll save those details for those of you who are brave enough to get stuck in a car with me on a road trip, or catch me in the middle of a deep thought in the studio.
If you’re still with me, thank you. I know this is a lot to read and comprehend.
I do want to tell about one more very important thing that happened to me just last week that changed my view of thinking yet again.
I hopped in the car with my buddy Erik and we started the 11 hour journey that would land us is Austin, Texas for the 19th round of the Formula One Grand Prix. This is especially exciting since this is the only race of the season that comes to the United States, and I had to miss last year due to a dear friend’s wedding.
To put the importance of this specific race in perspective- Lewis Hamilton was just a few points away from claiming his 6th world championship. There were only a small handful of variables that would stand in his way, meaning that we were more than likely going to witness a championship celebration by Sunday afternoon. Mercedes had already claimed their constructors title the weekend prior, so the silver arrows were in good spirits.
We arrived to the race track Friday morning, and had no idea what to expect, but as we got closer to the front gate we heard the F1 power units roaring in the distance for the first time. This would be comparable to hearing the crack of a baseball bat for the first time if you were a baseball fan. Seeing a Formula One car for the first time is pretty fucking dope. They’re really small, kind of long, and really fast. We tried to soak it all in as best as we could while making ourselves familiar with the small city of a racetrack that we’d be basically living at for the next 3 days. Scoping out the best turns, places on the ground to sit, bathroom locations, and where the best food was.
Saturday was a bit of a different story. We arrived a little later in the morning since we were mostly familiar with the area, but what we didn’t expect was double the amount of people to be there. Practice usually isn’t anything special in F1, but Qualifying on Saturday was definitely not something you wanted to miss. Especially when my dude Valtteri Bottas unleashes his fury and lands pole position. We also had a chance to witness classic formula cars rip around the track, it was wild to watch historic championship cars from the 70’s pushing their limits- I figured those things would be tucked away in museums or protected. The fact that they’re still in good operating condition and racing is fucking amazing to me. We spent the day wandering, soaking in the mass amount of shit happening all around the track, and shredding the go kart track. I was in fucking heaven.
As I was making general observations about this event- I couldn’t help but be insanely inspired by how smooth everything ran. There were so many bathrooms. Putting something like this must have been an absolute nightmare. I would very much like to see what an invoice looked like for things like bathrooms, vendor fees, race entry fees, etc. I constantly kept taking notes on how I can implement things like this into production- thinking of every single detail like making sure we have an air conditioned tent if we’re going to be outside during summer set, making sure we have enough plates and garbage bags, etc. There are so many elements to consider, I just need to figure out how to put myself in a mental position to use the portion of my brain thats frequently thinking of those little details. Just thinking about this right now gets me hyped!
Sunday. Race Day.
Valtteri Bottas sits on pole while Lewis starts from P4 on the grid. He would have 56 laps to figure out how to score just a couple points to secure his world championship. I don’t even know when we arrived, or what led up to us getting into position. All I can remember now is the race start and not being able to see shit, but I didn’t care. I was surrounded by die hard race fans from all around the world. Everyone was so friendly. I’ve never been in such a densely populated area with such high energy. This was the greatest day of my life.
The race was kind of chaos, and the energy levels were all over the place. There was intensity, overtaking, strategy switching, and at one point Lewis Hamilton was able to snag P1 until he began to lose his tires and Valterri swooped back in to eventually finish the race in P1. Something we’ve all been patiently waiting for, leaving lewis to finish in P2 and securing his 6th world championship.
The best way I can describe how important this all is- Imagine you’re a major Chiefs football fan. Well- out of the one game they play per season in your country- they came and won the fucking Super Bowl.
Immediately following the fireworks and crossing of the finish line we picked up our belongings and ran down the hill as fast as we could.
It was time to storm the track. I can’t put what this was like into words- you’ll have to look at the images for this one and imagine the screams and cheers. It was pure fucking chaos and I have never felt better about anything in my entire life. There were several moments where I just stopped and looked around at the confetti, champagne sprays, flags waving, cheers, and insane amount of joy that I was surrounded by. I cried a lot during this. I’m crying right now just thinking about it. This shit is incredible.
I couldn’t tell you how much time passed before I met back up with Erik and we made our way back to the car to start our journey back to Kansas City, and that is by far my favorite part of all of this.
If you want to get technical- this whole 5 day weekend was a vacation for me, and a way for me to get excited about something. That dream I was explaining earlier with forgetting where we were for a second and being engulfed in the moment- that shit happened to me here. It’s been a long time since I forgot where I was and existed in a different world, and that is a feeling I’m constantly chasing in just about everything that I do. Finding it feels like winning the lottery every time.
There’s something really special that happens when you lose yourself in something, I can’t explain it to you but if you know what I’m talking about- you understand what I’m saying. If you don’t- I highly encourage you to find something that you’re absolutely in love with, and allow yourself to be totally immersed in it. This is the shit I live for.
22 hours of driving.
3 states.
3 days of Formula One.
2 cases of food poisoning.
1 sunburned forehead.
2 bruised shoulders.
1 new mercedes hat.
2 honky tonks.
We survived what I would consider one of the best weekends of my life.
If you’re still here- you’ve survived one of the most difficult and detailed insights I’ve ever given to what the inside of my head looks like. While I left a large amount of shit out, hopefully you were able to take something away from this. I know I sure did.
thanks, it means a lot.
-travis