Throwback To The Future!

fluke
“Roads? Where we’re going we don’t need roads!”
We’re taking a flight back in time with Fluke Manufacturing! This week we’re busting out the film strips and having a flashback to the days of pre-digital shooting. Our Lead Shooter Henry Ngan captures the era in this classic Fighter Pilot Tech shot on film! Henry and the rest of the Studio 3 crew had a blast working with Art Director Val Kurita, who now Product Manages Chaudiere Design, Inc. in Seattle, WA.  And with retired successful Graphic Designer Gary LaComa who is currently creating Fine Art Photography , you can check out his gallery at Saatchi Art and shop on Zentopia to snag some of his beautiful art work. Gary hops in the time machine to share a few words with us about his tenure with Studio 3…
“This image was a core brand image for a new product introduction for Fluke Manufacturing. It was designed to be the visual icon for this new product in advertising, print collateral, and point of sale posters. The overriding concept of the product was “speed” which lead to a vision loosely visualized in my head and sold to the client. The client’s trust in us to deliver the goods was the primary reason we got this project. It was a very important introduction that the company had invested in heavily. The stakes were high. 
…It was always exciting working with The Boys and getting the results we did on this and many other projects. This campaign, built visually around this image, was a huge success for the client.
I would like to add however that I chose to work with Studio 3 on many of my clients projects over a decade of effort for 3 primary reasons. First their technical expertise. Henry and his support crew were, and always has been, technically way ahead of their time (even back then). This image was actually created in the camera and on film, unlike today where a computer screen and digital manipulation reign supreme. Second reason was their attitude about working as a team. Unlike many photographers, they allowed me to work with them in the trenches. We worked together hands on… as a team. Many photographers are less than enthusiastic about this collaborative style of work and prefer that you sit in a chair and yes/no “their” creations. Third my confidence in them to deliver. I knew they/we would deliver the product we sold and to do it efficiently and within my client’s budget and schedule. “

It’s always fun sharing these stories from way back in the day!

It's About That Time..

We’re springing forward with new technology! Studio 3 is keeping up with the recent time change with the new Samsung Galaxy Smartwatch! Inspired by losing an hour this past weekend, we thought we would focus on the hottest watch around. According to the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, wearable devices are catapulting into todays market! This snazzy timepiece is compatible with the Galaxy Note 3 and other Galaxy smartphones. You can place and answer calls directly from your wrist, how crazy is that!? With this clean accessory, you get style and substance. Pairing with that, we had Senior Shooter David Bell work his magic with lighting to enhance the clean smooth timepiece of the future. Once the smartwatch presented itself as inspiration, we had David Bell run with it:
“Hip and happening are always connected, you gotta love technology! Very cool Samsung Galaxy Smartwatch that keeps you connected all day. The shot is inspired by the fact that it works where you are. Clean and simple, like the watch.”
SQI
Excited about the new wearable technology addition to our wardrobe, Studio 3 did some research on what this sexy little device can offer. Check out this commercial showing the ‘Evolution’ of the dreamed about futuristic watch that became real…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32_cZvpx3D0

A Trip Down Memory Lane, In Freightliner Trucks! #TBT

Freightliner
A trip down memory lane takes us back to summer of 1983, and we’re in the middle of the Alvord Desert. For a few years around this time, we’ve been shooting calendars for Freightliner Trucks in-studio. These trucks were a work of art, show-trucks that were built and painted particularly to collaborate with the themes of each year’s calendar. But it was time for something new and fresh! This was our first attempt to shoot the calendar on location. Tom Stuart, our lead photographer at the time, scouted a few places that’ll be a great large flat space to offer beautiful surroundings to match the hues and beauty of the models and show-trucks we were shooting. So we arrived at Alvord Desert! Tom Stuart and our current Lead Shooter Craig Wagner, geared up, packed the studio van, grip truck, two RVs, and three 1984 Freightliner beauty trucks. They headed to the desert with two clients, three assistants, three models, a hair and make up stylist, and 3 truck drivers in tow.
Freightliner
For a week, our crew, clients, models, truck drivers, and stylist camped in the dessert shooting at sunrise and sunset and finding time in between to soak up the scenery and it’s activities. While our clients, models, and stylist camped in the two RV’s, the truck drivers slept in the semi-truck sleepers and Studio 3 rolled out our sleeping bags without hesitation, and slept under the stars.
FreightlinerFreightliner
The fun didn’t stop with shooting during the beautiful hours of sunrise and sunset. Thanks to the wind and rain, most of the day was spent getting equipment set up, with our crew jogging for a quarter of a mile at a time to retrieve our belongings. When we weren’t running for our lives, or shooting with the sun’s timing, the crew was enjoying BBQ’s, the local farmers hospitality with horseback riding, and dipping into the hot springs. With that said, take us back to the summer of 1983!
FreightlinerFreightliner
 

It's In The Details

Another one from our creative and innovative team of Digital Artists! Being experts in the industry, they’re crazy efficient and solution-oriented artists, with crazy teamwork that collectively gets us to where we need to be. Let our Digital lead, Alex Gumina, tell you how we never overlook the small details and work together with our clients to get to the final product!
“When I originally received this image for post-production it was so clean that I wondered what needed to be done to it. Upon reading the photographers notes I discovered that the client wanted the reflections removed from the marble tile, the imagery on some of the screens changed, and a host of other fairly intensive edits. Swapping out the images on the screens was easy – we do this sort of thing all the time. However, when it came to removing the reflections from the marble tile I had to formulate a game plan. Because of the perspective, simply cloning tile to tile wouldn’t work. The grout lines wouldn’t match up. My first inclination was to path out each individual tile and clone sample in from other areas, but I knew there had to be a better way. I decided to make a complex system of open-ended paths over the grout areas in between the tiles themselves. I then created separate paths for the different areas of colored tile. I filled in each of these areas with a solid color, which I sampled from the actual floor tile color. After I had each of the areas filled, I used the path I made over the grout lines to fill in the grout and applied an inner bevel. The result looked good, but didn’t really make sense because the reflection was completely gone. I scaled it back, showed the client, made a few minor adjustments, and arrived at the end result.”
Faustrollean Fixture Company

Lifestyle Photographer Matt Jebbia & Digital Artist Alex Gumina "Peace of Mind"

It’s summer in the Northwest, the perfect opportunity to get outside and shoot. Recently, Lifestyle Photographer Matt Jebbia headed to Green Lake to capture the practice of yoga in a peaceful setting. He came out with some great pictures, read below for his inspiration behind the shoot:

There is just something amazing about shooting outside in the NW. Seattle being one of my favorite areas to live and work has just an astounding amount of parks with water that just add an awesome element to any photographer’s photo shoots. These yoga images were shot on a pier at Green Lake in North Seattle. I was a bit concerned that my choice of time of day was a bit ambitious given that the sun is usually at its hottest point at 4:30pm. Turns out that in relationship to my model the sun created some pretty nice lighting on her face when she turned just the right way. This inspired me further, knowing with the help of our digital team, we could create an awesome tropical, yet serene image.

The pictures inspired a collaboration between Matt and Alex, with the end result of the model appearing as if she were in a tropical place like Bali or the Maldives. Alex Gumina shares how he created the tropical feel:

When Studio 3 photographer Matt Jebbia originally came to me with these yoga images he wanted to give them a more tropical feel. They were shot on location at Green Lake and although a beautiful setting, it certainly feels more like the Pacific Northwest than it does a tropical paradise. His initial edits for me were “remove the houses, lengthen the dock where needed / remove the railing, and see what you can do with the background in general”. The words “see what you can do…” sort of opened up the door for me to get creative, and I decided to take full advantage.
I thought to myself “where would be a really beautiful, peaceful place to do some yoga?” and the Maldive Islands came to mind. After a quick Google search I found an inspiration image and went to work. If you look closely, you’ll actually see this image at the top of my layers palette. I pasted it in so I could sample the blues for my sky gradient. For the clouds I considered using a Photoshop brush or some vector art, but I wanted something a little more original so I decided to hand “paint” them in on my own. It was at this point that I decided to start recording a video (see below).

I had already drawn my path around the model and used an alpha channel for her hair, so it was really just a matter of cleaning the image up, dropping in the background, and changing the color of the water. While reviewing the image with our Studio Producer, Megan Nolan, she pointed out that it looked like the model was struggling a bit with the sun in her eyes. I did some quick adjusting to fix it and I think the end result is perfect.
I spent about half an hour on the image before I started recording, and about three hours on it after. When I finished I imported the video into Adobe Premiere, did some quick editing, squished it down to three minutes, and added an audio track. What you have here is the final product. Enjoy!

Lifestyle Photographer

Lifestyle Photographer

Lifestyle Photographer

Sumptuous Products, Dynamic Fashion

Matt Jebbia’s passion for beauty and fashion photography grows with every photo shoot. The results are pristine and dynamic, thanks to Matt’s critical eye for detail and support from his team. Keep your eyes peeled for Matt’s latest beauty shot, and in the meantime check out some of our favorite MJ beauty explorations!

Collaborating between Stylists, Models and Digital Artists to breathe magic into an ordinary product or scenario is my passion. Promoting collaboration with my team at Studio 3 helps take my photos to the next level!




 
 
 

30's fashion photography with Designer Peter Czar

Dana Jonas was getting her fashion photography on! Her good friend Peter Czar designed the epic clothes featured in the photographs. We were also lucky enough to shoot in a beyond gorgeous home, we are talking museum quality, the house was unreal. When we say unreal, it not only was gorgeous, it was full of beautiful props, furniture, knick-knacks and artifacts galore. Couldn’t have set the stage better for this 30’s fashion photography shoot. As most fashion photography shoots, this one was inspired by the clothes. We couldn’t have asked for anything more shimmering, delicate, & feminine! Thanks Peter Czar. As for Dana, she has a few words of her own:

Oh man, I felt like a bull in a China factory! Although, thank god, I wasn’t. I remember there were little tea-cups sitting out, and I thought to myself “those are probably worth more than my car”. Haha. On the serious side of the things, the shoot was fantastic. For the first picture, I was bleeding a light head to get the power down on the lights, and turned the head around the face the wall behind me. The wood in this house was a beautiful dark, almost red color. The light gave the shadows in the picture a beautiful amber tone, and created the reflection on the antique throttle. The model was gorgeous and I couldn’t ask for her to wear the gorgeous clothing creations any better. The lighting, the fabric, everything came together so perfectly. There are those incredible moments, when everything just comes together so perfectly. Those are the shots I truly live for and what makes fashion photography more then just a picture, but more like a toast to the clothing itself.

 

Fashion Photography

 

To Check Out More Gorgeous Images Visit Our Website!

To Learn More About Peter, Check Out his Website!