Food and Pre-Production

Today (Tuesday July 24) had me realizing that I needed more hours at "the studio" to make the mark of 150. So, this week I decided to starting coming in on Wednesday along with Tuesday and Thursday. When I arrived at the studio at 1 pm today there was not much going on. In the main studio area, Ian and his assistant Matt, had a table top set up with lights for a butter toffee job they were shoot for publix. Like always I asked Callie how she was doing and continued on to Scott at his monitors in the next room. After speaking with Scott about what was on the schedule he informed me that they were waiting on approval of an estimate for a job. They did not want to do too much because it would be a lost cause if they did not get the job, but they did not want to be behind if they did. So they were in what Scott calls a "holding pattern". So most of my day was spent talking to Ian about his phase-1 back on his hasselblad and if he would ever consider stepping up to fully digital. He said that he really liked the idea of analogue and digital and you can not beat a t* lens unless you morgage your house for the 40+ thousand dollars H2 system. After about 3 hours of watching the set designer, art director, and photographer talk out the shot, Scott and I shot 8 more product shots for Whimsey Press. They were notebooks but long and skinny. We shot it in 15 minutes because all we had to do was recreate the set-up from the other 80 we shot. After the product shots I left because he was leaving. It was 5:45 pm.

Stock Photography and a Gas-Powered Generator

Today at SLP I came in at 2 pm to Scott in a meeting with his rep, Holly, from RepGirl and an ad guy from Delta. Scott has shot many ads for Delta and was talking to John about another idea he had and what he thought about it. I came in on the end of it so I didn't get to hear much of the production just the wrap up. After John from Delta and Holly left, Scott told me he wanted me to pick up some things from Ace Hardware on Howell Mill so that is where I went. He gave me a list and the company credit card, which made me feel powerful. I went to Ace Hardware to buy a gas generator, 6 "A" clamps, and 3 3-way splitters. I found the generator and splitters in no time but had trouble finding the clamps in the small store. I asked 3 different people and each time they didn't know what "A" clamps were. One guy asked me what they were for and I said to clamp stuff together. Finally, someone knew what I was talking about and led me there, which of course was the next isle over. However, they only had 3 large and no small ones.

Upon returning to SLP, Scott was edited pictures for his portfolio when a modeling agency called and it was time for the meeting they planned two days ago. The meeting was about an estimate that Scott had done 2 months ago with data from the agency and now they had changed their mind about giving up rights to pictures for Scott's stock library. Scott noted that this company was based on a knew model and 98% of the other agencies don't operate like this particular one does because it deals with "real" people as models and not models. SLP also has a connection to his particular company because Scott's old studio manager, Emily, and her husband run it.

After listening to the phone meeting, Scott informed me we would be shooting alot next week and maybe a casting call. He also told me to bring in some photos I have been taken to show him and talk about. I am looking forward to the critic. I left at 5 pm.

Estimates and Shooting for Ebay

I asked for the last week off to record a cd in Knoxville, TN. This was the first day back since Scott got married in Mexico. Eveyone I told the photographer I intern with was getting married asked the same question, who did he get to shoot the wedding. When I asked him later in the day he laughed and said some local guy who shot jpegs plus both of Scott's assistants - Ryan and Keith.

The day started kind of bad for me because I overslept. After debating if I should call in sick or face the truth, I called to say I was running late and would be there as soon as I could. Scott said "no biggie" and told me that I could help by picking up a package at Mark Anderson's house. I drove by there on the way to the studio and everything was fine and be there at 11:30 am. The studio has three jobs coming up in the next few weeks and mainly today they were estimating these jobs and producing them. One of the jobs, the one at the end of August, is a high fashion shoot with alot of different models and such. I will be able to see the process of producing a shoot as well as actually shooting it and then finishing it. One of the jobs I did today was to print out comp cards for models from an agency who specifcially sent certain models who would give all the rights up for the pictures taken, or buy it out. Part of Scott's deal with this particular shoot is that he will get the rights to the pictures not used and he can sell them into stock photography. After printing out models, ryan and I shot products for ebay. One of which is a very fast G5 apple that the screen was damaged while flying to Arizona a few months ago with SLP. Other things being sold was a 15 in power book and a huge collection of nikon cameras (a f5, d100, and n90), lens, and accessories.

Hopefully, tomorrow I will help with the estimating and get my hands dirty with the jobs coming up. I am looking forward to seeing a project all the way to the end. I left at 6 pm.