Looking at these files, I remember how much work we put into this. We had met a new client who said he redid the bar upstairs. Upon meeting the restauranteur, he said he would love to have professional photos of the whole place. He agreed to open his establishment to us whenever we wanted and do whatever we needed to do. I didn't start with the 4 am idea, but he got it soon enough. (They left the lights on all night).
We couldn't get the blinds in the bar to open so there are two windows unlit. We managed to bounce the sky off them and I really think it worked slick.
The inside was tough. So many reflective surfaces, light coming in from multiple directions, and hundreds of items organized for restaurant ready, but not nearly straight enough for a photograph.
We probably spent an hour lighting this,
and two hours lighting this.
Fun little tilt shift example. Floor photography is hard. But with a heavy shift, the focus of the photo really moves.
Cheryl shoots more yin than I do.
John had just joined the firm. Not sure where he had worked before, he clearly joined as a veteran architect and seemingly without the ability to display any of his previous work. Careful the contracts you sign.
Now in his second or third year, he both had finished a few projects and understood value in marketing. I haven't posted the first project we did for him, it was a hotel and they wouldn't let us in a suite without us paying them for it. So we just shot day time exteriors. New client discount in action, we took $300 and went on to some other addresses. We shot some parks, a sushi restaurant, and Porter's. The sushi guy wanted us to do some food photography but it was days before he took off on his first vacation in years.
John showed the images to one of the other principles who wouldn't get up from his chair to meet us in the conference room. John came back to see if he could borrow the iPad, and all I heard was "I could do that myself." John agreed to pay us for all the images, but it would have to come out of his personal checking account. He gave us a series of $300 checks each dated a month after the other, we gave him the files, and all the checks cleared.
Small business is hard. I'm so happy to know guys like John who plug away and smile.
The restaurant's best offer was $100 in store credit. While I probably shouldn't post these, at some point I need to accept the fact that even if they do rip them off, I probably wasn't going to get a nickel.