Behind the shoot on a Puma athleisure shoot.

Big brands are, quite rightly, protective of their image and what you produce on a shoot it representative of them and their vision, ethos and identity. It is so ultimately important that, as a brand marketing photographer, what you produce is in line with this whilst also maintaining your own identity and keeping clarity on your vision.

Here is the interesting thing; when working with a brand and a retailer on the same shoot, they may have slightly conflicting briefs – and somehow you have to produce a finished product which encapsulates both the brands feel and identity and the can be utilised effectively by the retailer.

I will be discussing briefly my recent shoot with the brand Puma, for use by the retailer Sports Direct.

Here are abridged versions of the briefs:

RETAILER briefs for the shoot:

• Street style –steps/underpass

• Lighting to be quite natural with a raw feel

• Play around with angles of the shots –shots from below to showcase the underpass

Brand brief for the shoot:

• Powerful, streetwise, and strong.

• Warm color temperature, black areas and shadows should have detail and look a little color-washed.

• capture natural light / Open shade

• Keep it interesting. Use perspective and a strong vantage point to keep the product/model the focus of the image.

• A view to it being like a more urban ‘en pointe’.

Okay, so to summerise, they collectively want an urban edgy feel, in a specific location, with slightly washed out shadows, and i should also mention that the range is called ‘THE PASTEL RANGE’.

I have 10 years experience in brand marketing photography, so In my head at this point, i already know where we’re going with this. Its a pretty good comprehensive brief, which isn’t too split down the middle with the differences between Brand Photography and Photography for Retail.

Here is where the wealth experience comes in to play, because:

• I have seen two photos of the location, but will not get chance for a recce.

  • I have to use my instincts and experience as a natural light photographer to guide me with what equipment to take, and plan shots for an 8 hr shoot in the hour it takes to do the hair an make up on location.

• It is forecast rain and cloud.

  • So it will be grey and dark, colours will be muted (not the end of the world).
  • The location is under cover so thats not too bad.
  • The brief is ‘natural light’ so my experience as a studio photographer will help me pick my additional back up lighting with a view to mimicking this in the event i need to supplement the natural light.

• The main kicker of the location is the green roof.

  • Pretty tricky to do a whole shoot focused around a roof, so for brand marketing photography, we need to get that into play as much as possible, without overplaying the low angle too much and ruining the shoot.

So, here are a few of the images from the shoot, below:

I will be posting some notes on Post Production in general, but as an overview, the post here was just a general cleanup, and softening on the shadows as requested by the brand, with a pastel overlay to really soften it up and give it the ‘en pointe’ feel.