New Hawaiian Airlines TV Spot Reels

Very happy to have had a hand in both of these...








Hats off to the creative team at LCA-Anthology & to the other photographers involved.

Tear-Sheets, Reels to Come & More Good Stuff...

So much good stuff going on, I can hardly contain myself. Returned early Saturday afternoon from three days on Oahu shooting for Prince Resorts Hawaii. Big thanks to assistant Barry Frankel for keeping me organized, caffeine-fueled & entertained, not to mention the schlepping of 7 overfilled flight cases of gear, one bursting-at-the-seams camera bag & laptop case thru two airports, one rental van and numerous hotel hallways. 


Highlights of the trip included watching an entertaining homeless guy foraging for used ciggie butts from hotel ashtrays, Mr. Spugi-san eyeing up Barry's legs at every opportunity, house fried rice at Side Street Inn, the Kakaako hole-in-the-wall hangout of Hawaii's top chefs and an impromptu dinner of, perhaps, the finest in Japanese Cuisine I've ever had the privilege of eating courtesy of HAPA founder Barry Flanagan & his lovely bride Leslie. Thank you & don't mind if I do eat that last piece of Uni! 


Once off the plane, safely & exhaustedly ensconced in my comfortable mountain land-fort, the Missus queued up all three Hawaiian Airlines television commercials that had just aired during the Merrie Monarch Hula Competiton, broadcast from the Big Island. You may remember a few weeks ago, I was busy chasing teens thru the jungle, jumping off rocks, hurling themselves in the air on trampolines... organizing talent for other scenarios... four different photographers, yours truly included, worked hard producing still images to be used as TV spots for the airline. I can't speak for the others, but I wasn't entirely sure how the spots would all come together. Having now seen the finished commercials, I'm ecstatic! They are all lovely and my work is prominently featured in two of the spots... one of the spots even opening & closing with some of the images we captured during a day spent working at OGG Airport. Nice work produced by all the other photogs involved and BRILLIANT editing and piecing the images together into three beautiful, poignant and at times, even comical 30 second spots by the awesome creative team at LCA-Anthology. Reels of the spots will be posted here once I receive them...


And... if that wasn't enough to rejuvenate me from the Honolulu shoot, it was off Saturday evening to attend a listening party at the fabulous digs of Throwdowns drummer Ian Hollingsworth, where the new CD we've been working on packaging images for was debuted to the young, hungry Hawaii music press & band followers... well-over 100 attendees by the time I arrived. Ran into the MOTH team of James & James, "Jewish Jesus" Smith, film-maker Brian Kohne, Dishy Trish, finally got to meet scene blogger "MauiZan" and others. Alas, already barely standing was I by this time, and having to be up again at 4am the following morning, I made the rounds, pressed the flesh and amicably chatted with friends old & new before excusing myself & rushing home to bed.


Up early the next morning, I am immediately treated to viral video of El Presidente pointedly roasting thedonald and Fux News attendees during the annual White House Press Correspondent's Dinner, followed by early evening reports of the death of OBL and finally, El Presidente's address on the matter, timed precisely to pre-empt thedonald's celebrity slave TV show. Bitch-slap a trois! Hey Don... you're fired.


Ah... it's been a good week!


To finish things off, the new issue of MAUI NO KA OI Magazine hit news stands today with the tear-sheets posted above, (& others) included between it's pages, complete with cheeky text by author Paul Wood.


But we're not done yet... two days of large-format, fine-art reprography for expat artist Avi Kiriarty begins in the morning, just after I conclude my duties as tuesday morning radio host. Friday's there's another venture out to the Ulupalakua Winery for almost final work on the new image campaign and then Sunday, my new BFF, BF & I head for a three day architectural & food session at two more of the properties in the Prince Resort's Hawaii portfolio. 


In between all of that, there's plenty of editing still to do...


While working in H-lulu, I came across this post at former PE Rob Haggart's APE blog titled "Photographers Hiring Help-Old vs New (School). This entry deals with the hiring tactics of two very well-known photographers... most notably, Nat Geo's Steve McCurry, best know for his NG cover portrait of the Afghan girl with the piercing eyes a few years back. One response to McCurry's ad for dedicated, unpaid interns - posted on Craigslist and since removed after the exposure and rash of rude comments, had me rolling on the floor laughing:

Be sure to read the comments left by readers at the blog too... oodles of fun!


Ta...

Will It Fit?

Busily making last round preparations for flights to & assignment on the Island of Oahu for the last half of this week. Flights are booked, land-chariots reserved, rooms for the stay overlooking Ala Moana Harbor confirmed, assistant booked. Now all that's left is the final packing & repacking of massive amounts of lighting & grip gear, cameras, external storage drives, laptops , food styling tools... all while praying that everything fits into multiple flight cases (6 total) and fall within the weight restrictions for checked baggage. So far, so good... everything thus packed falls with the 50-70 lb.weight limits. There's still some more gear to cram into those overburdened cases but it  looks like we'll manage to meet the limits.


We'll be spending a full two days shooting refreshed rooms, suites and food for Prince Resorts Hawaii at their Waikiki property, followed by a four day trip to the Big Island early next month to do the same for two of their properties there.


This morning's pile of email included a link to a survey of top Art Buyers conducted by Agency Access, the creative source list company providing contact lists and marketing strategies for photographers & illustrators. In this survey, titled "What Buyers Want From Photographers" more than 500 top art buyers & photo editors were questioned about how to best get their attention, where they find new talent, where they search for stock images, how to best deliver images and much, much more. You can follow the link here, sign up and receive your copy of the survey in downloadable .pdf format.

Seize This Day

The Missus celebrates her birthday today. Let there be cake! She deserves it after all. She's been quite busy keeping the home fires burning and acting as nursemaid to the recently eunuch-ized pup - sore, wobbly and insistent on trying to lick his fresh sutures. 


Meanwhile, I've been running between the fine, blue editing screen and various assignments... several trips to the Winery and several hours of editing & retouching, a big Willie K production at the MACC & more editing & retouching, a big Throwdowns production with yet more editing, retouching to follow, a benefit golf tournament with even more editing & retouching, followed the same day with behind-the-scenes coverage of the Aloha Iapana Japan Tsunami Relief Benefit Concert and more, you guessed it, editing & retouching.


That one was amazing... an afternoon & evening of outstanding Hawaiian Music performances by some of the finest practitioners of that genre. Kudos to Karey of Island Soul Entertainment, Luly of Pono Communications, Art & his staff at the MACC, all performing artists and attendees who produced a brilliant & very entertaining evening under the stars for a very worthy cause. I'm sure a fat wad of cash was raised towards relief efforts for the stricken people of Iapana (Japan).


 A week's worth of back & forth proposal revisions for a resort management corporation ended yesterday with final approvals. The assistant is booked for the job and all that's left to do is book the flight's, rental vans and try to figure out how to get all the gear packed to meet flight weight restrictions... an impossible task, I fear. Let's hope that the expeditious greasing of a couple of porter palms does the trick on departure day. Two islands, five days plus travel days required for this one.


Two new 2 TB back-up storage drives are slated to arrive today. They will be added to the mounting pile of redundant externals rising skyward on my desk. Methinks it's about time to seriously consider the Drobo option.


Two hundred sheets of 4x5 transparency film ordered yesterday and winging it's way across the Pacific in preparation for another project. It will be great to dust off the Sinar 4x5 again and put it to use. The sad news is that my favorite film, Kodak EPP Ektachrome 100 Plus, I've just learned, is no longer being produced and with only 20 or so sheets left in the studio fridge, I'm forced into the Fuji RDP option.


A few days ago, boxes of new fine art paper arrived, so... in between edits, I've been busily printing new work on the trusty Epson Large Format printer. Five new images delivered to the framers yesterday.


Trying now to squeeze in a couple of more shoots before flying off to H-lulu & the Big Island mid-next week. Fingers crossed that the fine weather of late holds thru until the jobs are in the can.



In closing... a couple of behind the scenes shots of a recent celebrity profile due to appear between the pages of MAUI NO KA OI Magazine at the beginning of May. Photos courtesy of Road Manager William Pie'. 'Tanks Bill!

©2011 William Pie

©2011 William Pie

Big Thumbs Up

photo: Jeffery Michael/ Images By Jeffery

It's early Saturday, the sun's just up and I've been since 5:30am. I should be sleeping but I'm equal parts exhausted-excited.... there's stuff to do - domestic duties to complete, images to make, editing awaiting my attention on the desktop. No rest for the wicked.


The massive airline campaign project is now completed, delivered, invoiced... done 'cept for the final bit of post-production. An email from one of the assigning agency's creative directors yesterday curled my lips into a smile when she reported that one of the delivered scenarios that I lobbied heavily for "cracked [her] up".


Things I learned during this project:


1) Facebook can be a viable casting resource. Thanks to all the helpful, talented folks that rose up to aid, assist, & act in the two week plus production.


2) I CAN (almost) still keep up with a crew of hyperactive 13 year olds.


3) If you lurk around a cemetery long enough, you're likely to turn up a live one now & then.


4) There is NEVER enough time.


It's no secret that I'm a music freak. The last three months have allowed me to indulge & engage my eyes & ears with some of the cream of Hawaii music talent. We've completed projects recently for HAPA, Willie K & his Band, editorial pieces on Mick Fleetwood, video production stills for The Throwdowns & more. There's a project for progressive/performance artists MOTH in the works and yesterday was spent shooting new promotional images & CD packaging art for The Throwdowns (see photo above). A massive mansion was conscripted for this effort and a full day of production ended with the band submerged in a swimming pool. And there's more to come with images for Barry Flanagan's (HAPA founder) solo projects.


Today, there's a benefit golf tournament and coverage of an evening Japan Relief Benefit requiring coverage. A project for the Pacific Cancer Institute is on slate for next week and a three day shoot on the Big Island for Prince Resorts is scheduled for early May. 


One of the best things I've stumbled across this week was a three part interview with uber-inspirator Dan Winters, published at Rob Haggart's A Photo Editor blog. Insightful, inspiring and well worth a read.


Now, it time to throw myself under a shower and head off to the links... FORE!

Deer Hunter

The Past Two Weeks In Pictures

You may have noticed that I've been conspicuously absent of late. Here's why...

Photo: Barry Frankel