ChatterArtists Holiday 2010
Continuing on with our theme of Sagittarius who loves traveling to far-off places – this month and for the first time, we are featuring travel photographers! Off course, most photographers want to be a travel photographer – who wouldn’t want someone to pay them to travel the world and take pictures?
Jimmy Williams
Starting us off on our travels we have Jimmy Williams, a photographer who has been around for a few years and was an advertising client of mine when I was at the Black Book. Some photographers like Jimmy, may not be known exclusively for their travel work, but often their travel and location imagery has been used for advertising as well as editorial and stock. Jimmy is also a living testament to the fact that you do not have to live in New York or Los Angeles to be successful. Jimmy Williams Productions is a high-class operation based in Raleigh, North Carolina, okay? Not only does Jimmy have standout work, and is clearly a superstar in my mind, he also knows that there’s no “I’ in team. He always has great people around him including Natalie Ogura, his long-time producer!
Tuscany, Italy
© Jimmy Williams
http://www.jimmywilliamsphotography.com/
Ashok Sinha
From a photographer with many years under his belt, we have a relative “newbie” by comparison, Ashok Sinha, who came to me a couple of years ago for some consulting help when he was just starting out. Back then Ashok was extracting himself from a corporate career, but had smartly put some money aside, and was chomping at the bit to move forwards and make photography his full-time focus! Since then he has been working hard and I have watched his progress – he seems to be one of those guys I see everywhere – except when he is traveling, of course!
Dakar, Senegal
© Ashok Sinha
Andrew Holbrooke
Next up we have Andrew Holbrooke, a photographer who has spent a large portion of his career traveling the globe, shooting stock and corporate photography. Andy and I worked together earlier this year on editing down his website in order to create a more commercial presentation that would appeal to multiple markets.
Turkana tribesman herding his camels, Somalia
© Andrew Holbrooke
http://www.andrewholbrooke.com/
North Sullivan
We move now to North Sullivan, a photographer who is based in Australia and represented here in the US by my old friends Watson & Spierman. And with a name like North Sullivan, what else could he do but travel the world and take big, bold, beautiful photographs? The image we selected was one of a series shot for a Quantas Airlines Global advertising campaign.
The Great Wall, China
© North Sullivan
Represented by Watson + Spierman Productions, Inc.
http://wswcreative.com/#/North%20Sullivan/Main%20Sullivan/1
Chris Clor
While I was requesting images from Watson & Spierman for North Sullivan, they suggested we might also like to show the work of a more recent addition to their roster, photographer Chris Clor, who splits his time between Detroit and London. Although they may be showing more of his commercial work, he has a beautiful library of environments and breath-taking landscapes. I was very torn between his beautiful images of Scottish castles and the one we did end up choosing of the Pyramid outside the Louvre in Paris, which almost looks appropriately enough like an oil painting!
Louvre Museum, Paris
© Chris Clor
Represented by Watson + Spierman Productions, Inc.
http://wswcreative.com/#/Chris%20Clor/Main%20Clor/1
Erik Almas
And bringing us towards the end of our journey is San Francisco-based Norwegian photographer Erik Almas, who some of you may remember was the subject of one of my ChatterCorner articles for PhotoServe. Back then we talked about his advertising shoot with a live lion for the Ritz-Carlton luxury brand, but Erik, like Jimmy Williams, also has some beautiful landscapes on his website and his “locations” are frequently and prominently featured in his advertising work.
Mendocino, CA
© Erik Almas
Alamy
And now for something a little different – whether we like it or not clients and ad agencies are still purchasing stock as well as assignment photography. Many Art Buyers have told me that at least 50% of the photography they license is stock, and although it obviously doesn’t pay nearly as well it used to, it’s not going away any time soon. So this month I decided to ask a friend of mine, Alexandra Bortkiewicz, Director of Photography @ Alamy Ltd. http://www.alamy.com/ (Stock Photography Agency) in the UK to pick a few of her favorite travel photographers from their extensive library for us, and this is what she gave us:
Paul Lieberhardt – http://tinyurl.com/2e4fpup
Alex says, “It is sort of more documentary travel but I love the moodiness of the work.”
David Noton – http://tinyurl.com/32kd5jl or http://www.davidnoton.com/
I read David’s bio on his website and discovered that he was born in the UK, and moved to the US while his father worked on the American space program. He then spent some years in Canada before returning to England where he was a keen member of the Combined Cadet Force, after which he went on to join the Merchant Navy and sail the world. His love of photography, knowledge of navigation, and a keen survival instinct has subsequently produced some wonderful imagery.
Jim Zuckerman – http://tinyurl.com/3xkuojj or http://www.jimzuckerman.com/
Beautiful, bold & bright!
Matthew Somorjay – http://tinyurl.com/35ons7p
Alex says, “I love the fine art feel and minimalism to the work – big contrast to say David Noton or Jim Zuckerman.”