Jim and I were trying to recreate the surrealistic look that has become quite popular in today's photography, especially in print advertising design. Jim shot on location in 40-degree weather with over a dozen scantly clad models. The set-up was quite impressive with many strobes set-up in various locations to get the hard rim lighting which is imperative in this surreal look.
After about 4 hours of set-up and light testing they shots the frames they needed by mixing various models in different locations knowing that in post-production we would be able to combine frames to get the best expressions for the final composite.
Above is the starting frame. As you can see there are a variety of challenges to overcome but because it is a well staged and lit shot there is much potential. First and most obvious was the dismal sky which was to be completely replaced. Next was the palm tree that due to the incliment winter weather was in pretty bad shape.
Other major issues included the un-even sunlight as you can see a pretty serious shadow cutting accross several of the models in the midground. By using a combination of exposure curves, lightpainting and color balance correction I was able to even everything out.
The client also had many specific requests for changes in what models from which takes were placed in the final shot. the girl in the pool leaning over the side was the first to be replaced followed by the three ladies in the lounge chairs in the middle of the shot. Several other takes were used to add people in the far background to the left and various other places in the shot... see if you can find them all.
Above is the final print ad with ad copy and Smoothie King logo. As you can see all the issues in the original shot have been fixed along with several other minor color and level corrections. All in all everyone with Smoothie King and the agency, St John & Partners, were very happy with the results and I would like to wish them success with the campaign.
This shot is the director's cut of the image. Jim and I prefered a previous version of the compisite where we used a sun and different variation of the clouds in the sky. We also wanted to further pump the mid-tone contrast for a bit more surrealism. In all I spent close to 15 hours working on the shot.
Please check out more of Jim's work at http://www.jimarbogast.com/. You can also find more work from St. John and Partners at http://www.sjp.com/.
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