2022 SPRING: 14: ASSIGNMENT FOURTEEN: WOMEN'S FASHION ACCESSORIES

DUE MAY 17. 2022

Good Afternoon,

Arthur Dyrektor
Creative Director
De Luxe +

I hope this note finds you well.

I need your creative eye and work again.

For this coming year, we are focusing on creating a new line of upscale women’s fashion accessories.

We provide a full line to a very discriminating clientele including Ladies’ purses, scarves, jewelry, perfumes, shoes, etc…;

Men’s wallets, belts, watches, cufflinks, ties, footwear, as well as a number of unisex items such as key fobs and cell phone covers.

We’re in the middle of a website redesign and we need two “hero” shots for the site’s homepage for several of our local distributors. Each distributor has its own website and this image is the hero shot for all, the full-page image on the home screen. These photographs will introduce our new line of fresh, fun, and upscale women’s fashion accessories.

We are creating a new line of women’s purses, gloves, clutches, and wallets.

The demographics are women of means, 28-40 who are no longer interested in the millennial silliness but still consider themselves hip enough to ignore the more staid and popular designer labels.

We have been working together on other projects, so I know you are familiar with our brand. This is a bit of a rush job, so please get back to me ASAP if you are unable to meet the deadlines.

Here are the particulars.

1. Dimensions: 1000w X 437h PX (16:7 ratio)

2. Dimensions are 1200w x 900h PX (3:2ration)
These should be similar images but re-composed for the different dimensions.

Output: sRGB 72ppi 70% – 75% image quality (must load FAST)

Timeframe: 2 weeks (drop-dead date is Wednesday after next as I’m flying out Thursday)

Theme: As I said, I trust your work and your vision, so I’m going to give you complete creative control, with 2 caveats:

1. Absolutely no busy backgrounds. Flat, minimal, or non-busy colors will be appropriate.
As you know, all of our products are shot on plain white for Amazon, and we have plenty enough of that already going on. Try a lay-flat approach, still life, editorial with or without talent (models), or environmental. The image should be something contextual that incorporates one or more of the products mentioned above. Your styling should be somewhat minimalistic and stark where necessary.

2. We need something that simply oozes luxury, but in an understated way that resonates with our demographic of 28-40 yr old professionals with income over $250,000.

Here are a couple of links to our main competitors in different areas so you get a feel for what we’re after:

Spend a bit of time on the Herschel site. We like their header and break images.

I have enclosed 8 images our product managers have chosen to give you an idea of the flavor of what we are looking for.

I look forward to your response.”

Yep. This is the kind of assignment that makes you a bit nervous, right? I know I get a little cautious when I am in total control.

They never have “no idea” what they want. They do, but they cannot articulate it. So they turn to us to fulflill the vision in their heads that they cannot share with us. Sounds like fun, right?

So what do we do?

We get clarification before beginning.

Dear Art,

Here is a link to a Pinterest board that I am using for inspiration and ideas for the shoot. Do you have any favorites or any that you really hate? Also, are you thinking we stay with the brand ideas we did last time or use the more corporate trends?

Let me know what you think.

Pho Togerpher

In the meantime, we are gathering our props or surfaces and working toward the brand WE have in our heads.

You can use Pinterest or any of the sharing sites from MEM to Notion to Google Docs.

What is encompassed in women’s fashion accessories:

Belts
Scarves
Purse
Wallet
Hat
handbag

No jewelry, watches, or shoes.

Bring your A-Game to this one.

HOME

RESOURCES

BOZINA VOYTKO

NICHOLAS DUERS

RICH BEGANY

Additional images to look over.

WITH PEOPLE:

: Image by Micah Gianneli and Jesse Maricic

ASSIGNMENT INFO:

PEOPLE

When working with people on an image like this, you may want to only use parts like hands, shoulders, or backs/legs to feature the flowers. If you include the face, make sure the face can help sell the flowers the way you want. It may quickly turn into a portrait of someone with flowers and it needs to be a photograph of flowers with a person for context.

Try thinking of using just hands holding or arranging the flowers, or a silhouette with the flowers in a small patch of light. Hands, legs, feet, and behind the back can always be a great way to show the flowers as something special, something given with love. If you are a people shooter, this will be a great portfolio piece.

STILL LIFE

If you are a still life shooter, consider the approaches the client likes. Are they cluttered with lots of extraneous props or are they more minimalist with strong composition and style? Color also plays a big part in the way the images are created. Colors pop, composition helps pop them and the colors around them are created so as to help the flowers stand out from the background. Consider your light first. Will it be from the back, warming the space, or from the side to accentuate the textures?

VIDEO CLIPS

If you are wanting to work on a video for this assignment, make a 30″ clip with music behind and titles for narration. Music and text running over the video would be a great small clip to have in your portfolio. Please make sure the video is placed where we can view it (YouTube or Vimeo) and make notes about its construction. We are all going to be interested.

LIGHTING

I suggest backlight and side light for this image. In order to accentuate the color and shape of the flowers, backlight will work well. Backlight also helps sell the ‘warmth’ and natural feeling of the space. Sidelight will accentuate shape and dimension as well, but add in some texture to the flowers or what is surrounding them.

Any light modifier will work – from natural light to grids and snoots as long as they do not make the image become more about the light instead of the flowers. Yes, photography is always about the light, but if it starts to be too dramatic, or too powerfully created it can overshadow the subject.