Stockland Martel Blog

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I took six pages (!) of notes at the seminar “Stepping Up to Larger Production Commercial Shoots,” which was moderated by PDN features editor Conor Risch. The panelists: photographer Kareem Black; Celeste Holt-Walters, senior art producer at McCann-Erickson; Stockland Martel photo agent Kathryn Tyrrel; and Bette Wilkes, executive producer for her husband, photographer Stephen Wilkes. I can’t re-create the seminar, which covered a whole lot of ground in two hours. But I can give you these nuggets to ponder:

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And you thought it was just about taking photos:

Bette: It is a business. A lot of people feel like you have a cellphone, a camera, and you’re going to be okay.

Kareem: You can’t discount how important good marketing is to you career. (There’s a good article from 2007 on Kareem’s ambitious marketing efforts here, at Format Magazine.)

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On promos:

Celeste: “I get bombarded every day with dozens and dozens of mailers, and I look at all of them.” Celeste said she files the ones she likes. She also said that the image on the mailer should be representative of what’s on your site. (Shocking to think that it wouldn’t be, no?) And she said that in an e-blast, the recipient should be able to click on the image and be taken straight to the photographer’s site.

Celeste also said that when she’s looking for a photographer, she first reviews her files of promos and at agents’ sites. The “last resort,” she said, is sourcebooks.

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On treatments and the creative call:

Celeste: “[A treatment] can help… But if it has the wrong images, it can hurt you.”

Kareem showed a treatment he did a while back for a Kool-Aid campaign that was inspired by old-school hip-hop. He showed the palette, the shots, and the inspiration, which in his case was photographs by Jamel Shabazz.

Celeste: “A creative call is more for the photographer, to show that they get it.” She also said it’s a good thing if the photographer and the art director are “vibing off each other” and personalities are “clicking.”  She added, “Some people just don’t work well together.”

Kat noted that she and the other Stockland Martel agents always do a pre-call with their photographers. “Have some ideas, be enthusiastic, but listen,” she advised. The concept can go a different way than you expected, and you have to balance being ready with ideas for the original plan with being open to anything new the art director may introduce in the call.

Celeste: “If you have a producer you think you’d want to work with, have them sit in on the call.” You’re going to be busy being enthusiastic, and everything [the art director is saying] might not be sinking in.” It’s best, she said, that the producer hear it all directly from the art director.

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On estimating:

When Kareem started landing bigger jobs, he soon saw that he couldn’t do it all himself and needed help. But he didn’t have an agent. His solution was to hire established agents to bid jobs for him on the side, separate from wherever it was that they worked. He gave them 10% of his creative fee in exchange.

Celeste explained that she needs to see how a job will be executed “down to the penny.” This statement might inspire some defensiveness form photographers, but Celeste explained that she knows the sensitivities of the client. So you might list wardrobe at $200, but she knows that the client is very particular about the clothing and will want that figure to be $1,000 (this is the example she gave), so she can work with you on that. The estimate goes “many rounds,” she said. “Just because someone’s questioning an item doesn’t mean it’s wrong,” she said. “But there should be a reason for everything.”

Celeste also explained that McCann-Erickson has its own estimate form, and the art buyers transfer the figures from a photographer’s estimate into this proprietary form. (The ASMP offers guidance on estimates here.)

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On diverse versus specialized portfolios:

Celeste likes to see portfolios edited by genre. “If I know that I’m looking for a great portrait photographer, then I think it’s important to have those photos in a specific portfolio…. It’s okay to have more than portfolio.”

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Tomorrow: highlights from “Starting Today, You’re a Brand: Building Your Brand & Your Business.”

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