One of my favorite things about my career as a branding and commercial photographer is all of the amazing people I get to meet and actually spend real time with.
Last year C&T Publishing contacted me about a half day photoshoot for an upcoming book they were publishing called Patchwork Playground by local Boise quilter and author Christina Lee.
I suggested a location I thought would work great for the photoshoot and provided sample work and was really happy when they got back in touch and let me know they wanted to hire me for this photoshoot.
Photographing a Book: Why Print Raises the Bar
There’s a big difference between work used digitally and work used in print.
When a photo goes on social media it can be sharpened and manipulated in ways that make it look better than it actually is, especially because it’s so small when viewed on a phone.
Print is where the rubber really meets the road and imperfections aren’t so easy to cover up.
All this to say there’s a higher level of stakes when work is going to be used in print.
Planning Shots Around the Book's Layout
C&T Publishing did a great job of getting me a shot list that outlined the specific photos we needed to get.
For most of my photoshoots the process of building a shot list is more collaborative, but C&T publishes books all the time and they’ve got the process really down, so they already knew what all we needed to get.
For me a shot list is a helpful structure that keeps us on track, but also gives us room to flex and respond to what’s inspiring us in the moment (that might not be on the shot list)
Lighting Quilts to Show Color, Texture and Stitching
Lighting makes a huge difference when it comes to showcasing textures, colors and stitching. I set up one light with an octabox modifier, but ended up liking the natural light better in the end.
Boise Urban Studio has really beautiful natural light, I do a lot of work out of the studio, and the side angle of the light in the studio worked really well for showcasing the quilts.
We hung the quilts on the wall in the studio using command strips to photograph them flat and then we also draped them over things in the studio and even piled them up on the floor.
We also wanted to show some details of the materials that Christina uses in her quilting, and we used a desk in the studio to showcase these. One of my favorite things about working in a studio is having multiple sets all really close to one another.
Author Portraits That Match the Book's Personality
Some of the most important photos of the whole photoshoot were the author photos of Christina. For me personally these were the photos I was most excited about taking too. I love taking photos of people and I was excited to play with some different options.
The main light source if I’m not using lights in Boise Urban Studio is the windows. We had some direct sunlight shining through for part of the photoshoot, so I used that to place Christina in the direct light to give a spotlight type of look and then we draped her quilts over Christina. These are the most dramatic of the portraits that I took of Christina.
Christina’s book is called Patchwork Playground, and the concept is using different patches to make a quilt. So I had Christina sit on the floor surrounded by the different patches and used a variety of poses and framed the photos differently, and I noticed they used one of these photos for the cover of the book.
The studio has a white wall with vertical lines in it, so I placed Christina in front of that wall and had her hold her quilts in different ways.
Those quilts are not light, so holding her arms out was hard for Christina, but she did great.
Then we set the quilts out on the floor and had Christina sit in the middle of them.
From this same spot, I was able to use two different backgrounds, I used the main white brick wall and then the rolling partition wall as well to give two different looks without having to do a whole different setup.
The last thing I tried which kind of worked was having Christina wave a quilt around, I thought this would add some fun motion to the photos, but the quilts are pretty heavy, which is why it only kind of worked. But even when an idea doesn’t work how I had hoped, it’s still so important to me to try things, sometimes they work way better than you had hoped, and I find oftentimes you find inspiration you don’t expect when you try things.
Delivering Images for Print and Publishing
It’s different to deliver images to be printed into a book, than images that are just going to be used digitally. The images have to be high resolution, they have to have the right amount of sharpening and they have to be in the right format for print. Luckily I’ve been at this for long enough that I already know all of that stuff.
Here are some photos of the final book which came out great, and if you’re a quilter you can order it here.
Photography for Authors and Creators in the Treasure Valley
I had so much fun hanging out with and getting to know Christina and I always love working with creators and people who are running creative businesses, they are in fact some of my very favorite clients.
If you’re an author or creator in Boise and you’re in need of photography, click here to reach out to me and let’s start brainstorming together and see if I could be a good fit for what you’re looking for.
Thank you to Christina and C&T Publishing for trusting me with this project, so wonderful working with you all.