The Official We Shoot Blog
Wednesday, April 5th, 2017
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Three different media were used to create this Cinemagraph. One shot was the sky. The second shot was of two workers in a man-lift. The third media was sound from a video clip that was of another man-lift. Seattle Commercial Photography by We Shoot.
Thursday, September 8th, 2016
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A gloved hand wipes a part in a factory. Seattle Industrial Photography by We Shoot.
Tuesday, June 28th, 2016
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Aluminum shavings from a machining process. Seattle Industrial Photography by We Shoot.
Thursday, August 20th, 2015
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Cars are reflected in a gas pump screen by Seattle Commercial Photographer We Shoot.
Wednesday, July 29th, 2015
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Aerial view of the Port of Olympia, Washington by Seattle commercial Photographer We Shoot.
Monday, July 5th, 2010
My partner and I frequently hear, “Professional photography is not in the budget.” Or, “We have no budget for photography in our marketing.” But the issue that keeps cropping up for me is that I think these companies lose sight of what is really important.
First, if a company is marketing itself, how many of them think that prospective clients really have time to read a lot of text about their company? Since most marketers know that time is of the essence, photographs say a lot more than words do in a short period of time. If the company markets itself with substandard images, e.g. underexposed, blurry, or just plain amateurish shots, what does the prospective client think? The client subconsciously thinks that what this company does is shoddy work and it is mirrored in the substandard images! The real problem is that the selling company sees gre at photography in the light of what it costs as an expense instead of what it costs for the bottom line. Why do you think Target spends so much money and time on those TV ads? Great photography translates to a fatter bottom line for Target.
The other day, I received a brochure in the mail from a local hospital. It had a number of what I would say are stock shots: happy, smiling people dealing with the hospital as patients or employees. To the untrained eye, this was acceptable. However, the only image of the hospital exterior itself was taken by someone who could best be described as a novice amateur. While the image appeared sharp, it appeared severely underexposed under the awning in the area of the front door. It looked for all the world like someone ran outside with their point-and-shoot camera and got an image to be used in the brochure. It was free, a no-cost shot. But, was it really? The people who took this shot were either unwilling or unable to get something better. As a pro, I would have taken several exposures of the entrance, at different exposure settings. This would have allowed me to cut the contrast and make the entranceway almost as light as the building by combining the shots to make a good one, either by HDR or masking techniques. The resultant image would have made the doorway a much more inviting look. Do you want to walk into a doorway in darkness? Hospitals are scary enough, without making the image appear foreboding. How many patients won’t contact this hospital, just because this image puts them off psychologically? If they lose just one, it will cost them more than hiring a good pro photographer, considering what healthcare costs these days. And I’ll wager they’ ve lost more than one client.
So, the end result is that while the hospital saved on not hiring a pro photographer, it cost them much more out of their bottom line. All because they forgot one thing. Good marketing isn’t about how much you spend on it, it’s about how much you get back from its execution.
If you are going to spend money on any marketing pieces, make it count. Go for the best paper, printing, graphics, and text. But above all, don’t stint on the photography. It can make or break the rest of what you are trying to do.
-Gary Silverstein
Friday, June 18th, 2010
Setting up a blog for your web site, in my humble opinion, is not for the faint of heart. I have written blogs before, and I have used the free services of “Blogger” (Google) and “Windows Live” (Microsoft). Setting up a blog on one’s website is a whole different kettle of fish. First, the services just mentioned are meant to be on the blog provider’s sites and not on your own. They are really quite easy to set up. Decide to create one, and you can be an author in a very short time, maybe minutes. Not so with putting a blog on your own site.
I read that putting a blog on our website increases our visibility on the web with the search engines, which helps SEO, or Search Engine Optimization. Blogs not on our website also help by making links back to our website, but I would think not as much as a home-grown weblog could. Blogs are text-rich, and the search engine crawl bots like that.
First, I searched the web for how-to-do-it pages. Then I decided to check with my host provider, as they seem to be up on everything, and I found that you need something to make it work, called an SQL database. I happened to know that my provider had such a weapon in their arsenal and were willing and able for me to use it. I wrote them and they recommended WordPress as the program of choice. They told me how to access this in my control panel for our website.
Let me be clear about this: Don’t attempt this at home! Unless you are comfortable with html and web stuff, this is best left to professionals.
I have written some websites on and off for many years, and felt that if someone who did not make a living creating websites could attempt this, it would be me.
I went into the control panel and downloaded the program (and blog) to the root directory of the website. In the documentation one usually sees after an installation, it stated that I might want to put the program and blog in a separate subfolder, as the files can look pretty messy in the root folder. I then attempted to do that in the configuration file, saved the changes, exited the program and was now unable to reenter. I got that feeling that one gets after accidentally deleting something very important and can’t get it back. I called tech support with my tale of woe. The tech said he would advise me to uninstall the program (I hadn’t written anything at that point) and reinstall it in a new folder off the bat.
I reinstalled the program and proceeded to set it up. One of the configurations was to be able to put in “pretty” URLs for when people wanted to bookmark a post. This would make it easier for them to identify the post without having to rename it. More on this later.
I opted to use one of the free templates to lay out our blog. I chose one, and set up an install. It wouldn’t install. I called the tech at the ISP host. He decided to do it for me. It took him a while, but he finally got it. If it stumped him (and he said he was familiar with WordPress), I probably would have gone crazy. I thanked him profusely, hung up, and advanced to the next step.
I had worked with templates before, and wanted to rid the sidebar of this blog of unneeded links put in by the authors, as it would be confusing for you, the viewer, to figure out why you needed so much documentation on WordPress instead of photography. Try as I might, I could make changes to the template, but when I closed it, it would heal itself and come back. It was like the Hydra – every time you removed a link, I swear it grew back with more. I realized that I had no way to save or update the file. I then got back on the phone with the tech guy. I was amazed. I made 3 calls to that point, and I got a different local guy (US) each time. I think he was a bit confused by my blathering on, but he was patient and had to put in permissions for me to make changes to everything in the sidebar. One at a time. Really. In the end, I was on my way again.
This blog was starting to shape up. I wanted to put in blurb somewhere telling what this blog was about. I finally found the “about” page. I went into the config screen and typed in my text and put our logo in it. I clicked “preview.” A Google page came up, saying the link was broken and it couldn’t find the about page. I spent many hours trying to figure out why it wouldn’t work. I knew the path didn’t look right for this file, but the only part of it I could change had the word “about” in it. Dejected, I shut down my computer and called it quits to sleep on it. I thought I had the idea early in the morning and ran to the computer to try it out. I didn’t see that the page had an htm ending on the file name. I was wrong. It still didn’t work. And then it dawned on me. The file name was all wrong. Remember making “pretty URLs?” I went back to the configuration page and unchecked “pretty” and rechecked the default. Worked like a charm. Now, hopefully, everything will work right and We Shoot has a real on-site blog. It took 3 days, but it was worth it.
– Gary Silverstein
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