The last project in Jill’s class involved collaborating with the first-years in the photography program next door. When they got the assignments back, they felt it was necessary to have a meeting about photographer-designer relations. Always in this program, we’re thinking, why didn’t you have this meeting before we started? But, I am beginning to suspect that the instructors adhere to the “learn from your mistakes” where it’s beneficial to go with your instinct first and then check yourself afterward. This, I think, works surprisingly well with artist-types who want to find their own way that works for them rather than the thing we talked about in the meeting. It was interesting to see how relations would have proceeded naturally, rather than what people have been coached to do.
In this debriefing meeting, or as Jill called it, “post-mortem,” we discussed the points of dialogue that should be covered in the meeting prior to the start of the project.
1) When do you need it?
This question controls everything. Our ambition is tamed by this question. This question forces us to carve away the parts of the piece that we can spare, and make a better end project for that editing. Given all the time in the world, we would plan wonderful photos and take none. That we have so little time puts a fire under us pushing us forward to do something.
2) What media is it for?
This is a crucial point in today’s world of multimedia. Print? Device? Which one? Newspaper? 4-color? These factors change the way that this photo will be read. Photographers adjust their output to fit these parameters. When you want to use a photograph to go to different substrates, media, get different versions of that photograph. Copy and paste doesn’t go as far as you think.
3) Communicate
Now you are ready to talk details. Visualize the end result together. We are visual people, the photographer and the designer may not have the same vocabulary, but we communicate our ideas in pictures anyways. Bring a tear (pronounced “t-err”, as in tear out a sample you like from a magazine), bring a tear sheet or a mood board. Talk about lighting, your sketches, discuss what terms like dramatic, or hard light, mean to you and get specific.
Also, be patient. As artists, we don’t know exactly how each piece will turn out, how far we can push it. It’s important to keep your vision in mind as you go. Also, remember that what you envision may seem simple to you as a designer, but setting up a photo that requires a detail such as a focus on a few things may be next to technically impossible with the resources at hand.
4) Conflict resolution. Frankly, photographers are fed by designers. Photographers are competing with stock photography. Robbie went so far as to say that it’s about the relationships you form and less about the quality of your work (note that good work leads to better relationships).
5) Get the Image. In the world of advertising, we do layouts to get the client to approve the idea. It is up to us designers to be leaders. It’s up to us art-directors to approve of the photography on the set. Tom advised to sit in the coffee corner or whathaveyou at the shoot and wait for the photographer to show you the image. Ignore their labor, their elaborate dropcloths, backgrounds and impatient models. Judge the image. Just the image. Note its highlights and shadows and imagine whatever post-production work that is going to be applied. But, when you think you have the shot, take a few more. Give yourself options. Let the photographer give you options.
However, at the end of the day, you don’t know how far it’s going to go and you have to trust your photographer and learn from their results about who they are as someone you may (or may not) select for future collaborations. That is the serendipity of art. Sometimes you work well, sometimes one of you is strong enough to lift you both up and other times, it’s truly broken. And you have to pick up the pieces and move on.
Katarina Countiss 