Happy New Year to all our friends and clients from the team here at Studio13! We hope you have had a joyous and productive 2016 and wish you all a prosperous 2017.
We have certainly had a busy 2016, so busy in fact, that this is the first blog we’ve done since the summer was over and I (everyone’s favorite blogger, Connor) went back to college. But no worries folks, I’m back and have got to catch you up with a story of a business that…is sure to get everyone’s attention…
In November, we had a client who, I kid you not, is called Big Ass Solutions, out of Lexington Kentucky. And guess what they make? Big Ass fans. You really can’t make this stuff up! Of course, everyone at the office really got a kick out of it every time their name came across our desks.
We first connected with this company at the American Institute of Architecture (AIA) Indiana/Kentucky regional convention, after being invited by Patrick Kestner at One 10 Studios for about 5 years. Both Studio13 and Big Ass Fans were there as vendors, mostly seeking out architects who could buy architectural photography and fans, and never expected to find each other. Both companies met a lot of people at that fateful convention, but Big Ass Solutions was our first real business connection. It’s like the Romeo and Juliet of the business world.
Their project for us was to photograph one of their vendors in a “vendor spotlight”. We headed over to Colors Inc., a metal anodizer for the fan blades of those Big Ass fans (as well as normal size fans, I suppose). The anodization process can either add a layer of protection or a cosmetic metal sheen and is an intricate and specialized process. Our job was to create a series of images, from the beginning to end of what Color Inc. did, something we call process photography.
Lesle was so excited for this project; she said, “I love industrial photography. Everything from steel toed boots to safety glasses, I love it!” Her lovely attitude toward the project absolutely conquered the not-as-lovely subject matter. Industrial spaces are meant for manufacturing and effective production, not necessarily beauty, which is why it takes a photographer like Lesle to find the beauty where others would not.
Another consideration that made this project challenging was working with the confidentiality and proprietary issues; since the process of ionization is so refined, it was important to Color Inc. that while showcasing their business, we don’t give away their metaphorical “secret formula”. But as always, Lesle was a rockstar and worked closely with the owner of Color Inc. to find creative angles that still accurately portrayed the ionization process as it related to the creation of some very large backside fans (No wonder they didn’t trademark that. It’s not quite as catchy. That’s okay, moving on).
And that is only the beginning of the amazing end of the year we have had. Make sure to stay tuned in the coming weeks to hear about more of the exciting projects we’ve had going on!
