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Saltmoor needed a campaign for a new range of flowers and fragrances: twelve still images for packaging inserts, the website, and a set of posters. We had two studio days, one photographer, a stylist, and a crate of cut marble. These are my notes from the planning and from the days themselves.
Write the shot list as sentences
A shot list that reads “hero 1, hero 2, detail 3” tells nobody anything. I write each shot as a sentence that describes the picture: “A single calla lily rests on the edge of a pale stone triangle, the shadow falls left, plenty of empty wall above.” The photographer can light it, the stylist can build it, and the client can picture it before the day.
Each sentence also names where the image will run and in which crop. That one line decides more about the shot than any reference image.
Twelve shots in two days is six a day, which sounds relaxed until you count the setups. We grouped the list by light and surface, not by product, so the set changed four times a day instead of twelve.
One light, moved, not added
Still life is mostly light. We worked with one large soft source and a white card to fill the shadows, and changed the mood by moving the light, not by adding more. Low across the table, it gives long shadows and texture; higher and softer, it calms everything and the shadow almost disappears. Two setups lit by one lamp feel like a family. Six lamps feel like six different shoots.
Props earn their place
Every object in the frame has to say something about the brand, or hold up something that does. For Saltmoor that meant stone, a single stem, and nothing else: no scattered petals, no glass bottles throwing reflections we would have to retouch. When the stylist and I disagreed about an object, we shot one frame with it and one without, then moved on. The client nearly always picked the frame without.
Take something out of the frame before you add anything to it. The second picture is usually the better one.
Leave room for type
These pictures were never going to run alone. Headlines, prices, and product names would sit on top of them. So we shot wider than felt natural, kept a calm area of wall in each frame, and checked crops on screen during the shoot: tall for the posters, square for the inserts, and wide for the site. I also brought the real headline lengths from the campaign copy, so we knew how much room an actual line needed, not a placeholder.
Shoot tethered, decide on the day
We shot straight to a laptop, and the client’s lead sat with us for the afternoon of each day. Picks were made on the spot, marked, and backed up twice before anyone left the studio. Choosing later from a contact sheet always takes longer, and the answer is always “can we reshoot that one?”
The grade is part of the brief
Colour starts before the edit. We agreed on one reference frame on the first morning, photographed a grey card at the start of every setup, and graded every image to that frame: warm whites, soft blacks, nothing saturated except the flower.
My shoot-day checklist fits on one page:
- the shot list as sentences, each with its crop and where it will run
- one reference frame for the grade, printed and taped to the wall
- a grey card, and spare batteries for everything
- a clear end time for each setup, and one person who calls it
- lunch away from the set, so nobody eats near the flowers
We finished with twelve stills from two studio days, plus three frames the client had not asked for and used anyway.
Written by
Hugo Merrin
Independent brand designer and art director
Hugo designs identities, packaging, and print for small makers from a studio in Lisbon. Eleven years in, every project still starts with a pencil and a printed proof. He writes here about process, pricing, and the craft behind each job.
