When you think about it, a Mac computer, iPhone, or tablet has many competitors on the market that boast similar products. What draws loyal fans back as soon as the latest product is launched? The answer is, arguably, the marketing. The sleek and simple Apple logo has become much beloved and recognized around the world.

A few years ago, we did a photo shoot for Hyper on their HyperMac line: batteries compatible on Apple devices such as an iPhone or iPad. Hyper definitely knows its stuff when it comes to marketing—they combine eye-catching models and bold colors to turn a product photography session into a fashion shoot.

With the launch of Hyper’s new product line, HyperJuice—a USB-compatible device that sends photos from a professional camera to a portable storage and viewing device such as an iPad—we found ourselves at the Wedding & Portrait Photographers International (WPPI) trade show in Las Vegas. Hyper kicks it off big this year with scantily-clad, hand-painted models, their pronounced muscles and defined curves accentuating all that is beautiful about the human body.

As a nod to the electronics industry, recognizable symbols are painted over the models’ eyes and on their bodies: A Wifi symbol, a battery icon, a music note, the Hyper cross logo.

To add to this already amazing display of art, the models also molded their bodies together, sometimes forming shapes such as the HyperJuice iUSB Port device.

We are used to being behind-the scenes with our cameras and equipment, and our subjects are the stars and focal point. At WPPI, however, we found ourselves at center stage with more than 20,000 photographers and filmmakers passing by to watch us do the professional shoot. Talk about an audience! Many people found it hard to give just a passing glance to such decked-out models.

As they played and posed, entwining their bodies together to become one, it hearkens to the relationship between humans and technology in the current day and age: we admire our devices, we couldn’t keep our hands off them, we count on them to stay connected, we love them.

Thus is art so simply expressed and conveyed, powerfully marketing a product by catching the eyes of thousands of passersby.

So you’re starving. Maybe you skipped a main meal or two in your constant sprint to a day full of meetings, managing to gulp down an energy bar en route from Building A to Building B. Maybe in between Chem Lab 46A and Engineering 113, you haven’t had so much as a wheatgrass shot in your stomach. Or maybe you’ve completed a two-hour workout, darned proud of yourself for making it through, but knowing if you don’t get some food in your system, you’re going to keel over before you make it home.

Now you’re staring down this delectable burger, a juicy 1/3-pounder patty nestled atop a bed of caramelized onions, underneath a blanket of oozy, melting cheese, crowned with some tart tomato slices, dill pickle chips, and a generous scattering of fresh greens. Those lightly-toasted buns with their mean grill lines just call out for you to sink in with your teeth and tear out a good chunk, satisfying your craving. Go ahead, you know you deserve it.

Or maybe you’re more in the mood for some savory garlic noodles, the sweet smell of shrimp sautéed in a rich, buttery garlic sauce creating an aroma in the air that you find hard to resist. Maybe you’re feeling adventurous today and decide to go for that pork belly sandwich, with pork chunks embedded next to the Asian sauerkraut, all wrapped up in a crispy French baguette.

With the latest wave of “Moveable Feast” lunch truck goodness, delivering interesting, savory, French-Vietnamese fusion food conveniently to a location near you, is Le Bon de Cuisine. Their menu keeps it hearty and fulfilling with just the right fusion flare to make it interesting. Hungry for a more permanent solution to having to hunt down Le Bon when you’re bit with the craving bug? Good news for you, as Le Bon’s main chef is planning to open up a restaurant, offering these and other delectables soon in San Jose. That’s right, pork belly sandwich at your beck and call, right where you know you can find it. Yeah, you know you want it, so come get you some.

When we decided to renovate the studio, we wanted to create a cozy, inviting space with lots of natural light and elegant furnishings. But we weren’t just thinking about the inside environment; we wanted to do something good for the outside environment, too.

That’s why on top of all the other renovations we made to our studio—literally—are 28 SunPower solar panels. They are the most efficient panels in the business, and will help us save money and cut way down on greenhouse gas emissions.

I don’t want to bore you with too many numbers, but this is pretty impressive: the panels will offset our power costs by $300 a month. Over the next twenty-five years, we’ll save a whopping $92,000.

But the environmental benefits are even more amazing. By installing those 28 solar panels, we’re saving the equivalent of driving a car 354,000 miles. We’re saving the amount of CO² produced by 3,400 trees. Imagine if a family that never recycled anything started recycling all their cans and bottles and paper. Twenty-five years later, they have saved 98,400 pounds of solid waste from ending up in landfills. That’s the equivalent of how much energy we’re saving!

With all the lights and equipment we need to use, photography shoots can suck up a lot of energy. But we believe creating a beautiful photograph shouldn’t come at the expense of the natural environment. The new solar panels help us give back to the planet while bringing our power bill down—a real win-win!

We decided to go with SunPower because they have been around for over 25 years and offer the most efficient solar panels on the planet. They’re so efficient that they even generate power on cloudy days! The panels sit low over the roof, and their sleek design makes them barely noticeable. We don’t have to put in any extra effort at all. And whenever I want to see something that will make me smile, I can just pull up the SunPower app on my iPad to see how much energy we’re saving.

Come visit our newly renovated studio to see all the improvements we’ve made, inside and out!

As we say goodbye to 2011, we also say goodbye to the headache of renovating our photography
studio. We spent 3 months dealing with the fine white dust from the drywall, the teeth-shattering jackhammering, and the noise from dawn till dusk. Renovation is super stressful, especially if, like me, you’re someone who is meticulous about the tiniest details: light, color, the shape of the tiles, design, ambiance, and on and on.

But the good news is that our studio renovation is finally complete! Champagne all around, please! Happy New Year!!!

We decided to go through the remodeling process because we wanted to be able use the studio as an elegant backdrop in photos. Renovation of this proportion usually takes 6 months, but we
completed a majority of it in just under 3 months because we are utilizing the space as a studio and can’t have such a long downtime. We had to be extremely creative in making the renovations in sections.

We did all the interior design ourselves, and we’re so please with how it turned out! The studio used to be really dark, but now light pours in from skylights and windows. Glass doors open onto the yard, creating a flow between indoor/outdoor living space.

We created more light by adding 7 new skylights, and a bunch of new windows. We also installed at least 60+ new light fixtures into the studio, most of which are LED (energy efficient and non-toxic).

The interior has a wedding theme with a glamorous, contemporary, warm and extremely sexy feel. The furniture is modern and cozy, the perfect place for couples who are getting married to get comfortable, have some wine and cheese, and chat with us about their plans.

The fireplace is elongated, see-through and set into beautifully curved tiles, bordered by wood. The other side has a large black granite surround, sitting on a sensual red wall. The see-through fireplace is fun because it’s essentially 2 fireplaces in one.

The salon also received a facelift with new light fixtures, glass French doors and new flooring.

With its beautiful lighting, flowing design, comfortable furnishings and elegant touches throughout the space, visitors tell us the new studio has the feel of a high-end lounge.

In this tough economy, consumers are being very selective about where they choose to take their business. Before they pull out their wallet, people are performing online research. The Pew Research Center survey on Internet use shows that 78% of adult Internet users look for information about a service or product they are considering buying, and 69% search for information about someone they know or might meet.

What does this mean for your business? You can bet your potential customers are carefully comparing you with your competition. If you want to capture their attention, you’ll need to find that extra thing that will separate you from the pack.

The best new way to draw in potential clients is with a video testimonial. Written testimonials, as you may have noticed, are overused and overabused. Many websites have them, and while visitors may take the time to scan the page, the information doesn’t really sink in. It’s nothing like staring into the eyes of someone who is raving about the person or company the viewer is considering. It’s an easy sell, and the best part is that you don’t need to brag about yourself.

Video testimonials are a great marketing tool to separate you from a million other competitors. We recently put one together for Terel Beppu, a real estate agent with Intero Real Estate. There are currently NO other realtors who are doing this, so it really makes him stand out from the crowd.

The video shares stories from actual clients who worked with Terel, and shows several families in the houses he helped them purchase. The impact of their statements is much greater than it would be in a block of text; you can see their faces and really tell how much they mean what they say.

The video also shows Terel in action, his demeanor, his professionalism and ethics. You get to know his personality well even before meeting him, and to see how dedicated he is to what he does. What is it like to work with Terel?

Because they can present a ton of information in just a short time in an interesting way, video testimonials are much more effective than plain old text. They are great for all kinds of businesses and products, and can even be made for dating services, showcasing a person and his or her personality.

Oh, and I should mention one more thing about the Pew survey: 71% of adults watch videos online. If you post it, they will watch.

Anyone who has ever attempted to pick out the best company picture has run into the eternal problem of group photos: there is never one that everyone likes. Someone is always blinking, making a weird face, sticking out their gut, looking in the wrong direction, sneezing, etc. Many a company photo shoot has lead to arguments, dissatisfaction, and pleas for retakes.

But thanks to technology, this problem can be a thing of the past. Nowadays, when companies book our services for group pictures, they prefer to have us take individual shots and merge them together with a little help from Photoshop.

It creates a unique look that is absolutely stunning, and has several benefits:

1. No one will be unhappy with the final result anymore. Because they were photographed individually, each person can select their best photo out of 10-30 photographs taken.
   

2. It’s easier for everyone to find the time to show up for the photo shoot. Scheduling a group of busy professionals is exponentially harder than individuals.
   

3. If a team member is added or removed from the team, there’s no need to schedule EVERYONE for another group photo. We simply book a shoot with the new person, and add them to the shot.
   

4. It’s so much easier and quicker to set up the shot, because the amount of space needed to take this type of group photo can be 10-20 times smaller than for a traditional group shot.
   

5. The same individual pictures can be inserted into various group pictures, so if someone works in more than one department, we can use the same portrait in multiple departments of a corporation!
   

6. And of course, it looks super cool. We play with the arrangement, and add in shadows and lighting techniques, so it appears that everyone was in the same place at the same time, and just magically happened to all look amazing!

The one drawback of this technique is that it costs more to take group portraits like this. However, the cost can easily be mitigated over 1-2 years with the time and cost savings of scheduling individually and not having to do retakes.

Clients often tell us they are so happy that they chose to do their company photos this way, and they will never go back. It’s easier for the employees, and everyone is happy with the results. If you want a group photo you’ll actually be proud to post on your website and hang in your office, consider trading in the traditional technique for our more modern
method.

Usually, wedding photography is totally different from product photography. There are numerous times where our commercial & product photography skills really come in handy: when we’re shooting bridal jewelry. Part of getting up close and personal with many couples on their wedding day is getting close-ups.

A lot of couples ask for shots of their wedding rings, and brides who wear tiaras or other heirloom pieces passed down from generation to generation will ask us to photograph them.

Using a close-up macro lens is important for jewelry shots, of course, but lighting is the ultimate key. Natural lighting tends to work badly for ring shots, due to a reflective blend of colors that can mottle the jewelry. To really make the jewels sparkle, close-up photographs tend to need a LOT of light and they need to be well-placed lights.

For example, couple of weeks ago, we shot a wedding at the Ranch Golf Club in San Jose. The wedding colors were purple and green, and the bride’s flower of choice was purple tulips. When we shoot up-close with petals, getting the lighting right is super important—the rings in the purple flower would look dingy and purple, had the setting not been backlit with well-placed lights and reflected back. This shot took us just a few minutes, but could easily be used by a jewelry company for a full two-page spread advertising in a fashion magazine!!!

One of my other favorite jewelry shots was from a wedding at Far Niente, an amazing high-end winery in Napa. The winery has huge wine caves built into the hills, and their wines are in the hundreds. They do not usually hold weddings in the vineyard, but since the groom works there, they made an exception. The couple’s love is in its early phases now, but will age like a fine wine, so we honored the occasion and the spectacular setting by showing the rings against the ripening grapes.

The natural light outdoors made for great wedding shots, but we used lights for the ring pictures. Like the tulip photograph, this was especially important, because the light going through things like leaves and petals can leave a weird tint on the metal and jewels. By carefully lighting the rings in this shot, we made them sparkle and really pop against the green leaves and purple grapes.

One more that I LOVE is this stack of rings. This is from another incredible wedding, this time at the Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite. The groom has a son and daughter, and they decided to buy them rings for the wedding too, so that the wedding was not just about the couple, but also about the memorable and meaningful new bond between the kids and their step-mom. Isn’t that sweet?! It totally melted my heart. We stacked the rings together to show how the family’s rings were a symbol of their togetherness—all the separate rings became one.

Below is some of our commercial photography work, photographed for Brilliant Earth, a San Francisco conflict-free gem company that sells wedding rings to couples who are concerned about the source of their diamonds. As you can see, the type of work is not much different from the personal jewelry shots!!

When couples ask us to photograph their rings, we always look for creative ways to tell a story with the picture—it shouldn’t look like an ad for a jewelry store; it is personal and real. And it should definitely have the right lighting. ☺

Rick, Leica’s Sales Manager couldn’t find a volunteer for the Commercial product photo & video shoot for Leica and C&D Semiconductor. So, he’ll have to step into the suit himself. We were in a nice air conditioning room but after an hour in the suit, he still came out full of sweat. I feel bad for the folks who work in the clean room, for companies like Intel.

We were photographing Leica’s microscopes, C&D’s wafer cleaner and robots. Leica’s heavy microscope was relocated into C&D’s clean room in San Jose to be photographed. We did both photo and video for this product shoot. With both medium, we had to bring double amount of strong lights to ensure that the background stays white instead of ugly gray.

A few years two back, we photographed a huge group of Whole Foods Market employees in their Cupertino branch at Stevens Creek Blvd. Boy, it was a challenge especially the shot was backlighted and we had to raise to 5 stories high to take that shot for over 350 employees! The good part is that since the store was not opened to the public yet, we can photograph outside the store without having to disrupt the flow of business.

However, this year is different. Whole Foods Market raised the stakes on me on multiple fronts! Switching out hundreds of employees during business hours require significant coordination and they can only do it in the late evening.

Not only do we have to content with horrible light, we had to work in the the loading dock. This time, a rickety ladder became my only source of support that I hold on to my dear life. Beneath me, a large garbage container filled with organic fish, meat, vegetable and eggs, ready to sniff my non-organic diet. Yes, it probably wouldn’t surprise you that I have only 15 minutes. You really don’t want to photograph a large group in more than 5 minutes anyway as people do get restless. And you’d think a photographer’s work is glamourous.

Now, did you think we are done? Would corporate want a photo of their employees in a loading dock? Here’s the final shot after hours and hours of photoshop, removing the rails at the bottom and the background. Groan, I hate fingers…

Photographing architecture and remodel can be fun but this, a bathtub by the water? Gosh, I’d love to have a bathroom like that. Stroy Kaiser of HRI Construction, you rocked this one!!!

Most shots by the window tend to have reflections and worse, the outside tends to be completely white. Using off-camera flash enables us to capture a scene that has sunlight splattering all over WHITE tiles without overblowing it.