We are in the midst of our busy season and excited to have lots of weddings and portrait sessions to share with you on our blog very soon! Our busiest times of year tend to be spring/early summer, then again in the fall. In the off-season, I do a variety of photography and graphic design projects to fill my time. One of my best friends from JMU, Erin McHardy, has been so kind as to recommend me for some projects at the PR firm she works for in DC. I never gave much thought into doing commercial photography, but it has been a lot of fun! (It’s even more fun to see the photographs around the city!)

The first project we did a few months ago was a campaign for DC charter schools. It was a fairly simple photo session where I photographed the kids against a chalkboard, and then Erin and the rest of the designers in her firm created banners using the photos. The campaign took over the entire ad space at the Union Station metro during the month of March. There were ads on the platforms, walls, columns, and even the floor! Here’s what one of them looked like:

The banners were also placed on the Red Line Metro buses. My friends will call me and tell me they still see these driving around. Erin chased a few down for me to photograph:

I was thrilled to find out today that this campaign won an award in the Graphic Design USA’s 2010 American Inhouse Design Awards magazine!

This past month, the other project I’ve worked with them on was a campaign called Defeat the Debt. They hire an actor to be Uncle Sam, and I photograph him in various situations… here is homeless Uncle Sam, hanging out at some DC bus shelters in the city (and also a winner of a GD USA InHouse Award):

One morning we met for a shoot at a construction dump in Dumfries, VA to shoot Uncle Sam “digging himself into debt” (get it!?). The main purpose of the shoot was for an actual commercial they were filming, and I was there to take stills. It was quite the interesting set:

Luckily there was a LOT of help when it came to digging! Here is the awesome film crew in action:

The adorable child actress:

There haven’t been any print ads for this shoot made yet, but there will be a pretty cool commercial spot. After the shoot, they let us play for a little. (Thankfully, no one managed to injure themselves!) Jeff and Erin were pros, me- not so much…

Later that evening, we all met up again for a second commercial at a swimming pool. Why? Uncle Sam was going to drown in debt, of course. The video crew had a crazy set up, with an arm hanging the camera face down over the pool:

I shot pool-side, or on the diving board:

This is and example of what I got:

And who would’ve thought- this campaign made it all the way to billboards in NYC Times Square!

I’ve been looking for a reason to jump on the bus and go hang out in New York for a few days, so I may have to this month with the ads are on display :)

This is all very different from what I usually photograph. I thought you might be interested in seeing some other projects. Stay tuned to the blog in the next few days as we start sharing the first weddings of the season!