Timothy Archibald Serves Up The Cheese

Typically, professional photographers do not attempt mimic the bad, cheesy family photos that everyone sees circulating around Christmastime.  In the case of Timothy Archibald, however, a recent photo shoot allowed him to do just that.  Tim had landed a gig with Nokia shooting a series of images that are currently being used as downloadable holiday cards which people can send to their friends and family.  “We deliberately tried to tip our hat to the cheesy family and pet photos that people send around the holidays.  Some of the images we took are beautiful and artful, and some illustrate the holidays in all their wonderful tackiness.”

Tim and his crew decided to break down the shoot into three major types of photos – the family photo, the studio portrait (e.g. posing with Santa), and “a celebration of the cheerful junk that bubbles up during the season.”   They wanted to portray a photographic type of Folk Art with a tongue-in-cheek look at family during the holiday season complete with dog costumes and reindeer sweaters.   

One limitation that Nokia imposed was that everything had to be shot with their new Nokia Lumia 1020.  Nothing was to be composited or recut, all the shots had to be directly out of the camera.  Despite the obvious limitations (adjusting color temperature, etc.), Tim was surprised at how much the camera was able to do.  “I had the camera for a few days before the shoot so I was able to play with it and give it a test run.  We definitely pushed the camera as far as we could, but I was actually pretty happy with the photos it was able to produce.”  In fact, the limitations of using a non-professional camera for the shoot actually lent itself well to the amateur look and feel they were going for.

Tim credits his crew and prop stylist Shannon Amos for making the job such a great experience.  “It was a blast working on this one.  We really were able to form a tight collective with the art directors and everyone behind the scenes, which made the end result so much richer.”  And Nokia loved what Tim produced, grasping the concept instantly and running with it.

For a behind the scenes look at the photo shoot, check out this video produced by Nokia.

To see more of Timothy’s fantastic commercial and personal work, visit his FoundFolios portfolio.