Page 8 - Capture Nov-Jan 2021

I think the greatest opportunities are for artists and photographers who bring more to the table than just a good image. Randal Ford
told digital first, and motion over static. The new billboard is a six-second YouTube bumper or looping video for social feeds. As a creative, I love these new formats and you can have a lot of fun with them, but for photographers it’s really challenging. If stills are required, ever decreasing budgets mean pulling them from audio- visual content or shadowing a film crew and shooting from the hip around a grip’s arm.” Getting desire and investment to come together for crafted single-image campaigns is becoming harder and harder to secure, he adds. “But when you do get an opening to make this kind of work, it can really stand out because the categories are far less crowded. There are still opportunities out there for great visual thinkers and crafters.”
In Australia, VMLY&R found COVID a little easier to manage. Creative director Jake Barrow explains: “We had a few lucky escapes with some shoots happening pre-lockdown, some timelines had to shift, and sometimes, as with our OzFish campaign, we just adapted. One shoot for Ford was shot remotely, with the crew in a studio in Sydney and agency in Melbourne having input via video link. The production side of the advertising industry is probably one of the most resourceful industries on the planet, so we’re fortunate we haven’t had to compromise on quality.”
Silver linings in 2020
The silver lining this year seems to have been time away from the camera, what Neibert describes as a “not self-prescribed sabbatical from commercial photography”, and it’s his view that you can learn and grow creatively by pursuing other interests. “I spent much of 2020 flushing out ideas that have been on the back
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© RANDAL FORD
© SEAN IZZARD