Stephanie Rausser’s personal project Kiki & Coco, is an awesome example of how you can use the web and social media to see if there’s interest in something you’ve created then use that demand to evolve the project into other mediums. Also, there’s simply no better way to make a connection to clients than with a personal project, it speaks volumes about your passion for photography.

Rob: Tell me how the project started?
Stephanie: In November 2007 one of my closest friends, Debra McClinton, took her life. Our daughters were the same age and we had become good friends after she assisted me for many years.

I had realized things were bad for her, and I remember after a call in the summer of 2007, thinking something needed to be done – that things had turned for the worse. Three months later it was too late and to this day I have guilt and anguish over wishing I had done more. When we worked together we worked well together and often went on trips, taking turns photographing our daughters and after her death I have had this recurring dream where she moved in with us and we become business partners and photographed every job together.

At the time, I was wrapped up with my business and life and I did not intervene. What intervening would have looked like is hard to say but my choice not to has impacted me. Sometimes things happen in your life and they are an invitation to change things. Deb’s death stopped me in my tracks and it made me start to think differently. Like no other deaths I had experienced, it made me realize how fragile and delicate life is and how important it is to take care of yourself, those that you love, and to slow down. The Kiki and Coco Project came about because it was a way to not only deal with the grief and sadness that followed Deb’s death but also it was a way for me to do something out of the ordinary, something that allowed me to connect in a more meaningful and creative way.
This is how the trip to Paris with my daughter Kiki, and her doll, Coco, came about.

So, when you got back you made a video of the images from the trip (here). What was the response to the video?
The response was great. The French music we found to go with it was adorable and it seemed the images moved people. The video (slide show) was reposted on many blogs. I think too it was the final reason my agent Sarah said yes to working together. We had met many times prior but when I got back from Paris and finished this project, I sent her the video and we met one more time and that is when we started working together. I could tell she really resonated with the Kiki and Coco slide show. After the slide show was created, we designed the calendar, printed 3000, and sent them out to art buyers, art directors, family and friends.

What was the response to the calendar?
The response to the calendar was big and it was predominantly a female response. To this day, four years later, I still get emails from women wanting to know where they can buy the doll.

Moms especially loved the calendar. I must have gotten an email a week for months from moms asking where they could purchase the doll. They would email me and mention that their daughter would love the doll appearing in the photographs but after getting quite a few of these emails I started to wonder if it was really the mom who wanted the doll.
There is now an official Coco inspired doll and is still made and available at http://shop.jessbrowndesign.com/product/coco-inspired-rag-doll
There are also several knockoffs of the doll with the same name.

Another great response to the calendar was the ad jobs that came about. The conference calls with the art directors would start something like this: “I have your calendar and what you shot for it is in the same vein as the project we are doing….” I definitely got several ad jobs as a result of the Kiki and Coco calendar.

How did it evolve from there?
I did two more calendars after “Kiki and Coco in Paris.” One was with Kiki again in Italy (same idea: 20 days away, afternoon shoot every day, a story to tell with the preface to the start of every day being: how do I make my next photo even better and at the same time keep to the parameters of the story I have already created). I sweetened the deal for Kiki and swapped out the doll for ice cream cones, lollipops & popsicles and it was called “Sweet Italia.” Originally I had thought of taking the Coco doll to Italy but as time progressed I realized my daughter was not so interested in being photographed as I had hoped she’d be. I realized it was necessary to raise the ante; to her, ice cream and lollipops were more intriguing as she had a wicked sweet tooth. She gave me her all but after the Italy calendar project she begged me to find another model.

Also, although ”Sweet Italia” was beautiful it did not have the same aura, draw, and sentimentality that “Kiki and Coco in Paris” had. I did my last calendar “I left my heart in…” (2011) in San Francisco with my niece, Zeli. Then, in the Spring of 2011, Cameron + Company, a boutique book publisher in Petaluma, CA contacted me to see if we could turn “Kiki and Coco in Paris” into a children’s book. I sent Cameron and Company the roughly 5000 images from what I shot over 20 days in Paris and from those photos they came up with a story that would appeal to children. They pulled their favorites (which I asked to re-edit because they originally wanted the photo to be from the perspective of the doll but the project was shot from the perspective of the girl and the strongest images were about the girl, not the doll) They then wrote a twist to the story that I took photos for and now we have the book, Kiki and Coco in Paris.

How do you see projects like these fitting into the job of professional photographer?
It is so important for a professional photographer to be able to tell a story that engages his or her audience, especially in the competitive and saturated climate today, where images and videos are at every turn.

When you take a big project like what I did in my three calendars, where I photographed each afternoon for 20 days, it is a creative process that is vital to honing your artistic skills. When you are in the midst of a project like this, you are constantly thinking, what tells the story the best? What can I do now that is even more unexpected or unusual within the set parameters – which in this situation with Kiki and Coco was a seven-year-old girl and her obsession with a cute little doll in the beautiful city of Paris. Where do we go next to help tell the story? What could be brought in to make for a funnier photo? What can I do that will make my viewer smile, or even better, laugh out loud? I think doing projects like this makes a photographer a better problem solver on top of the fact that when you are deep in the project, it is one of the most exhilarating places to be as a creative person. The process of narrowing down 14 final images from thousands of images (12 calendar months and a cover and back image) for each of the three calendars I did has been an enjoyable creative process like no other. If I had my way I would still be doing the calendars with kiki every summer in a far away location but it turns out she prefers to be behind the camera, like me.

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When I first saw Massimo Gammacurta’s Lollipop project I knew he had a hit on his hands. 2 years later I wanted to know how a great personal project translates into paying jobs.

APE: Ok, take me back to the beginning. When did you create the lollipop project and what was the process for creating and photographing them?

Massimo: Two years ago I had this idea about making some lollipops shaped like fashion logos. I was intrigued by the possibility of “eating fashion”. When you eat food it goes into your blood, into your system and I felt that it would have been intriguing to make an edible Gucci or a Chanel lollipop. Also, the other idea was about oral fixation, “suck fashion” or it could have easily been…”fashion sucks”. Once I had the idea, then I had to deal with the process of making it. I had to learn how to make hardball candy from scratch and also how to make the molds. It wasn’t easy at all but I felt like I had to do it myself.

Can you tell me more about the process for making the candy and molds? You don’t have to give me any secrets.

I never made hard candy and it is a very volatile media. I had to heat the sugar at 300 degrees and it becomes as hot as lava, is very dangerous and it dries very fast. What makes this pieces unique is the fact that are “sloppy”. All the details work that happens after the base mold is done is what makes them interesting. I played with humidity, double dipping splashing it and ever chill blasting this pieces so they can crack internally. Believe it or not the hardest thing to do was to carry them into the studio. They are lollipop size and they are extremely fragile and i lost many just by carrying them into the studio.

What did you think would happen once you started promoting the project?

I didn’t promote it at all. I just uploaded on my site and I forgot about it for like 2 or 3 days,

Then what happened?

Someone must have seen the images on my site and started tweeting and blogging about them. I woke up one morning and I had 5000 entries on my website in one night and I couldn’t understand why. So I googled my name and the lollipops were all over the internet. Basically it started a chain reaction and I was all over the web.

Tell me about the brands you used, there was some negative reaction at first wasn’t there?

Actually the 1st email I got about this was from a store in Tokyo that wanted to order 5000 lollipops, they wanted to sell them for 12 dollars a piece. Also, I had a lot of legal firms from all over the world checking my site out but nothing really happened apart from a letter from a big fashion group that advised me to stop using their logo. We later talked to them and once I explained that it wasn’t my intention to mass produce these candies and they stop bothering me.

Tell me about the book. How did that come about and what was the result of that?

I really loved the 4 original lollipops I made and I thought it would have been cool if I could make a lollipop book of all the logos I liked. It took me a year but in the end I made and shot 50 pieces and started to send it to publishing houses until I found one (BIS publishing) that gave me a book deal and printed my book.

Now, tell me about the payoff, what jobs came because of it?

The Lolli-Pop project made a lot of noise on the internet and helped me tremendously in promoting my photography business. I shot a candy number story for Wired Magazine, started to shoot major catalogues and editorials and recently I just shot a campaign in which I used all my fine arts techniques and ideas in a commercial shoot.

Was’t there a point when you wondered if it would just make noise on the internet and not result in any paying jobs? How long was it between when you first created the project and the jobs came in because of it?

Yes it took more than a year. I think that many people thought that these were either photoshop or CGI generated. Also some were under the impression that i bought it somewhere and asked where to find them or even thought i was some kind of candy factory producing these myself. It became hysterical and frustrating at the same time. I think when Wired commissioned me the candy numbers is when people started to take notice. After that i would go into meetings with my books and a lot of people in the business knew about the “fashion lollipops”.

And finally I understand Chanel just bought some prints, but wasn’t a lawsuit a possibility at one point?

Yes, but once we explained to them that these were not mass produced pieces but art, they stopped. I’ve already sold a few prints through my gallery in Paris (http://www.visionairsgallery.com), but when Chanel approached me about a month ago to buy 2 prints for their permanent art collection I felt for the first time that this idea had come full circle and the originality of the concept had finally paid off.

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Jasmine DeFoore, former Redux rep and current photographer consultant, has a 3 part self-promo series running on her blog starting today. She rightly concedes that nailing down creatives on what works is impossible because if you “ask 5 different people [you will], get 5 different answers.” The general consensus as noted by DOP Brenda Milis is “not a lot of money needs to go into making a good, impactful photo promotion” and DOP Allyson Torrisi who says “great talent will stand out on a single postcard with two images. The goal is to drive me to your website to see your work.”

It’s well worth a visit (go here) because there are lots of examples and even discussion of certain promos.

Molly Roberts, Director of Photography, Smithsonian

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Photographer Casey Templeton showed me some of the amazing responses he received from a promo he did recently and I thought you might want to hear more about what went into it. You can see more behind the scenes images and a video about it on his blog (here).

Here’s Casey explaining the piece:

I worked closely with Suzanne and my assistant, Rob Jefferson, starting the middle of last year to get the ball rolling. After a successful 2008 and beginning of 2009, I realized my work came mostly from word of mouth and I hadn’t done any marketing. We decided if I wanted to take my business to the next level, I needed to start marketing myself on a national level. We also knew I only had one chance to make a first impression so we had to do it right.

Rob and I met with Suzanne in her office and got a chance to see a variety of her throwback collectibles such as a Simpson’s lunch tin, figurines and print pieces which set our minds racing.

The big question was how do we fill a box with multiple items that are tied together with a common theme. Since this was going to be the first time these agencies and art buyers would have heard of me, I wanted to put in items that meant something to me and would help them to get to know me better. I started by writing a list of things I loved which could also be placed in a box.

I spent approximately $15,000 on the project between research, materials, portfolios from Lost-Luggage, assembly and shipping of the kits. A portion of this was also spent on my designer, Robb Major, that I used for every piece in the kit from the business cards to the screenprinting on the shipping box. I produced 300 promo kits and mailed 290 to a selected list of agencies, art buyers and in-house corporate groups that Suzanne and I compile using Agency Access.

The responses have been overwhelming and I am currently working on a an email blast to follow up on the delivery of the kits and start organizing meetings with various agencies that have requested to meet with me.

Here are some responses from the week they were shipped:

“As an art buyer, I get a lot of little promotional pieces. I am spoiled. BUT, yours was so well put together and well done that I stopped everything I was doing and went to your website. NOT to my suprise your work is just as thoughtful, inavative and touching as your promotional piece. I offficially have a work crush on you. Please come and see us so we can put you to work ASAP.:)”

“I just received your magic lunchbox and I gotta say it’s quite the spread. The San Cristobal just made my drive to NY tomorrow night that much better. If you’re ever in Boston for a job let me know and I’ll set you up with a portfolio review with my art producer colleagues so they can get to know you. Thank you and stay in touch.”

“Talk about getting someone’s attention. Great promo package. Fun and a great way to get your work in front of folks.”

“Thanks -for the promo package! Quite a statement. Glad you reached out. Wanted you to know that we appreciate it!”

“That was a pretty fancy promo for a recession! Thank you — and you are welcome to send email promos anytime.”

“Just received a super fun packed from you guys. Just wanted to say lots of thanks. I looked through the images in the packet, as well as your site. You guys have amazing work. Anyway, I’ll def keep you in mind for future projects, and thanks again!”

“Cool promotional box! So much so in fact that I feel compelled to use you for our next photoshoot. I have a client in ————– on March 12th. Are you available and interested? Wow, this just goes to prove the power of good advertising.”

Continued response last week:

DDB:
“This is the most amazing promo I’ve ever received in my 12 years of art buying! I truly hope to work with you soon and I hope this gets you a ton of work! Its genius!”

BBDO:
“Liked your work very much-very honest and truthful. Will def keep you in mind.”

Draft FCB:
“We want you to come and see us because this is thoughtful and your work kicks ass”

Periscope:
I LOVED the promo. I feel like I already know you, thanks!”

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The first installment to the excellent What Is England? project curated by Stuart Pilkington is up (here). The project is the sister of the 50 states project (here) both are intended to paint a picture of a country and its states through photography. Both are excellent sources for finding photographers to hire and represent the kinds of things the internet is awesome for.

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I’m not surprised that the king of promotions (Monte Isom) was the first to come out with an iPhone app as a marketing piece (here). It usually pays to be the first so I’m sure it worked for him in the way that a well made mailer might and as a method for cutting through the email clutter it must have been solid gold.

Not long after Monte’s came out I saw another from Caesar Lima (here).

According to this story on the WSJ Blogs (here), companies like Net Solutions in Chandigarh, Inda build apps for clients at $3,000 to $15,000 a pop.

It will be interesting to see where this ends up. I can certainly see an app from someone like Howard Bernstein being quite valuable but how many individual photographer apps can you download before your phone is clogged.

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Stuart Pilkington, founder of the 50 states project–which I think is such a fantastic idea–is launching a project for 2010 entitled “What Is England?” He’s looking for 46 photographers, each based in one of the counties in England he’s got listed, to take 6 images in 2010 that will represent the photographers style and the county where they live.

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Erik Wåhlström shot a 1 minute video of himself thumbing through his printed portfolio (on his blog here too). He’s a talented photographer and this is a solid book so it’s a good example for those looking to put one together. I think there’s something else interesting here for photo editors because I think I might enjoy the option of previewing a book this way to decide whether or not to call it in. Regardless it’s kind of a fun way to send your work around and might snare a few people who might not otherwise look.

from Erik Wåhlström Fotograf on Vimeo.

more

and

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Unsolicited guest post from:
Deborah Dragon, Deputy Photo Editor at Rolling Stone.

The other day I received a “follow up” phone call from a photographer thanking me for checking out their site and mentioning that they were really interested in working with the magazine and since I was “interested” in their work, could we set up a meeting. I thought “did I click on something” or sometimes I see work that I like and send an email saying so and to let me know when they update their site again. This was not the case, so I googled their name, went on their site and couldn’t understand what happened, because this persons work was completely inappropriate for the magazine.

So, what ever happened to people sending or emailing appropriate mailers to magazines? I would think with the capability of tracking emails and clicks on sites, there would be the possibility of organizing these things better. I get about 150 emails a day from photographers and reps, yes, 150 emails JUST FROM PHOTOG’S and REPS, 50% of them are lifestyle and food. My goal is to visit EACH ONE…HMMM I can’t imagine why photo editors aren’t seeing peoples work. Maybe if the photographers all got together and agreed to STOP loading PE’s email boxes with giant attachments and/or links to images that are not suitable for the publication I could actually achieve my goal. Save your valuable time and figure out what magazines you really want to shoot for, then start shooting.

And, most importantly if you ask me, if I see your work, I like it, and I like it for the magazine… believe me, you will know it and I will contact you. You don’t need to follow up with my clicking on your website.

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I made a few more changes to the promo to get it working better before I send it out. I decided to change the name to:

FolioBrowser.com

After seeing ILikeThesePhotos in print several times I was starting to think it sounded a little juvenile, not very professional and too one sided. Folio Browser is a little stiff but I can see it becoming a useful tool for Art Buyers and Photo Editors and I’d prefer it sounded professional (it’s kinda like when your daughter name’s the dog princess and the stupid thing gets lost and you have to drive around the neighborhood yelling princess at the top of your lungs).

The biggest change is that the links to photographers websites are direct. They don’t go to Flickr first. In fact you don’t even have to know Flickr is involved in any way. It just serves up the images for the thumbnail page. The other big change is that the title can now support a name and location for the photographer. I’ve heard from a few people that this would be a really useful addition. If anyone wants to help me out with the locations for all the photographers just visit the flickr page and leave a comment on each one (here). I may not have the time to get them all changed on my own.

I already have several requests to make region specific versions of this project (Canada, West Coast, Los Angeles, Mexico, Mid West) with different groups of editors selecting the final group. I think that’s a great next logical step and I’m excited to see if this could become a regular resource for people. Only time will tell.

The only major problem with the new version now is that it’s slower than the previous. See what you think for yourself:

ILikeThesePhotos

FolioBrowser

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Tracking my movements on your email promos and website.

I think my enthusiasm for email promos and links to work on photographers websites was completely cut in half the day someone emailed me and said “I see you’ve been checking out my book” I actually looked for a portfolio in my office because I didn’t recognize the photographers name, “I just wanted to see if I can show you some more work or shoot an assignment for you.”

Then I realized they had tracked me from an email promo I clicked on and suddenly I felt duped. Are all the photographers secretly tracking my movements to see when I click on a link or how much time I spend on their website. Man, that sucks.

The truth is I spend way less time on someone’s website that I really like and way too much time on websites I find horribly bad.

I’m sure it’s pretty satisfying to see how many clicks you get and how much time is spent on the website and what kinds of things get people to visit and what kinds of things get people to stay but letting me know you’re watching is downright creepy and makes me think twice before clicking and visiting.

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2 promo cards in the mail today. Can’t remember the last time I only got 2. Maybe the promo card side of business is slowing down because of the web. Anyway this one looked cool and the photographer, Ayuson has some nice material on her/his (can’t tell with only one name to go off of) website. I really like describing light.

The other card went in the garbage.

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