I've was an early fan of tilt shift photography, the method of tilting the focal plane on a view camera to cause distortion, or of using a tilt shift lens on a manual camera. I originally saw this technique used by Olivo Barbieri for his aerial waterfalls project. And then there was the stunningly cool Vincent Laforet imagery in Play Magazine, which I've mentioned before. I loved the miniaturized-feel of the landscapes. Lots of this kind of imagery popped up; Ben Thomas made a whole site out of it, called Cityshrinker, and Toni Hafkenscheid starting using the technique within a square format.
Then tilt shift hit flickr; first with tilt shift pools, and then with fake tilt shift pools (there are several pools for each)...
Boing Boing helped us out by pointing us to a Photoshop tutorial for making fakes. Tilt shift was officially mainstream. BUT, today was the first time I've seen tilt shift used in advertising. Specifically in Spain and Germany, in ads for Mazda and Toys 'R' Us, respectively. And now I think my tilt shift buzz is officially wearing off. These images feel boring and old, already. Our love is dead, tilt shift, and advertising killed it. I can't even tell if the ads are fake tilt shift, or real. Although that helicopter in Cologne looks weird. Can you tell?
photo by Olivo Barbieri
photo by Vincent Laforet
photo by Ben Thomas
photo by Toni Hafkenscheid
photo by Toni Hafkenscheid
Mazda 2/ GPS:
Advertising Agency: JWT Spain
Creative Directors: Javier Valero, Napi Rivera
Art director: Pol Úbeda
Photographer: Fergus Stothart
Toys 'R' Us:
Agency: GREY Worldwide
Then tilt shift hit flickr; first with tilt shift pools, and then with fake tilt shift pools (there are several pools for each)...
Boing Boing helped us out by pointing us to a Photoshop tutorial for making fakes. Tilt shift was officially mainstream. BUT, today was the first time I've seen tilt shift used in advertising. Specifically in Spain and Germany, in ads for Mazda and Toys 'R' Us, respectively. And now I think my tilt shift buzz is officially wearing off. These images feel boring and old, already. Our love is dead, tilt shift, and advertising killed it. I can't even tell if the ads are fake tilt shift, or real. Although that helicopter in Cologne looks weird. Can you tell?
photo by Olivo Barbieri
photo by Vincent Laforet
photo by Ben Thomas
photo by Toni Hafkenscheid
photo by Toni Hafkenscheid
Mazda 2/ GPS:
Advertising Agency: JWT Spain
Creative Directors: Javier Valero, Napi Rivera
Art director: Pol Úbeda
Photographer: Fergus Stothart
Toys 'R' Us:
Agency: GREY Worldwide
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OK now I feel officially OLD. It's 1997 and Photo Editors are completely fed up with all the features in T+L being shot in Tilt-Shift. Then the American Express ad campaign starts and we can't get away from it. Double-spread Tilt-Shift ads everywhere. They even started adding the effect to car television ads with a tobacco grad split filter. By 2003 it was almost over in the mainstream magazines and the last holdouts were the slower to react local market mags. Here just barely 10 years later it's back!!!! What's next, the hosemaster?
Great blog by the way.
Dan- we're not old. Rachel is young. I was just digging into Luerzer's Archive to find an amex ad to send her. Wasn't it Brett Froomer that shot them?
And the technique goes back even further than 1997. I recall Ansel hating the technique in "The Camera."
Yes! I am but a naive pup. Send me the amex!
R
Here you go, you can buy one for yourself.
http://www.adaholic.com/AdDetail.asp?Id=285
Yes, Brett Froomer. Good memory. I wasted 15 minutes waiting for his name to come in to my mind and eventually gave up. Yes, it's an old technique, probably 1997 was when I got sick of it. The new twist appears to be aerial.
Dan- How'd you ever find that? Oh wait, that's your job.
Truthfully, I was just glad the technique wasn't white hot anymore so it could be used when appropriate. Now it'll be the thing photo editors love to hate, or hate to love again.
You KNOW a trend is passe' when you see an ad for a Photoshop plugin that does it automatically. This month's Popular Photography has an ad for a plugin which, when I saw it, prompted the thought, "Oh, look! A LensBaby plugin!"
M
Dan- How'd you ever find that? Oh wait, that's your job.
I see variants on it all the time in photo school. People still seem to get a kick out of it. What I'm interested in is why? What's the theory behind it?
Is it just another one of those things that "looks cool?"
Interesting shift in advertising (pun intended).
Yes, Vincent LaForet's shot at the US Open Women's Final is particularly memorable.
www.photoprogress.org