Rangefinder Magazine
March 2006

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Marketing Hi Jinks! Suzane Maitland
 

hi jinks, (noun)—playful, often noisy and rowdy activity, usually involving mischievous pranks; noisy and mischievous merrymaking; rambunctious play; frolic

Yikes! Got a great product but a limited advertising budget? Why not try a little marketing hi jinks?

That’s what I’ve been doing for the past two years with my pro bono client, Ruth Mitchell Dance Theatre. I’m making noise, playing with ideas, and having a great time. On a serious note, I’m getting my work seen and my name recognized. And I’m doing the same for this fabulous non-profit dance theatre.

When I started my portrait business in 2003, nobody knew me. Metro-Atlanta is huge, and it’s filled with scores of long-time professionals and up-and-coming photographers. How could I possibly stand out in this crowd? Doing high-quality work alone wouldn’t guarantee my success. I needed visibility. I decided to focus my efforts on attaining exhibits.

This presented two challenges. First, as a location photographer, I didn’t have a storefront— and I didn’t want one. Second, I had little money for advertising. But I had other assets, namely talent, creativity, determination, willingness to work hard, and a huge desire to share my work with the public. I could offer these in exchange for exhibit space. So I set out to find it.

Opportunity Knocks

As luck would have it, a friend told me about a possible opportunity. A large dance school in a historic building on a bustling, old-time city square had big empty windows just waiting for a little “TLC.” They also had well over 400 students and an accompanying non-profit dance theatre. Not surprisingly, they didn’t have much money to promote their performances.

A WORD OR TWO ABOUT THE CREATIVE: All these campaigns were done, concept through design, by me. I don’t have a big staff or fancy equipment. The non-profit dance theatre has no money for a big-budget photo shoot. Every image shown here was created in a classroom at the dance school or just outside its doors. At most I’ve had one assistant along to help tote equipment and hold a reflector. I rely on my creativity and willingness to experiment, take risks, and see what evolves. All design work, including paintings, was done in Photoshop.

I offered to create advertising campaigns for them, gratis. They would fund production of all the promotional pieces—from postcards and posters to banners and billboards. My work and web address would appear on everything. They went for it. They put their trust in me and it’s been an amazing journey so far.

Alice in Wonderland

Just a few weeks after initially meeting, I would begin the first advertising campaign for the theatre. The production: Alice in Wonderland.

Images these pages: Suzanne’s promotional pieces for Hi Jinks and The Nutcracker

I needed to wow them. They had to feel safe gambling the success of their production on me. I respected every dollar they could allot to the project and tried to come up with creative ways to use it. One thing I wouldn’t (and still won’t) skimp on is energy and creativity and the highest standards in design.

As the foundation of the advertising campaign, I created a 30x40-inch painting of Alice from my portrait of the teen in the starring role (see image page 62). The framed painting appeared in their windows in a manor home setting with a rabbit-hole view into Wonderland on the other side. The image was also used for a commemorative poster, flyers and the program cover. Each time Alice was seen, so was my name.

I contacted a reporter with our large metro paper with a story angle for her column. She liked it and it ran—a first for the theatre. Another smaller, local paper featured the Alice portrait on the front page of the entertainment section with the lead-in: “Portrait Artist Suzanne Maitland created this painting of…” The free exposure was great!

Urban Dance Series

With the Alice performances finished, the windows would once again be bare. This was totally unacceptable to me. I couldn’t lose the momentum I had built over the previous months. Plus, our partnership was still new, as was our rising level of exposure.

I asked the artistic director to provide a dancer for each of the dance disciplines in which they offered instruction and one hour of her time. I had an idea. I was going to create banners for the windows. They would be low cost and reusable. They would make a statement.

A few days before the shoot, I scouted the streets and alleys around the school and chose some locations. Using all natural light, the series of images were created. There were four six-foot long images that filled the center windows of the studio and literally stopped traffic—pedestrian, that is! We were making an impact and getting noticed.

One of these images, “Hip Hop,” brought me an Honorable Mention in the 2005 WPPI 16x20 Competition. I also use this and two of the other banner images on note cards and sterling silver jewelry I market.

By George!

For the Theatre’s fall 2004 production, By George!, I wanted to convey the theme, “Sophisticated, Sassy, Smart.”

To carry it off, the imagery had to project that notion. Unfortunately, the only time the AD and dancers could meet for the shoot was just after finishing a weeklong dance workshop. They were exhausted. It was late and energy was very low. We left the shoot thinking we would have to try again. But a little creative cropping and Photoshop work made this image a winner. The image, titled “Amazing Grace” (above), brought in big crowds for the show. It also earned me my highest score in the 2005 WPPI 16x20 Competition, a 96.

Nutcracker

The Nutcracker has been performed for decades. My self-imposed challenge was to make the promotional campaign fresh and contemporary. Since Nutcracker is an ensemble ballet, I wanted to avoid highlighting any particular dancer. Therefore, I chose to focus on the costumes and the dancers’ fit bodies (see image page 59). Hi-key kept the look clean and fresh. The typeface selection gave it just enough of a traditional feel.

All the dancers were photographed individually by natural light in the dance school classroom. The image composite was done in Photoshop.

Peter Pan

Last spring the theatre took on a huge endeavor—a totally new, “from the ground up” production. Since they were stretching artistically and spending so much money to launch this show and make it excellent, I felt I had to make the campaign spectacular. I wanted it to reflect their energy and commitment. I wanted them to sell out the performances.

The main image for the Peter Pan promotion was a shot of Captain Hook (shown page 146). It was done in the last minutes of the session. I love faces and closeups, so I just had to do his portrait before we wrapped up the shoot. The cold, gray, winter day was coming to a close. The light was fading fast. I brought him right next to the window and placed my Westcott B/W collapsible background behind him. I set my Canon EOS 1D Mark II (with a 50mm, f/1.4 lens) at ISO 500. I chose Aperture Priority and an fstop of f/3.2, and 1/25 second later I had the shot. In Photoshop, I bumped up the saturation a bit and cropped the image even tighter to focus on his awesome face.

The image of Captain Hook was featured on the postcard mailer, a 6x3-foot banner and a billboard—my largest print to date! Of course, I had to get Tinkerbell alone too. I had her perch on a barstool and curl up to appear small. Again, only natural light was employed (with the same specs as Hook’s image). I boosted the saturation in Photoshop, then applied a Gaussian blur for a dreamy effect (also shown page 146).

The theatre had its first official sellout performance at the Sunday matinee.

Hi Jinks!

Our latest campaign has been the most fun yet. Hi Jinks! just revved up my creative juices. The dance is highenergy and wacky. While watching a video of the piece, pink, orange and green popped into my head along with the graphic elements of circles and squares. These elements would form the basis for the campaign. The images of the dancers were isolated in Photoshop and brought into my canvas of shapes and colors. As with all my designs, the typeface had to convey the theme too.

Using Photoshop allowed me to keep the photo shoot simple. I joked with the dancers about our “big-budget production” as they worked with me to stay within the 10-foot-wide muslin that hung over my background stand in the classroom. The cool concept and the dancers’ charisma carry this campaign.

(Tech Details: Canon EOS 1D Mark II; 50mm f/1.4 lens; Bogen tripod; f/4.5 for individuals, f/7.1 for the group; ISO 400, 320, 200; Window light supplemented by two medium Westcott Spiderlites)

Exposure

Because of my pro bono efforts with the dance theatre, I have a permanent showcase for my work. Locals and tourists alike see it, and the dance school families are intimately familiar with me and my images.

Over these two years, I have striven to get our names (mine and the studio’s) and offerings out in front of the public as often as possible, in as many ways as possible, for as little money as possible. These efforts are paying off—each successive campaign has brought greater recognition of both the dance school’s excellence and my own artistry.

We still have a low-budget program. I still have to stretch my brain and their limited dollars while trying to top the last campaign—but these challenges make it fun!

The Art of Association

Now whenever anyone thinks of the Ruth Mitchell Dance Theatre, they think of me too. I’ve doubled my exposure, and I have gained so much more than just that. It’s been a very rewarding experience for me, both personally and professionally.

Recently the artistic director thanked me for “making our dancers look so good.” The thing is, when they look good, I look good!

From the outset, my goal was to make the dance theatre’s windows the most beautiful on the Square. I can proudly say I’ve done it.