Graphic Design, Advertising, Web in Yorkshire - Giles Cooke Design » Photography http://www.gilescooke.com Thu, 14 Jul 2011 09:45:10 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 Random Studio Shots http://www.gilescooke.com/random-studio-shots-712 http://www.gilescooke.com/random-studio-shots-712#comments Wed, 24 Feb 2010 10:54:43 +0000 GilesCooke http://www.gilescooke.com/?p=712 Some random shots of the new studio.

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]]> http://www.gilescooke.com/random-studio-shots-712/feed 0 Nice photography http://www.gilescooke.com/nice-photography-369 http://www.gilescooke.com/nice-photography-369#comments Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:02:19 +0000 GilesCooke http://www.gilescooke.com/?p=369 Not entirely relevant to what I do, but lovely stuff all the same

Ambroise Tézenas
Born in Paris in 1972, Ambroise graduated from the Applied Arts School of Vevey, Switerland in 1994. First based in London and then in Paris, he was a member of Editing agency from 2000 untill 2002. From 2002, Ambroise Tézenas has essentially devoted his time to the creation of a personnal work on landscapes. In 2004, he co-founded the association of independent photographers Think Pictures.
His work produced in Beijing from 2001 to 2005, witnessing the changes happening in Beijing before hosting the Olympics, won the Leica European Publisher’s Award. It was published in five languages ans is now in its second edition.

01_at_bruxelles_01 13_at_hong-kong_05 17_at_london_01 18_at_london_02 21_at_mumbai_01 22_at_mumbai_02 24_at_new-york_01 32_at_paris_07 34_at_venezuela 35_at_beijing_01 38_at_beijing_39

from

http://www.younggalleryphoto.com/photography/tezenas/tezenas.html

]]> http://www.gilescooke.com/nice-photography-369/feed 0 Graphic design, and it’s uneasy relationship with iStock http://www.gilescooke.com/graphic-design-and-its-uneasy-relationship-with-istock-339 http://www.gilescooke.com/graphic-design-and-its-uneasy-relationship-with-istock-339#comments Wed, 23 Sep 2009 14:24:37 +0000 GilesCooke http://www.gilescooke.com/?p=339 iStock is a resource for people to supply, buy and live in a virtual world of stock material aimed not only at the graphic designer/creative, but also at a much larger business audience. It is relatively cheap when you compare it to the more expensive/exclusive stock libraries, for example gettyimages (who recently purchased iStock and ramped up the prices), but what does a professional graphic designer really get from iStock? Well, cheap photography from a self policing web community, with contributors worldwide supplying a wealth of source material. But I have noticed a backlash against this recently, where clients have said “yes, that image is a bit ‘iStock’”. The reason? In my view, as soon as any average photographer has the ability to make easy money with their brand new 12 megapixel digital camera, they quickly work out what people want to buy, and produce more of that; it is a simple supply and demand formula. And with less creative people now getting heavily involved in selecting photography, every design job has started to look the same, and we are getting creatively dull. Is there no room for the expert any more? The truth is the real talent won’t bother with it.

The iStock style has become scorned upon, the illustration is safer than a nice rabbit, the photography in the main is bland. There may be a certain amount of risk taking/creativity, but the problem is these images just don’t sell as well, so soon no-one will produce it anymore. One photographer I know saves his best work for himself, and puts his ‘rubbish’ on iStock as it may bring in £15 every now and again.

iStock was a good resource for designers to get their hands on hi-res, reasonable quality imagery. But, like everything in this world, it has become easier for anyone to design, shoot, write and gain an audience – which is great, but conversely we have lost quality and, more importantly, we have lost creativity.

What’s next for iStock? Well, they are now moving into generic branding, where designers can supply generic logos for generic businesses around the globe. No real thought about what the logo needs to do, a simple ‘change the word to stick with an icon’. This will be fine for companies up to a certain level, but to be serious about your brand and making it work for you, you will still need expert skills and knowledge.

My advice? Fight the machine, or at least get the job done right.

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