Author Archives: John Linn
Continued Success at the District ADDYs.
At the 8th District ADDY® Awards Show last week, Adventure Studios & Adventure Advertising took home three ADDYs (one Gold and two Silvers).
The Gold ADDY went to Adventure Studios for “Red Bull Skate Athletes,” a photo series of professional skateboarders on Red Bull’s team. Adventure Studios also earned a Silver award for “Red Bull Skate Action” photography. Another Silver ADDY went to Adventure Advertising for a “Fall/Winter Photo Solutions” catalog done for Creative Memories.
Winning in the 8th District means going up against the best work produced in 2011 from top agencies in Minnesota, North & South Dakota and Wisconsin. It’s a very competitive market, so we’re thrilled about capturing three pieces of hardware.
Winning ADDYs at the District level is the second step in competing for National ADDYs against more than 1,500 national finalists. An illustrious judging panel will choose winners from across the country on May 4-5. The National ADDY Awards Show will be held in Austin, TX on June 5, 2012 in conjunction with the AAF National Conference.
Shooting South of the Border.
Boating Magazine regularly hires us to travel to unique locations across the continent. Each time, they introduce us to wonderful people who enjoy boating just as much as we do.
A recent trip to Baja, Mexico is a perfect example. Adventure Studios joined
Boating Magazine writer Jim Hendrix to shoot a story about trailer boating in
that beautiful region.
We worked with a group from the organization Vagabundos del Mar who graciously shared their unique lifestyle with us for a few days. We trailered boats through breathtaking country, explored incredible waters, slept on the boats and caught Dorado and Roosterfish. You can read the story in the March 2012 issue of Boating or online at www.boatingmag.com/skills/trailering/trailer-boating-baja.
Direct Sales – Eat. Drink. Be Manly.
Adventure Studios has a lot of experience shooting for direct sales companies like Creative Memories and Thirty-One. Our images have helped them build their brands, consultant bases and overall sales. While those companies appeal to female consultants and consumers, a new client shows that direct selling isn’t just for women anymore.
Man Cave brings men together for “MEATings” where party goers can eat brats, have a couple of cold ones, play games like Hammerschlagen and purchase premium meat products, grilling accessories and related Man Cave items.
They turned to Adventure Studios to shoot their new 2012 catalog. To tackle the project, we had a MEATing of our own so we could live and photograph the Man Cave experience first hand.
A Half Decade of ADDY Bests.
For the fifth straight year, Adventure earned top honors at the central Minnesota ADDY competition. In addition to winning Best of Show, Adventure also claimed two Judge’s Choice Awards, Best Copywriting (Greg Skoog, copywriter), ten Gold ADDYs and four Silver ADDYs for work produced during 2011.
Best-of-Show Award – Red Bull skate athlete photography
Judge’s Choice Award – Bayliner Boats photo book
Judge’s Choice Award – Park Tool ad campaign
Best Copywriting Award – Creative Memories catalog; copy by Greg Skoog of Creative Memories
Gold ADDY Awards – Creative Memories catalog, FIT packaging, Bayliner photobook, Park Tool campaign, Initiative Quarterly photography, Crestliner Boats photography, Bayliner photography, Nautic Global Group photography, Red Bull action photography, Red Bull skate athlete photography
Silver ADDY Awards – Rage Broadhead ad, 2011 AAFCM ADDY Award materials, Creative Memories design, Polaris RZR photography
All of the award-winning photography was by John Linn and the Adventure Studios team. Winning Best of Show and the other awards confirms that we’re doing a great job for our wonderful clients, and that’s the best thing of all.
No Job Too Big.
With more than 70 subject boats to shoot and weeks spent on the water – the annual Nautic Global Group photo shoot is one of the big projects each year at Adventure Studios. For the 2012 model year, our hard-working crew photographed the Hurricane, Rinker, PolarKraft, SanPan, PartiKraft, Sweetwater and AquaPatio brands. We shot at multiple locations in Michigan and Indiana, and in the end delivered more than 750 print-ready images to Nautic Global Group for their 2012 catalogs and advertising needs.
Minneapolis Office Party
When: Friday, February 10th, 4 pm to 1 am
Where: 4850 35th Street West, Minneapolis
Visit adventurestudios.com for directions.
Capturing the Essence of a Slogan.
In August, Adventure Studios traveled with our photo boat and production RV to Lake Tellico, Tennessee to photograph 11 new Bayliner boat models. The theme of the shoot was “So Worth It,” which is Bayliner’s new tagline.
Our goal was to capture the authentic human moments while boating. Those moments that make it “So Worth It” to own a Bayliner. Solid client direction and great teamwork made this a very successful project. So successful in fact that the photographs, along with others in Bayliner’s portfolio, were recently compiled into a stunning new photo book that was just printed and released.
Picture Us in Minneapolis.
Adventure Studios™ began in Brainerd, MN in 2005. Since then we’ve shot from east to west; from Canada to Mexico. And now we’ve expanded with another studio in the West Lake Calhoun area of Minneapolis. The location lets us tap into the cities’ creative culture, people and resources to better serve clients located in the metro and nationwide.
We share the space with SixSpeed, a firm that has relied on Adventure Studios for several photo shoots. This is a new location for both companies. Together, we’ll throw an open house party in mid-February. Invitations to join us in the City of Lakes will be mailed out in the coming weeks.
A Skate in the Park.
Leave it to Red Bull to create something like the Mississippi Grind Tour! Built on a massive barge, this floating skatepark traveled 1,705 miles from St. Paul to New Orleans. Our colleagues at Six Speed helped Red Bull produce and promote the event, and Adventure Studios handled the photography at stops in Davenport, St. Louis and New Orleans.
At each stop, we got great shots of professional Red Bull boarders showing off for thousands of spectators. Some of the big names included Zered Bassett, Ron Deily, Steven Webb, Ray Maldonado, Ryan Decenzo and Kenny Anderson. We also photographed amateur riders competing in Red Bull’s “Ticket to Grind” contest.
In addition to capturing action on the barge, we shot at an Iowa farm with a barn converted into a skate park. In St. Louis we got permission to ride in the City Museum for some very unique skateboarding images. And in New Orleans, we photographed pro riders as they took their skills down Bourbon Street.
You can see a wide selection of Mississippi Grind images at http://www.adventurestudios.com/work/detail/red-bull-mississippi-grind-tour. In addition to USA Today and other national news spots, these images continue to appear in skateboarding magazines and are distributed to media outlets through the Red Bull Content Pool (https://images.redbullcontentpool.com/).
Images That Leave Impressions.
In the bicycling industry, Park Tool is the king of tools. The brand loyalty among bike mechanics and do-it-yourself cyclists is huge. So when Park Tool needed photographs to break through the clutter and communicate their brand essence, this image left the strongest mark. It’s a nice example of how we combine marketing strategy, great photographs and masterful retouching to create brand ambassadors.
