Shore Thing! Wristwatch Photography

with Shore Projects

Wristwatch photography has rapidly become a feature of Pocket Creatives‘ year, having worked with brands Burlingham London and Larsson & Jennings, we took on the challenge of adding something new to Shore Watches‘ already impressive library of photography.

It’s actually quite nice to have the challenge of seeing how you stack up compared to other photographers who have produced some cracking wristwatch photography images already – not only does it set the bar, but it gives you the mindset of not just wanting to deliver the same, but different.

Wristwatch photography carries a number of quirks, and they all have personalities of their own: they hate the sun being a certain angles to their faces, they dislike fingerprints and attract dust like magnets (!), they love flat angles and symmetry but really come to life when you find the right backgrounds.

For the recent wristwatch photography projects that we’ve undertaken for Shore, I’ve taken a much more low-tech approach to my normal route. I’d usually go studio, high res, perfect flash lighting that takes hours to set up. Instead, I’ve traded that in for quick, low footprint, mobile and lightweight. We’ve been on location up in the Lake District and Devon, combating the wonderful weather the UK throws at you, balanced out with the breathtaking and varied scenery that we have at our disposal. So, the heavy Nikon DSLR camera stays at home, and for these I’ve armed myself with the very adaptable Olympus mirrorless system.

What I’ve enjoyed during these wristwatch photography shoots, is spending less time on settings, being lighter on my feet has made me able to fire off shots quicker with less setup time, and as we’re seeing locations for the first time I’ve been more reactive and less planned. It’s exercised a different part of the brain.

I tend to shoot two or three of the same shot in the same space, some wider, some closer, and some with different lighting impact – as we’re only using natural lighting and no flash, it’s very much about making the most of what the sun gives you at that particular time of day. Delivering a variety of shots means that the client still only selects one or two from each set, but giving more choice provides more variation overall.

At the end of the shoot i’ll do some basic post-production, which usually involves killing off some unwanted reflections and a heap of dust – no matter how hard you try to keep it off during the shoot. I’ll also add some selective adjustments to remove anything I didn’t want to be there – it might be a highlight, or the reflection of someone’s red jacket. The most important thing is presenting each watch as it should be, accurately, supporting it with the beauty of a location without it taking over.

Ben Street at Shore Watches had this to say:

“Would highly recommend. The images created by Pocket Creatives went above and beyond what we required. They were highly professional, catered to our style and fit the brief perfectly. Many thanks!”