At Sugino, we shoot a lot of food and beverages. Like our recent four day shoot for Diageo beverages.

And we eat a pretty amazing lunch together nearly every day, from some of the city’s tastiest restos. Check out a wicked time-lapse we made using the iPhone app ‘Time Lapse HD Camera’. So cool!!

So it’s no wonder we were stoked to see Saveur‘s top recipes of 2011 recently. It’s the magazine’s annual roundup of the editors’ favourites from the past year.

As usual, the pics feature Saveur‘s “rustic chic” (and are often shot by Todd Coleman, a guy who doubles as the Executive Food Editor). And the recipes — from the simple to the laborious — are authentic and creative.

Check it out (and click the images to read more and find the recipes).

Koshary

Maple Squares With Walnuts

Banana Pudding (top), Escarole Soup (bottom)

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The Board

In 2007, we were asked by Elspeth Lynn and Lorraine Tao at Zig to shoot a spot announcing the arrival of Cosmo TV. The storyboard opened on a woman’s hand. A miniature guy slowly climbs the hand as if it were a rock face. When he reaches the top, the pinky finger on the woman’s hand extends. The guy gives a big sigh of relief and hugs the finger. He’s literally “wrapped around her finger.”

The Challenge

Cool idea, but how will we make the effect seem real?

We started by taking a still of a woman’s hand and projecting the still against a piece of fabric stretched on a 20’ x 20’ frame near the rear wall in our studio. We then built an 18’ high “green screen climbing wall” with hold points matching the key points on the woman’s hand.

We hired a rock-climbing specialist to come in and build a belay system for the rig. We then auditioned actors with rock climbing abilities. On the casting day, we had the actors climb the giant hand. At the other end of the studio, we did a female hand demo casting.

The Shoot

We delivered a motion plate shot of the woman’s hand and a plate shot of the guy climbing the giant green screen hand. Using a switcher, we were able to lay the climbing takes over top of the hand plate shots ensuring that the elements were a close match for the composite.

The Result

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Wherever you are, whatever you are doing – spread the love today!

|ƎVO⅃ve or Die|

This Retro Thursday I’m (Miho Matsuoka, digital artist) going to take you all the way back and by back I mean way back to… you guessed it….2005.

Shin Sugino and Foodland Ontario  teamed up to create a series of commercials featuring various vegetables and fruits growing.  How did they do it you ask ? Well, Sugino Studio set up cameras at an apple orchard and inside greenhouses to shoot a stills time-lapse of apple trees, apples, tomatoes and mushrooms growing for over half year.

Whew! You think that’s pretty complex, check out what needed to happen next…

Naturally, we ended up with thousands of images. And on top of that, all objects had to be close-cropped out of the backgrounds.  It was the very first project I worked on at the studio as a part-time employee.

I visited the studio weekly to get images and took them home to work on Photoshop and applied cut-out & general cleaning and colouring. I believe the amount of images I worked on were more than five thousand. It took several weeks to complete, and was worth every second!

Photographer : Shin Sugino
Agency : Bensimon Byrne
Client : Foodland Ontario

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At Sugino Studio we love to share.

Past blogs have offered you an intimate look at our toilet seats, Andy McLeod’s not-so-secret desire to be Vulcan and Eden Robbins’ JFK connection.

We also love creative inspiration. And every once in a while we come across a piece of work that we think is particularly notable, and want to share.

Watch. Think. Discuss. Enjoy!

The Joy of Books, by Type Books:

The creator Sean Ohlenkamp, from Lowe Roche, had enlisted the help of Mohawk College students to create this stop-motion project. Grayson Matthews concocted the perfect music to compliment the video. Todd McLellan worked with Sean on a 2010 Audi shoot.

Type Books store on Queen St. West may not be as big as Chapters Indigo, but it made a huge impression on us.

Great job everyone!

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The Kray Twins

©David Bailey

 

The second thing I realized was that Michael Carlevale needed to be shot (photographed that is) in a meat locker. Gangsters in the Kray mold always had a meat locker that they frequented, as do purveyors of quality flesh, and I knew where to find one too. St. Clair and Keele, the old aptly named Beef Terminal. I’d previously shot there in the abattoir and knew of the perfect place.

 

Mohamed Satur

©Eden Robbins

Black and Blue…the only other thing the place brought to mind was The Rolling Stones album of the same name. Memorable because it had “Fool To Cry” on it, a great song made famous by the fact that Keith Richards once fell asleep onstage while playing it, only to be woken up by the feedback.

 

©Hiro

 

Ring, ring, ring. (You couldn’t get a Katy Perry ringtone for your phone back then.)

Michael Carlevale: “Good afternoon, Michael Carlevale speaking.”

Eden Robbins: “Hey Michael, it’s Eden here. Just making sure that we’re still good for tomorrow.”

MC: “Ahh, Eden…. Yes, yes. 2 p.m. Correct.”

ER: “Ya that’s good. St.Clair and Keele, Beef Terminal.  I’ll be out front. Black Bentley right?”

MC: “Not quite sure what my driver will be using tomorrow. It’ll be black nonetheless. What shall I wear?”

ER: “Black suit and shoes, light raincoat, hat and a ‘brolly.‘ And you’ll be wearing your Rolex, right?”

MC: “Which one?”

ER: [pause] “Doesn’t really matter, just needs to be a nice watch. I want to make it to look like you’re in a bit of a hurry. Like you’ve got some other business to take care of. You know what I mean.”

MC: “Yes I do.”

ER: “OK, see you tomorrow.”

MC: “Would you like to come back to the restaurant for dinner after the shoot?”

ER: “That would be lovely!”

MC: “Have a nice evening.”

ER: “Bye for now.”

 

What a gentleman. And what a dinner. -Eden Robbins

 Michael Carlevale

On November 15, 1965, a 19-year-old Japanese boy landed at Vancouver airport with $350 and a second-hand Canon point-and-shoot 35mm camera in his bag. He rode the CP train to Union Station to follow his dream of studying Printing Technology at Ryerson.

Speaking no English and having no friends, the boy’s Canon was his best friend. He wandered the city, endlessly snapping pictures. His choice of the film was Kodachrome, even though it was expensive. A roll of 36 exposure and processing was $2.99. He made $50.00 a week as a printer at a Japanese newspaper company and all he could afford was one roll of film a week.

For the boy, the super-saturated look of Kodachrome was the colour of America. It was the colour of optimism, and of hope for a limitless future.

After three years of night school, he was eligible to apply to Ryerson — but he applied for Photography instead of Printing, and he became a photographer.

This is the story of how Kodachrome changed my life forever. Today I mourn the death of Kodachrome and reminisce about those lost days of innocence.

Shin Sugino

In a world where anything is digitally possible

there will be the dawning of a sensational new online project.

From Canada’s Finest Motion and Stills Production Company

comes a true story of hard work, determination…

and everything Sugino.

Directed by Dré Dee
Created by Spencer Crone
Executive Producer Andy McLeod
Stills Producer Taeko Yamanouchi
Assistant Producers Dan Arki & Sarah Gheriani
Social Media Coordinator Dorothy Leung

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In this edition of Retro Thursday we look back at a client that has been in the news plenty recently. For Rob Quartly, Kodak was a great client to work with, especially on this project.  The concept was funny and brilliant.

Kodak may be filing for Chapter 11, but Rob’s work is still earning its keep, thank you very much.

“Ah, the wonderful world of parody. Given all the crazy things we do in this business, it is great to make a little fun of ourselves every once in a while.
Using the camera as the point of view of an actor gave me permission to have the actors play right down the barrel — major eye contact equals more impact. I remember being nervous about using a continuous jump cut as a style; it really wasn’t around at that time. But it turned out to be a great way of creating a “best of” kind of cut. A perfect tool for precis film making, which is, of course, what commercials are all about.

This went on to win a Gold Pencil.” - Rob Quartly

 

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NHL All Star Weekend is here! To help you get in the spirit, Todd McLellan in collaboration with Cundari, brings you two Subway spots sponsored by the Ottawa Senators.

Eat Fresh.

CUNDARI
VP Operations Creative Services – Georgette Lordanous
Account Director – Melissa Gallagher
Broadcast Producer – Cherie O’Connor
Creative Director – Raul Garcia
Creative Director/Copywriter – Brian Murray

SUGINO STUDIO
Director/DOP- Todd McLellan
Executive Producer – Andy McLeod
Line Producer- Dan Arki

 STEALING TIME
Editor – Paul Skinner

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