With the rise in COVID-19 vaccinations and the world reopening, we see more and more tourism work pop up. People are anxious to get out of their homes and seeking new destinations to explore safely with family and friends. While dining, shopping, and entertainment locales are re-opening their doors to the public, many cities like Dallas are launching campaigns to promote the unique experiences that their cities have to offer visitors. In her latest campaign for VisitDallas, local photographer Inti St.Clair photographed places all around the city.
These attractions included an exhibit at the Dallas Museum of Art, The Kessler theatre, and the Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden — among others. While these are all popular locales in the city of Dallas, Inti’s photographs capture the essence of each place excitingly. She shows not only what visitors might see and do, but also how they might feel.
Inti worked with Slingshot, a local advertising, and marketing agency that handles VisitDallas’ campaigns for this project. She had never worked with them before, but Ann Vorlicky, the agency’s producer, reached out to Inti’s agent to have her bid on the project.
I feel like they chose me because I’ve done similar projects before. I love working with kids and on location, and my treatment reflected that. I was excited to see my marketing efforts pay off!
Shooting on location comes with its own unique set of challenges but photographing so many different places in just a few days meant that the team had to be highly organized. Due to the wide variety of locations they photographed, scheduling was tricky. Often, locations would be long distances from each other, making it tough to set call times and move crews and gear to the following location.
Shooting in this many locations means we needed to keep our gear and crew to a minimum but still light the indoor spaces as required.
While some locales were indoors, others were outside and often busy with people, so weather and environment were other variables they had to workaround.
The time of year we shot, the weather was very unpredictable. At the Audubon location, the day of the shoot, the weather wasn’t great, so I ended up going back the following day on my own without the talent to capture the scene and then compositing that image later.
Some of the other locations were challenging because we couldn’t close the space down for production, and they were pretty busy, so we had to navigate that. Bribing with tequila shots and ice cream did the trick, though!
The final images required a significant amount of post-production, from removing distracting signage to editing people in the shots and compositing images to get the proper lighting and facial expressions. Inti even reduced the size of the Ferris Wheel better to accommodate the copy on one of the ads.
The campaign, which ran with the tagline “VisitDallas & Find Your All,” covered all that Dallas has to offer and presents a fun look at the city’s most iconic destinations. Inti’s images are aspirational and inviting, a perfect fit for a campaign inviting people to experience Dallas destinations. All that travel between locations definitely paid off!
My incredible crew really made it all come together smoothly despite the hectic schedule!
Photographer: Inti St.Clair
Client: VisitDallas
Agency: SlingShot
Creative Team: Callie Lack, David Taylor, Clay Coleman, Bennett Smith
Producer: Ann Vorlicky
Digital Tech: Elliot Snedden
Assistant: Austin Lochheed
Wardrobe Stylist: Ashley Lee
Hair and Makeup: Michelle Dick