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A few months ago, Nashville-based photographer Kyle Dreier received a phone call from entrepreneur and Lifebox creator, Austin Gill. Austin had created a diet/food regimen that utilizes the fasting mimicking technique for healthy eating. Fasting Mimicking is essentially the process of fasting without completely depriving your body of food. Austin created Lifebox because he wanted to create a way to improve one’s health that’s easy and doesn’t suck the fun out of life.
Upon purchasing Lifebox, one receives a monthly delivery of healthy food and personalized guidelines for conducting the fast mimicking. Austin turned to Kyle because of his reputation as a food photographer and his background in art direction. Kyle was excited to work on this project and lend his talents to help promote this new product.
Although Austin had few preconceived ideas of how he wanted the pictures to look, he knew the photos needed to show that the program isn’t out of reach for those intimidated by dieting.
Before any creative considerations, Kyle and his Producer Erica O’Rock ironed-out all the logistics of the shoot, working with Austin to determine the number of images, the budget, the location, which products they would be shooting, etc.
After all the logistics had been taken care of, Kyle and his team proposed the pictures he ultimately produced be an extension of the brand’s current color palette. Kyle knew that adding a little color would go a long way in making the food seem fun, appetizing and also help sell the idea that Austin envisioned.
I worked with my styling team to map out how color would be used, how the compositions would be created and how we could photographically translate all the dreams, desires and expectations of the client while still staying within budget.
The shoot itself went relatively smooth. Kyle said the biggest surprise was actually how tasty the food looked right out of the box. A shoot with so many individual items like this turns into a game of puzzle solving, which Kyle found to be quite enjoyable.
How can we arrange some fifty-plus items in a way where there’s not too much repetition and spacing is pleasant? That’s the fun part…puzzle solving on set.
One crucial aspect of the shoot was making sure all the colors matched Lifebox’s branding. Luckily for Kyle and his team, they used similar colors on a project shortly before this one, and they were able to source the identical colors using Pantone paint samples from a local paint store.
Kyle could have replicated the background colors he needed later in Photoshop, but he takes a traditional approach when it comes to photography. In this case, Kyle and his team spent the time and money upfront to get the color palette set so that everything could be captured in-camera. This method ensured pitch-perfect accuracy while also helping the folks at Lifebox get excited as they were able to see how the project was coming together in real time, as each image was made.
The whole production was one of Kyle’s favorite shoots in recent memory.
Something about this project that resonated with me was how the client came with no preconcieved ideas and turned to us to help them. They wanted our creative direction and once established, we all worked to make it happen together. It was very much a collaboration of information, ideas and talent.
When all was said and done, Austin and the rest of the folks at Lifebox were very pleased with the resulting pictures. Although Kyle doesn’t have the exact figures, Lifebox’s business and brand awareness have exponentially increased since the images went live.
Kyle doesn’t have any plans with this company at the moment, but he can definitely envision working with Austin again in the future. In the meantime, Kyle continues to help food and drink clients of all sorts to promote their products and ideas.
See more of Kyle at dreier.com!