By Sean Stone
Yadid Levy is a worldly fellow—born in Denmark, raised in Israel, currently makes his home in Buenos Aires. He speaks a bevy of languages—Hebrew, Danish, English, Spanish and passable Arabic. In his 15 years as a travel photographer, he ‘s visited over 70 countries and every continent, except Australia. He has recently shot for National Geographic Traveler, Lonely Planet Magazine, and Bon Appetit. Not surprisingly, with such a massive body of work, he was struggling under the weight of an enormous website housing thousands of images. Knowing he needed a little help sorting his work out, he gave Wonderful Machine a ring.
Yadid first contacted me for assistance with a print portfolio. He’d been living without one (if you could call that living) for quite a while, and wanted two copies—one for us to keep and one for him. I started sorting through the work and seeking to strike a nice balance of portraiture, photojournalism, and food. Food is of course an important part of travel shooting, but it’s also a passion for Yadid’s. One of his favorite things about his job is the opportunity to sample amazing food and meet some of the best chefs around the world. While discussing his book, he shared with me a tragic story about the time he photographed in Copenhagen’s famous Noma—rated for several years in a row as the best restaurant in the world by Restaurant Magazine. Yadid was there when they first opened, photographing the chef and some of the signature dishes for a Swedish travel magazine. Chef René Redzepi offered to make him a few things to try as well as photograph. Yadid politely declined, since he ‘d filled up on spaghetti before the shoot. Nowadays, I hear it can take years to get a table. Yadid learned his lesson; never to eat before a shoot.
Anyway, back to the portfolio, I sequenced the layout to begin in the west; South America, Western Europe, and go east as the book moves, to North Africa and the Middle East, South Asia, ending in China. I also chose slightly quirky, funny shots for the opening and closing images. Never hurts to show some personality and humor, without misrepresenting your tone and style! Once the book’s layout was completed, we moved on to the printing stage. For the sake of price and ease, Yadid took my recommendation of the Adorama book, and the results were great.
You can flip through the finished book here:
Yadid was very happy with his portfolio, so he decided to continue working with us on a few other related projects. The next step was a leave behind/postcard. Our designer Peter and I worked on this together, using Yadid’s existing branding.
First, Peter came up with a few different front and back layouts designs. Yadid wasn’t completely on board with the early versions, so Peter worked from his feedback to create something they were both satisfied with. I then worked with the image selection. Once completed, it was sent off to Modern Postcard for printing. Now, Yadid not only had a crisp, new portfolio but complimentary leave behinds, making him all set for some portfolio meetings.
However, we weren’t finished yet. While Peter was working through the card design, I revisited Yadid’s website, which was so large it was starting to look like a stock library. I edited the work down to two main categories, one that focuses on destination travel, the other on food and portraits (mostly chefs). On my recommendation, Yadid left intact his travel features section. In my own experience using his site, I looked through his broader selection of travel images first, then moved on to the features section, checking out work in places that interested me in particular. I believe anyone who travels, or spends much time looking at travel photography, would do the same.
Yadid’s entire rebranding project grew out of a simple need for a printed portfolio, which we now have on file for future meetings. I’d say that’s a win-win.
Looking to design or refresh your logo and establish a brand identity? Reach out!