I met Justin Clemons, a longtime Wonderful Machine member, back in the Fall at a Phase One Stand Out event in Dallas. The first thing I noticed was his cool, cowboy personal-style, suaveness, and Western twang, which his body of work lives up to.
Justin’s homepage with his new logo and edit!
Justin was primarily shooting portraits of celebrities and executives, with some architecture and interior images sprinkled in, as well as motion work. In a comfortable spot professionally, Justin wanted to hone in on more portraiture work, with a strong emphasis on storytelling, and leave his motion work in the past. I told him he’d come to the right place and that Wonderful Machine would love to help him upgrade his brand.
After a few months, Justin got back in touch with me to begin the process. First things first, with a Branding Overhaul [especially when a photographer is going to redirect their site content and marketing efforts to a very specific pool of clients], comes the Blueprint. This in-depth document essentially outlines every aspect of the photographer’s current brand and breaks down the plan and creative direction for the rebrand. I teamed up with Stacy Swiderski, our fabulous Senior Photo Editor, and then later with Designer Kori Dyer of Dearest Creative to bring Justin’s new refined vision to life.
Dang! That Blueprint is AWESOME!!! Thanks for putting the time and effort into it. I definitely feel listened to and taken care of and it is only the beginning. I was worried that I would only be a number in this process, and that is the furthest from the truth. I feel like I am in good hands. Thanks!
The plan for Justin’s site would be to keep the same template on Squarespace (highly recommended!) but structure the edit in a way that brought his Portraiture and Narrative work to the forefront. Also, since Justin was leaving behind the Motion side of his business, we thought it was best to work on a logo refinement to reflect the changes.
Justin’s new logo
Up next came Justin’s edit, which Stacy did a fabulous job curating. She was sure to showcase his most relevant and commercially viable work to the front of Justin’s website. Based on the image content Justin provided for Stacy’s consideration and with his plans moving forward, she separated his work into the following galleries:
“Millennial Parents” update which actually appeared in Southwest the Magazine April 2017 edition. You can see the spread in print here. https://issuu.com/southwestmag/docs/april_2017
With the web edit complete, Stacy began the print edit component and suggested that Justin order two custom print portfolios from Hartnack & Co. Stacy printed Justin’s new books on matte Moab Lasal paper, known for its thick and rich look, which made Justin’s images look so lush! I’m so excited that we get to keep one of these bad boys in-house to feature at our monthly portfolio events.
Justin’s new book!
Armed with a shiny new edit, an awesome book and upgraded logo, the last step in this Branding Overhaul was creating some new marketing collateral to promote his branding reboot! Since Justin was set on doing more portraiture work, we created a booklet style promo from Modern Postcard that featured a collection of his strongest portraits.
Justin’s new promo piece!
Looking ahead, Justin plans to meet with clients this fall and follow up with his mailer. Stay tuned! To get going on your own brand reboot, please get in touch with us!