Lung Cancer Raises Awareness through Love

November 24th, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Branding, Interactive, Photography | 1 Comment »

November has been Lung Cancer Awareness month and the Lung Cancer Alliance teamed up with MarketZero to create a pretty cool marketing campaign to generate some attention.

The innovative thinkers Michael Sokol and Andrew Santamaria of Marketzero came up with a new character, Dr. Lung Love, and a clever parody that mimics Pitbull’s new music video, “Hotel Room Service”. Today, the Lung Cancer Alliance has their version called “Waitin Room Service” thanks to director/editor, Eric De Fino, of Raygun who created the music video:

Marketzero asked my team and I to help conceptualize the look for the Lung Love Website. We thought it would be great to continue the parody and reproduce the Pitbull album look. So, during the filming of the music video at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Atlanta, GA, my producer, Jamarie, along with my trusted photo tech guru, Trent Chau, set up a mobile environment to get the shots we needed in between takes.

Photo by Trent Chau

Given the type of shot we wanted the only place we could use was the hallway. We couldn’t keep our setup there for long since foot traffic was an issue.

Ultimately we got what we needed to create the composite for the Lung Love site. Of course, the nurse wasn’t wearing a camo set of scrubs so I had to add that pattern in post. Everything turned out perfect at the end.

Dr. Lung Love

Many thanks to the whole team!

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“Let’s Get It!” Nominated as Finalist for iStockPhoto Design of the Year

September 2nd, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Branding, Interactive, Photography | Comments Off

Every year, iStockPhoto holds an international contest called “Punctum Day”. They essentially narrow down all their content to find finalists for best photograph, best video, and best design, which ends up  being judged by some recognizable names. This year Russell Brown, Sr. Creative Director of Adobe and Scott Kelby were some of the judges.

2009 Punctum Day

iStockPhoto selected the “Let’s Get It!” composite as a top 10 finalist for the Design of the Year award. Granted it didn’t win, but being a top 10 finalist is pretty darned good. You can find out more about it on the iStockPhoto Finalist page.

We had originally conceptualized the shot to be done at the exterior of a mansion in Atlanta. We were going to bring in a couple of luxury cars and boats, while integrating a few stock photos in post. But, after we were done thinking through all of the logistics, I felt it was more appropriate to try something else out instead. We ended up capturing the models in a studio and building a “getting it” scene around the featured players, using nothing but stock photography. Essentially, that’s how the following design came to be:

Let's Get It!

My team and I are grateful for the finalist recognition. And congrats to the winner!

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“Mr. Amazing” Wins Best Film

August 14th, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Branding, Film | Comments Off

81 Edits + 48 Hours + 29 Cast & Crew + 27 Sets + 9 Red Bulls + 2 Canon 5D Mark II DSLR Cameras = One Amazing (Award Winning) Film.

Imagine making a short film in 2 days, better yet, picture yourself conceptualizing, writing, shooting and editing that film in the same 48 hours. Well, that’s the 48 Hour Film Project (”48HFP”), an international contest that challenges filmmakers to complete a 4-7 minute film over the course of a weekend.

48 Hour Film Project

Out of the 70 teams who entered into the 2009 Atlanta 48HFP, our movie won Best Film along with four other awards. The best part of this story is, I’m not a filmmaker…

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iStockPhoto Votes “Let’s Get It!” as Design of the Week

April 14th, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Interactive, Photography | Comments Off

In the Let’s Get It! composite I made for the Azizi Major’s Website, I combined seven people with 26 stock images:

Let's Get It!

Most all of the stock photos were from iStockPhoto, who just yesterday voted the photomontage as Design of the Week on their homepage:

iStockPhoto Design Spotlight

Thanks! I appreciate the accolades because this was the most complicated of the Azizi Major’s Website photos.

I wanted the final composite to be “over populated” with images that would represent luxury, wealth and success while keeping Azizi as the main focus. At first, my team and I discussed coordinating a much larger photo shoot at a mansion in Atlanta and Photoshopping in various elements like helicopters, cars, etc. But we ultimately decided to shoot the models, Azizi Major and CEO on green screen and tell the rest of the story only through stock imagery. If we would’ve gone with one of the other stock sources, this final image would’ve been extremely expensive to put together. Therefore, iStockPhoto was the most logical choice for our budget.

In hindsight, I think it was a smart decision. If you want to take a second to check out all the images used in the composite, click here.

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Massive 17,000 Pixel Panorama of Blackcomb

March 19th, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Interactive, Photography | Comments Off

When I was in British Columbia with my wife for a photography/ski trip earlier this year, I propped myself on top of the 7th Heaven ski run in Blackcomb until the sun was right and took a series of shots to ultimately create this massive panorama:

Blackcomb's 7th Heaven Ski Run

View the 17,000 pixel wide panorama here. Click to zoom. Drag to explore. More controls are on the bottom. Be sure to check out Whistler on the other side!

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The Making of Mistress of the Metropolitan

March 19th, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Photography | Comments Off

Recently, some fellow photogs asked where (and how) I took this shot:

The model is Misha. A few weeks ago (early March), we decided to do a photo shoot in my rooftop pool that overlooks downtown Atlanta. My goal was to capture her in a seductive sense of luxury with a slight metropolitan feel. Trent Chau, another great fellow photographer, graciously helped out that night while I climbed into the pool to get my shot:

Image Courtesy of Trent Chau

Fortunately, the pool is heated and only 3ft. deep (yes, the camera is insured). And, no, I did not use the pop-up flash to take the shot. It was only used to remotely trigger the SB-900 (full power) to my left and the one directly behind Misha (1/4 power as a hair light). I could’ve used the 70mm-200mm f/2.8 from the other side of the pool, but I felt it was necessary to get this shot from no more than a few feet away. So, I wound up using the 24mm-70mm f/2.8 instead.

All-in-all, I think it turned out pretty well. The only problem was getting out of the pool. It’s frakking freezing when the cold March wind hits you!

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Create Magazine Recognizes MikeWittenstein.com

March 2nd, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Branding, Interactive | Comments Off

A friend of mine and fellow interactive guru, Brian Rudolph, pointed out to me that the site I designed for Mike Wittenstein is mentioned on page 39 of the February/March 2009 issue of Dynamic Graphics & Create Magazine. Funny, I didn’t even know:

Create Magazine Mentions Mike Wittenstein.com

Wow. I was amazed to read this and I greatly appreciate Create Magazine’s comments. However, I wasn’t the only one involved in bringing the site to life. After conceptualizing the overall approach, filming and editing the green screen and designing Mike’s brand and look, I called upon Actionscript specialist Gregor Patterson to custom program an interesting blend of Flash, HTML and Javascript. This approach allowed the site to be SEO friendly as well as offer visual impact. We also called in design guru and CSS expert John Williams to create a blog in Wordpress and integrate many elements with Salesforce.com. Mike’s site wouldn’t be as simple and cool without them.

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Behind the Scenes of AziziMajor.com

February 27th, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Branding, Interactive, Photography | Comments Off

I’m proud to announce that one of my latest clients, Azizi Major, has his new site up and running at AziziMajor.com. Azizi is an extremely talented hip-hop artist and producer and it’s been a privilege to work with him on this amazing Website.

Azizi Major

Azizi asked me to create a “unique” site experience for his debut album, Vendin’ Machine Music. The final result is pretty revolutionary in the music industry. My team ended up developing a visual MP3 player that allows you to hear his entire album, as well as experience the music online. My business partner, Azizi and myself talked about various ideas with regard to putting his album online for people to listen to and be a part of. The fact that visitors can listen to the album for free online seemed to fit his business objectives and serves as powerful tribute to his listeners and fans. Given the quality of the experience and the availability of it to anyone, this approach allows the album to be felt and savored by so many people.

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BRANDING TO THE POWER OF 5 Still Going Strong

February 27th, 2009 by Thom Milkovic | Posted in Branding | Comments Off

BRANDING TO THE POWER OF 5It’s been almost three years since I released my eBook, BRANDING TO THE POWER OF 5. I’m still amazed at how well it’s selling and pleased to hear all the positive feedback from everyone.

Just wanted to say thanks for all of the support. A special warm felt thank you goes to my wife, Jamarie, who helped edit the book and build the idea with me. Without her, it probably wouldn’t have made sense and been full of grammatical errors.

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