The best weekly in Portland, The Willamette Week, had me running around photographing locations for their annual drink guide. One of my favorite places to photograph was the Gilt Club in Northwest Portland. As a professional photographer you often want as much training as you can get shooting in a style that represents your vision, but you also need to get out of your comfort zone once in a while.

Editorial photography (essentially cheap advertising photography) is good training because you’re forced to make compelling images regardless of the location you’ve been assigned to. In some aspects it’s more difficult than advertising work as you’re not able budget for location scouts and assistants to help with lighting and props and you don’t have a second pair of eyes to make sure you’re thinking of everything. This is why I urge emerging photographers to shoot as many different styles and genres as possible. Inevitably what you learn in these other ventures will pay off when you’re problem solving in your higher end work. I found my prior experience photographing in dim situations as a photojournalist really helped me with this assignment. Lighting the scene was not an option. Hauling in lights would’ve disrupted business and given me unnatural expressions. In any case, the Willamette Week was happy with the body of work and I reinforced my ability to photograph in extremely low light. Play on playah.