This is Photolink

Over the last few months we’ve been honoured to host some of the brightest and fastest names in British cycling in the Photolink Studios.

Thanks to our strategic positioning between the BBC Studios at Media City and the Manchester Velodrome, we’ve had world champion cyclists Sir Chris Hoy, Mark Cavendish, Bradley Wiggins, Victoria Pendleton and world champion BMXer Shanaze Reade passing through our doors on an almost regular basis.

So seeing as there are just under 100 days to go until their collective moment of truth at the London 2012 Olympics, we thought we’d take this opportunity to wish them all the very best of luck and point you towards the latest Sky campaign they're starring in.

Featuring imagery that was produced and shot in the Photolink Studios, the campaign will be almost impossible to miss on a series of 48-sheet billboards across the UK as build-up for the forthcoming Olympic Games starts to reach its peak.

Let us know if you see them elsewhere in the country as we've only managed to snap the ones around Manchester on our lunch break! You can guess how proud we all are, can't you?

News, Photographic, Production

Having your name in lights is a dream for most of us. So seeing our hard work – in particular our creative design, production and photographic work for BANK Fashion's latest advertising campaign – on a series of massive billboards nationwide is just as good. If not better.

Spearheading BANK Fashion’s spring/summer campaign, the billboards feature concepts and imagery creatively conceived, directed and produced by the Photolink team led by group creative director John Whalley and fashion production manager Claire Smith.

The photography was shot by Jamie Rowan and the final campaign collateral was designed by Photolink designer Charlotte Bradley.

The campaign centres on the brand’s own exclusive brands Blonde + Blonde, Ribbon, Nanny State, and Rivington, so we worked closely with BANK to develop a concept that would highlight the products’ perfect fit with forthcoming summer trends as well as express the cool and confident nature of the mother brand.

We were asked to help create and produce the entire campaign after an early spring campaign for BANK Fashion had the desired effect. It also tied in nicely with the recent heatwave when it launched. Let’s just hope the weather stays as bright for the latest campaign!

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Creative, Design, News, Photographic, Production

Last month we sent a team to London to film TV presenter and ‘Face of Regis Salons’ Emma Willis joining a handful of prizewinning bloggers for an exclusive makeover under the expert supervision of Regis UK creative director Guy Cammarano.

All were invited to the brand's flagship salon in Debenhams on Oxford Street for a morning of pampering. As Regis UK’s creative partner, we were there to film every last snip, clip, colour and polish.

Bringing a beautiful end to the ‘Locks Rock & Load’ competition on the Regis UK Facebook page and blogger outreach campaign we devised and orchestrated for the salon brand at the end of last year, the day was a reward for fashion, beauty and 'mummy' bloggers who helped promote the campaign.

The first of its kind to be implemented by a hair salon, ‘Locks Rock & Load’ was a unique way for Regis Salons to engage with their clients online, asking them to upload their favourite hairstyle onto the Regis Facebook page.

The campaign was supported by email, display and Facebook ads, and we also provided imagery and creative for in-store promotions to neatly dovetail with the online activity. It all helped campaign gain press coverage in a number of trade, regional and national press publications, including NMA, The Drum and the Manchester Evening News.

Find out more about what we did for the ‘Locks Rock & Load’ integrated campaign on the Photolink Work page. To find out what Regis UK creative director Guy Cammarano and the team did for the ladies, take a look at Emma Willis' blog about the day here.

Creative, Digital, News, Photographic

We’re very pleased to announce that Argos has won Product Innovation of the Year at the Oracle Retail Week Awards 2012. The retailer, a long-standing client of ours, beat off stiff competition from Halfords, B&Q and Debenhams to win the award thanks to its successful revival of struggling toy/childrens clothing brand Chad Valley.

After buying the brand following the collapse of Woolworths in 2009, Argos managed to “reinvigorate and extend the brand … increasing sales in a market that has declined by value.” said the judges.

Photolink-represented photographer Darren Taylor shot all the imagery across the latest Chad Valley ranges - imagery that has played a key role in reversing the negative perceptions of the brand among its core consumers (aka mums with kids).

We produced the shoots but it was Darren’s ability to capture the genuine enjoyment of kids at play and showcase a variety of products in their best possible light that has given Argos the perfect creative collateral to lift the Chad Valley brand. This being just one of the many reasons why he's our kids and childrenswear photographer of choice.

Check out Darren Taylor’s stunning portfolio here.

News, Photographic, Production

Last week the Photolink Studios were visited by photographic royalty as internationally-renowned photographer Nadav Kander - a man who counts portraits of Barack Obama, Brad Pitt and David Lynch as highlights in an epic portfolio - spent the day shooting exclusive images for a new exhibition commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery.

The exhibition is the culmination of a three year project called Road to 2012 which is creating a lasting record of the people who are dedicating their energies to the games. This was Kander’s second commission for the exhibition; his first being a portrait of young British sprinter Jodie Williams (right).

On the day he was joined by Zoe Tomlinson, an ex-Photolinker who is now part of his production team, while Photolink fashion producer Tarnia Armitage helped arrange the smooth running of the shoot from our side.

Kander's subject (who will have to remain a mystery until the exhibition starts in July) was shot in the Parish Rooms (Studio 5) and is another red hot tip for London 2012.

Take a look at how the project/exhibition is shaping up here and see Kander’s serene portrait of Jodie Williams in context. There’s also a very interesting interview with the man himself on YouTube which goes into great detail about the art of turning a picture into a portrait. Inspiring stuff.

News, Photographic, Production

If you didn't catch last night's episode of the award-winning series Waterloo Road on BBC One you would not only have missed a cracking slice of modern British drama, but our very own studio assistant George Read playing the role of a young photographer!

The BBC crew hired our studio (Studio 5) for two days to film the scene in which George photographs one of the show's stars Darcy Isa playing school girl and wannabe model Lauren Andrews. In short, the poor lass is fed a string of false promises about impending stardom throughout the episode and then (spoiler alert!) informed that she'll never be a model near the end.

Don’t worry if you missed all the drama last night, you'll be able to get it on iPlayer shortly and see the story play out in its entirety - as well as watch George’s rippling bicep almost steal the show. If you're more interested in the size and shape of our Studio 5, however, take a look around on the dedicated studios website here.

News, Photographic

Don't look out of the window, it’s probably grim. Take a look at these images from a recent swimwear shoot in Santorini for Littlewoods instead! They feature in the retailer's current campaign and will remind us all that the sky doesn’t always look like concrete. Feel better yet?

Photolink represented photographer David Woollacot and the team were on the Greek island for a couple of days for the shoot and said that despite the bright sunshine and smiles all round, it was still a little bit nippy for wearing bikinis. If you're still a bit jealous, you're not alone.

The shoot ran smoothly regardless of the weather and the models were consummate professionals from start to finish. Credit for the smooth running also goes to our Manchester based fashion production team who had arranged everything the team would need in advance and organised the logistics of transporting it to the volcanic island before the shoot began.

Aegean Airlines were a massive help with transportation, too, giving us a great deal on our excess luggage (no mean feat with a Star Alliance Member). So we said we’d tell everyone about them when we got home. They fly direct to Athens and Larnaca from Heathrow and have an extensive domestic network to pretty much all of the Greek Islands, so check their website out for flights here.

News, Photographic, Production

The Argos Spring/Summer 2012 catalogue has just hit stores and contains, along with the usual array of home and lifestyle essentials, a nice little cross-section of our creative output.

Argos launched their ‘big book’ catalogue in 1973 and it's said that over 18 million UK households still own a copy of the catalogue at any one time. We’ve been designing and producing pages for the catalogue since 2004, so there’s a good chance you’ve already seen our shop-able page design skills in action. If you haven’t, your neighbour probably has.

We’ve also laid the framework for the creative direction of imagery usage and continue to produce product and lifestyle shoots all over the world for the catalogue. For instance, we produced and shot a selection of the catalogue's outdoor furniture imagery on location in Portugal and produced and art directed the shoot for Emma Bunton’s new kidswear range. The first range of its kind to be featured in the Argos catalogue.

What you won’t see however is the mammouth artwork and shoot production effort that goes into each issue. The artworking side of things is expertly managed here in Manchester and supported by our design team in Mumbai (see Photolink India), while shoot production (wherever in the world) is dealt with by our dedicated photographic production team in Manchester. Take a look at the individual case studies for all the work that went in to the latest issue of the Argos catalogue on our Work page.

Artwork, Design, Photographic

This is Kevin Peschke working his magic on the paradise island of Praslin in the Seychelles at the end of last year. He was shooting swimwear for the Littlewoods Spring/Summer catalogue on the spectacular Anse Tamake beach.

Renowned for its unspoiled natural landscape of epic white beaches surrounded by protected jungle, Anse Tamake beach provided the perfect backdrop for this aspirational swimwear shoot organised by our Manchester-based production team.

Peschke and the team stayed at the famous Raffles Praslin hotel on Anse Tamake beach, literally yards from where they were shooting, and were treated to a level of hospitality that almost put the paradise surroundings in the shade.

As ever, we’d like to thank everyone who helped out with the smooth running of the shoot and we would like to extend our special gratitude to all the staff at Raffles Praslin who helped us organise logistics around the island as well as showing us the best bits. Take a look at the Raffles Praslin website if you feel like the same kind of pampering (perhaps without the added stress of work!)

News, Photographic