I’ve had an RTD (Ready-to-Drink) product on my project wish-list for a while. Now, I’m thrilled to have built a studio and working processes that have made me fully prepared to make the most of this opportunity! Incredibly, I get to work with an aesthetically considered and high-quality brand within an industry I’ve been actively trying to break into: Crook and Marker canned cocktails, Crooks! I’m being a little self-indulgent, I know, but if you don’t celebrate your wins, no one else will.

Based in New Jersey, USA, Crook and Marker reached out to me via Instagram to discuss shooting their products and new packaging as part of an ongoing rebrand. They loved my creative direction from my self-initiated project Corona Tropical, shot with my prop stylist Georgina Isaac. Attracting projects like this was precisely my idea behind creating the Corona content in the first place! Isn’t it nice when things work out the way you hoped? And better still, as this project was not commissioned by Corona, my concepts were unowned by any brand. So, any changes to make were improvements rather than a need to give the content variation from a previous project.

As always, my top tier printed vinyl backdrops come from Club Backdrops. Use that link to get your first backdrop free!

This project was a great push to revisit content styles I’ve created previously and improve upon them, as well as trying out new ideas. The most effective of which is definitely the half-submerged can shots — the surface of the water from below acted as a perfect mirror of the colour backdrop below resulting in a nearly seamless underwater environment. I will definitely be pitching this style of shot in future projects to see how far I can push the concept.

The brief was as close to perfect as a product photographer would dare wish for: Clear and consistent branding with plenty of room for creativity, and a client who trusted my insights and direction. Perfection!