ABOUT

The brief was to create images to help market an upcoming Stranger Things book release by Penguin Random House / Netflix.

I was provided a mood board which had a host of dark imagery with glowing red elements and given creative freedom to create imagery with the same feeling, with the book as the main focus.

I developed a concept around an idea that would create the effect of the ground opening up (the Upside Down - if you've seen stranger things) - it took some thinking to make the set work as I had hoped. The main feature of the set was a suspended, thick clear perspex holding wet, dark gravel. Under the suspended perspex I had flash lighting with red gels - these were set to be hot so that the brightness and brilliance of the red would shine through the gravel and the opening I had created to make it feel the ground was opening. I added some atmosphere to the air with a smoker.

Above the suspended surface, the book was carefully lit to highlight the gold foiling on the cover while adding more drama to the shot.

The shot with the book standing, was based on the same idea but also brought in some elements from the mood board with the vertical red, glowing lines - this background was created by using the black side of mount board hung from a cross beam, evenly spaced apart with another red gel/flash in behind.

Further atmosphere, brightness and glow was added in Photoshop - and backgrounds were extended a little to create further bleed.