48 THE WORLD OF HOSPITALITY
Trust me when I say there is a much better
chance of influencing bookings positively with
ten memorable images than with one hundred
mediocre ones.
WHAT WOULD YOU SAY IS YOUR
BIGGEST STRENGTH THAT SETS YOU
APART FROM OTHER PHOTOGRAPHERS?
I have always been very technically oriented
when it comes to photography, and I also
have 15 years under my belt of working
with demanding clients who possess high
expectations. Aside from all of that, I have
a Masters in Business, and I have a strong
ability to understand brands and strategies.
As a commercial photographer, It is essential
to understand what it is, that the hotel is
trying to sell and their plan to achieve it.
Understanding these different factors, my
fifteen years of experience and my business
background is what sets me apart from other
photographers.
WHAT IS YOUR PRODUCTION PROCESS
AND HOW MUCH OF YOUR WORK IS
INVOLVED WITH POST-PRODUCTION?
When I first started, almost two decades
ago, photographers that spent too much
EDITOR’S CHOICE
time behind a computer editing their images,
were virtually looked down on. There
was this idea going around that a great
photographer should capture a great picture
on their camera alone. I still agree with that
statement to a certain extent, but the level of
photography has skyrocketed since then, and
photographers must excel in both areas. This
concept is almost hard to conceptualize now
as some of the best photographers today have
a team of retouchers doing things that they
probably couldn’t do themselves. It is almost
as if two artists are working as one with the
photographer taking all the glory.
In my case, I like to focus on quality and not
quantity, and this allows time for me to do
my post-production. My work, along with
many other photographers today, requires
a lot of post-production. Especially my
architectural work. I often light different areas
of a room with artificial lighting on multiple
different frames, and I then merge them in
a single image. This process is called image
compositing, not to be confused with HDR,
and it results in beautiful pictures. This sort
of production would’ve been impossible to
achieve 20 years ago on a single frame.
WEBSITE: https://antoniocuellarphotography.com