Every assignment is an honor and a privilege. Cover assignments come with that extra pressure to make something special. As a creative, I am guilty (at times) of trying to show my photographers muscle and pull out all the stops. I’ll bring every imaginable prop or lighting technique to a shoot to give it a 110%. I always want to surpass my client’s expectation. This project, however, benefited from simplicity and great art direction from Katherine Kershaw who is the artist behind the layout of the Carolina Law School magazine. Our goal was to illustrate how research done by the school’s faculty and students has a nationwide reach. We dry mounted a giant map of United States and pinned down cities impacted by Carolina Law with tacks. Voila!sometimes less is more. I won’t even begin to paraphrase the article but it is an impressive read authored by multiple faculty. Click on the following link to see a digital copy of this Carolina Law issue.

Solair awnings create a comfortable outside living space anytime of day protecting you from the sun and rain at the click of a button. Want a lot of shade? Just push the remote button on a Solair PS500 awning and you can cast a shadow up to 25 feet wide and 12 feet deep over your deck or terrace. The marketing team for Solair awnings recruited Exum Photography to photograph an awning in Woodstook, Georgia at the home of Jane and Roger (the friendliest folks I know in GA). It was important to choose our weather as you need mid day sun to appreciate what an awning can do. As predicted we got our sun, AND just to challenge us, mother nature sent wind … lots of wind. Solair awnings are designed with a sensor that automatically retracts the awning under high winds … protects the awning, protects the house. So we disconnected the awning power source. Problem solved, right? Not exactly, the wind only increased as our mid day light closed in. Postponing the shoot was a last resort. The awning swelled and moved like a giant sail. It just would not sit still. We needed to tame the awning long enough to get our shot. Rope! Let’s tie it down and Photoshop the rope out later. We had rope and homeowner, Roger, brought more rope. We tied the structural pieces down and tamed our awning. However, the small overhanging valance kept flapping in the wind. It would not lay down. What now? Fishing line! We tied down the valance flapping material with fishing line.  Our team of 9 pitched in and scrambled to tie down the valance, literally sewing it down. Voila! The awning sat still in the whipping wind and from our perch on the man lift we got our shot. Thank you Solair Shade Solutions team members, David Heiman and Madison Owen, for your willingness to let us experiment taming the awning. Thank you homeowners, Roger and Jane, for pitching in too and for the wonderful dinner we shared after the shoot. Many thanks to the Exum Photo team Griffin, Jenna and Eric and to our stylist Amy Matthews from Crews Inc production company out of Atlanta.  Photography by Steve Exum

How do you tell an extroverted engineer from an introverted engineer? The introverted engineer looks at his shoes, the extraverted engineer looks at your shoes. Believe it or not, delivering this joke (albeit poorly) and a few one-liners actually broke the ice nicely for a recent portrait assignment for Black & Veatch, a global engineering and construction firm. Our task was to capture personality in our subjects who were not accustomed to being in front of the camera. For a photographer, creating rapport with your subject is paramount. Doing this with a complete stranger in less than 15 minutes requires charm, diplomacy, wit, and a comedians flair.  Honestly, photographer Steve Exum delivered these jokes so poorly, as did his assistant Kelsey, it was likely the sloppy delivery that created the atmosphere of fun and warmth that put the subjects at ease. It truly got them to laugh at us. We do tip our hats to the following Black & Veatch subjects that appear in this blog post in the following order … Angela Aguna, Lee Mather, Zainabe Sanusi, Cambi Colli, Clincy Simmie, Nicole Ross, and Venkatram Bachoti. This group truly brought charisma, personality and style to the shoot. This project was a global effort organized by Global Photo Associates in partnership with Exum Photography and other studios to photograph 175 of Black & Veatch’s  most accomplished engineers and professionals in 12 different cities around the world.  Of the 175 portraits, 70 of them were made by photographer Steve Exum in Cary, NC and in Overland Park, KS. All of the subjects are being honored as part of a 100 year celebration of Black & Veatch which was founded in 1915. Many thanks to Black & Veatch’s global marketing director, Chad Pulley, and project coordinator, Robert True, for putting their trust in our team. This collection of portraits are on display in 4K resolution on 6 giant flat screen displays in the Overland Park, KS world headquarters this fall. Photography by Steve Exum

Kings BBQ has a thriving online business that ships BBQ anywhere in the continental United States called Oink Express. Their brick and motor restaurant in Kinston, NC specializes in vinegar flavored Eastern North Carolina style BBQ featuring pulled pork, hushpuppies, ribs, and southern sides like cooked turnip greens, mac n cheese with ham chips. The also have some amazing deserts … spiced apples, pecan pie, and chocolate chip pie to name a few.  Check out http://www.kingsbbq.com and order some BBQ today to be shipped right to your door. Many thanks to my talented food stylist Elizabeth Hensley for her outstanding work and attention to detail. She acquired great props and the perfect ingredients to accent our set. This is our second time shooting recipes for Kings Restaurant. We shot Kings world famous “Pig n a Puppy” recipe featuring pulled BBQ pork in a giant hush puppy sandwich. We made an overhead shot hoping to create a billboard campaign. Kelsey Morgan, our in-house graphic designer, created the bill-board mock-up. I’d stop to try this curiosity if I saw it on roadside billboard … would you? Photography by Steve Exum of exumphoto.com.

Our team at Exum Photography is very proud to see our photography for the Sunbrella brand translated into national ad campaigns. The ads are running this spring after shooting multi projects in southeast for Sunbrella  last year. We also love the giant play the Sunbrella website gives to our images. This lightfast, stain resistant, multipurpose fabric for the home, boat and auto is simply outstanding and can not be outdone. We are proud to be a part of the Sunbrella Creative team along with the creatives from Wray Ward Ad Agency. I want to give a special thanks  to my team at Exum Photography: Product Stylist, Laura Hardin, lead photographers assistant,  Griffin Davis, production assistant,  Jenna Moore, assistants Matt Bell and Eric Waters, and our make-up artist Kacie Fauling. Also many thanks to our models from the talent agencies at  Marilyn’s, Directions and Locke. Here are just a few of the magazine where these ads are running Architectural Digest, Coastal Living, Southern Living, Real Simple, Robb Report, Houzz. Photography by Steve Exum.

Raleigh, NC – Our team at Exum Photography finished the Peter Millar Spring 2015 line book shoot in early July. Over the period of about a month, we shot and edited over 750 product and model shots. Our two models where Amy Lemons and Robert Stewart, represented by Marilyn’s Modeling Agency and recruited by Michael DeFosse (talent representative extraordinaire!). We must give a shout out to Peter Millar creatives Lindsay Browder & Anne Rhodes for producing and managing the entire photo shoot and catalog design as well as our product stylist team led by Julia Abrams with help from Jeff Barbour. Our team of interns, Morgan, Morgan # 2 and Kelsey from NC State, helped create a smooth assembly line of unpacking, steaming, styling, shooting, editing and repacking. A catalog shoot has so many moving parts. Big thanks to make-up artist Jami Svay for keeping both our models in check. Can’t thank my immediate team at Exum Photo enough. Griffin Davis and Kelsey Morgan were early to rise daily to be on set every morning. They are exceptionally skilled photo editors, set builders and product shooters. It truly takes a collaborative team to execute such a massive project. Thanks again to all! Photography by Steve Exum & Griffin Davis of Exum Photography. Please visit our client’s website to see an stylish line of apparel for men and women. www.petermillar.com

Arts and Science Magazine editor Kim Spurr collaborated closely with Steve Exum to brainstorm on creating artwork for a story on drug abuse. The story’s focus was on neuroscience research taking place in the lab of UNC-Chapel Hill psychology professor Regina Carelli. The copy dealt directly with the psychologically addictive properties of drug abuse relative to substances that are physically addictive. Since we there were no drug abuse subjects interviewed for the story Steve created a photo illustration in studio. Steve chose Matt Stephens from Burlington, NC after meeting him in the gym. “With Matt’s bald head, large brow and deeply inset eyes, he’s look was perfect” said Exum. “We added a piece of glass sprinkled with droplets of water to create a rainy day, depressing mood for our main shot. I’m super pleased with the shot and prefer it in black and white.” Exum Said Photography by Steve Exum

Click here to continue reading the story by Whiteny L.J Howell.

Model and actor Richie Walter jumped in front of Steve’s lens for a model portfolio session beforeheading to Los Angeles. We liked one of the images so much it’s presently the lead photo for our new website. Good Luck Richie on the west coast! Be sure to surf our new site and don’t forget to come back as we will be adding new portfolios and testimonials soon. Photography by Steve Exum