2009 Best of the Industry Awards, Illinois Meetings and Events
copy by Lauren Hurley
Whether they’re snapping photos, shooting video or mastering turntables, the team behind Fig Media love showing off its many talents. The boutique agency offers an interesting mix of creative services including event photography/videography, DJ’s and even Web and graphic design services. Many of the team members are multi-talented and can be found behind the lens or the DJ booth at any given event. Fig also boasts an impressive client roster from ISES and NACE to Lookingglass Theatre and the Chicago Convention and Tourism Bureau.
(Chicago/773.338.1334/www.figgy.net)
Ken Kincaid has worked with the best: Lauren Bacall, John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, Gregory Peck, Charles Bronson, Maureen O’Hara, Audey Murphy, Hugh O’Brian just to name a few!
This is a quick preview of a shoot fig owner, James Gustin did last week.
“Ken’s the real thing, he worked with the three John’s: John Houston, John Ford and John Wayne throughout the 50’s through the 70″s. I met him in Rogers Park where till recently he collected aluminum can tabs by the thousands. Ken is a wonderful guy and a man of significant character.” ~ James Gustin
James has an amazing ability to see people. Chances are if you live in rogers park- you have probably passed this guy on the street and not paid any attention. Little did you know, a piece of cowboy legend just passed you. This is just one of James’ gifts, he sees stories in the most unlikely of places.
His story is unique, in this article by the Chicago Sun Times, Kincaid recalls the shot that welcomed him to Chicago, just four days after he arrived:
“I came to Chicago in ‘87 for a week to visit my sister. On the fourth day I was here, I decided to run an errand for her, and I got my guts shot out as a thank you at Berwyn and Broadway.A man stepped out from across the street, just wanting to kill someone. Yelled at me, ‘Hey, cowboy, I have something for you!’ When I came out of a coma five weeks later, I found out what he had for me. A soft-nosed, hollow-point .38 bullet. It felt like somebody hit me in the belly with a baseball bat. It threw me about five feet, I guess, backward, against the wall. Anybody who thinks these movies, where you get shot where you were standing, that’s a bunch of bull.”
James also filmed a short documentary interview with Ken to get more of his story, the piece is currently being edited by our intern crew, so keep an eye out for more.
A curious fig deejay, Andrew Gee, researches the history of valentines day.
Valentines day has a lot of different meanings to a lot of different people. Why do we buy cards? Why do we indulge in chocolate? Why do we have to go out to dinner and spend money on our significant other? This got me thinking, “Where did Valentines Day come from?” After numerous google searches and Internet research I think I found where Valentines day comes from.
Valentine’s Day celebrations are from both ancient Christian and Roman tradition. One legend says the holiday originated from the ancient Roman festival of Lupercalis or Lupercalia. This was a fertility festival or a lover’s holiday that was held on February 15. To elaborate more on this festival the young women in the city would put their names in a big urn. Than the city’s bachelors would reach into the urn and choose a name and become paired for the year with the women he chose. These matches often ended in marriage. This shocked me at first knowing that Valentines day originated from a festival where they drew names out of a jar to see who you would eventually marry.
In 498 A.D. Pope Gelasius declared February 14th St. Valentines Day. The pope found Lupercalis un-Christian and banned the festival. So who was St. Valentine and why was this day named after him? There are many stories of Valentine and why he was put to death. I found out that Valentine was a bishop who held secret marriage ceremonies to young soldiers and their loved ones. Emperor Claudius II thought that this would make his soldiers weak so he forbid marriage to assure a quality army. He was put in jail and martyred by the Emperor Claudius II. Prior to Valentines death, he continued to minister his prison guards. One of the guards adopted a blind girl. He asked Valentine if God could help his daughter. Valentine prayed for the girl and miraculously she received her sight. After this happened the guard and his whole family believed in Jesus and became baptized. The Emperor heard about this and he was furious that Valentine was still making converts while in prison, so he sentenced him to death.
Just before being put to death Valentine wrote a note to the jailer’s daughter, signing it, “From your Valentine.” This originated the card giving tradition, which still lives on to this day. St. Valentine was a man of love and passion, which represents this romantic holiday very well. Through out the years Valentines day has grown in to a holiday where you show your affection to the one you love.
Personally, this holiday never really meant anything to me until this past year. I am very lucky to have a person in my life that I love and can share my experiences with. Oh and did I mention that my girlfriends birthday rests on this romantic holiday? Yea, it’s a big day for me! So I started stressing out about what to get her and how many gifts I need to buy. Do I get her candy and jewelry? Do I get her flowers and jewelry? Or do I get Flowers, Jewelry, Candy and a teddy bear just to be safe.
In my opinion Valentines Day is a day that couples express there love for one another and show affection to the people they care about. Personally I think that this should be shown each and every day and you shouldn’t need one day out of the year to express your love. I hope this gives you a brief history on Valentines Day and you learned as much as I did. Whatever your feelings are toward February 14th make sure you express your love and gratitude to the people you care about.
fig media’s long standing internship program attracts some of the hottest young talent in Chicago media, we are honored to have these young leaders working hard and training with us. Now we are going to brag about them. Starting with Justin Jach.
Justin is a talented young filmmaker that impressed us with is hard work, ability to take tough feedback and passion for the work he does. He has been working on a very cool documentary project on graffiti. A project that just won a grant from Fullbright to turn it into a feature length documentary. Winning the U.S. Panel, Justin advances to the next round in Brazil.
“I like analyzing graffiti as a mode of social communication. I’m interested in the ways people communicate with other people in a society, and the way that culture defines language and vice versa. The goal of my Fulbright is to make a full length documentary film on graffiti and how it functions within a society. Especially looking at it as a way for a part of society that is denied a social voice to re-establish communication with the rest of the population. ” Justin Jach.
Congratulations Justin, can’t wait to collaberate! Good Luck in Brazil, we are crossing our fingers for you.
Billy has been hard at work the past year developing his fashion photography. An effort that fig media owners James Gustin and Michele Gustin have supported, fostered and encouraged. Through Billy’s hard work/passion, the teams dedication and our amazing interns we are proud to show off this first round of work and have so many surprises a long the way- you will not want to miss what we have coming up next!
In a November staff meeting, the fig team sat around and discussed new ideas for expanding projects and running holiday deals. Enter, the holiday video card. That evening, using twelve dollars and their studio at fig east- the team bought antlers and director Melissa Martens grabbed employees and asked them to sing Rodolph the Red Nosed Reindeer to the best of their ability. Using Go Green and Skip the Card. as the tag line- the holiday e-card became an instant hit.
“What we did not realize was just how sticky the idea would be. Once the video launched we saw a jump in views from 10 views to 350 in a matter of 24 hours. The idea was covered in BizBash as one of the top 10 best last minute holiday ideas and the requests started coming in,” Melissa said, “What started as a fun spontaneous morning meeting idea, has turned into an exciting new product that we have tons of fun filming.One of our corporate clients raved about the idea saying that it saved her so much time and money coordinating and signing over 5,000 holiday cards in a few weeks. She traded the hassle of blisters on her fingers and stamp licking for directing her staff in a rendition of “let is snow.” In one afternoon she got all she needed and we did the rest.Now they have a hilarious living video greeting to send to all their clients and friends.”
The newly engaged dynamic duo Andrew and Nicole posted their card on their social networks and watched the fun as it spread to family, friends, co-workers and even ended up in a corporations newsletter.
The requests and shoots keep pouring in for the idea, and as it gets closer to Christmas and new years we are finding people are eager to gobble up the opportunity to save some time and star in their own video. Fig plans on keeping the fun going, developing new ideas for custom video e-cards in the future, so keep an eye out.
For now you can book your holiday card shoot with fig, as a gift for someone, for yourself, for your company or even for next year by going here: BOOK YOUR HOLIDAY CARD! Time is running out, and next week is filling up with shoots-so get in early to lock in your shoot date.
Although I am not married, engaged, or really even close to my own wedding, I still can’t resist reading up on the latest styles and trends with weddings. I also like to stay on top of what is happening so I can better connect and consult with all of my brides and grooms. This year I really found the best way to do this, was to read and follow blogs. Here are a few blogs I found to be the best:
1. http://www.stylemepretty.com/
This blog is always staying fresh and talk about everything from beautiful reception shoes to do it yourself ideas to amazing vendors to hire. The photographs are beautiful and inspiring, and you can really find a range of weddings from all different styles.
2. http://weddingsunveiledblog.blogspot.com/
This online magazine reflects many styles from the Southern wedding. A great place to get inspiration for your photography.
3. http://offbeatbride.com/
Not always the most tasteful weddings in my opinion, but a fun read. Come on they have a link called wedding porn.
4. http://tenthousandonly.blogspot.com/
A great blog with cute ideas that don’t hurt the pocket.
5. http://bklynbrideonline.com/
Nope we aren’t in NYC, but we travel. Always inspired by the events and photos featured on this Brooklyn blog.
6. http://www.trendsettingwedding.com/
A fun blog that features Chicago weddings.
7. http://www.bride-buzz.com/
A soon to be awesome blog launching January 2010!!
Getting married in 2010? Check out fig weddings for all things deejay, film and photography.
“Everyone is discussing: What is viral video? What makes things go viral?
Some of the widest circulated videos are uploaded by you. They get passed around because they are funny, shocking, moving or clever. So when creating something that you want to go viral, follow this rule:
If you want to watch it over and over, send it to all of your friends and so on…then you are onto something. If you don’t like it…it won’t get passed around.
In this episode, James Gustin and Melissa Martens explore this topic using their favorite viral wedding videos.
Why wedding videos?
James started his company, fig media, 15 years ago with wife Michele Gustin. They operated out of their apartment deejaying and documenting weddings. Their vision on documenting the American wedding was unique in the industry at the time. They focused on telling great stories through getting to know their couples and their families, telling the story of the day through documentary style cinematography. This was years before the trend started to catch fire. Today fig media has a team of film makers, deejays and photographers delivering this same vision, using weddings as a way to develop themselves as artists. Together they are developing the fig films brand to further their mission of telling great stories. fig holds the art of documenting a wedding as an honor, documenting and making films for families that will live on for generations. Being passionate about this mission, the film team is always looking at what couples are doing with their videos…and it just so happened that these wedding videos were starting to get notice from 23 million people…so being curious fig wanted to dig into why.
So we have included the videos below for your viewing pleasure. Post your favorite viral video in the comment box!
Recently one of these clips show up on the ABC tv show Flash Forward, kudos to you if you can figure out which one.
Check back next week when Kevin returns to talk abouthow companies are using social media to create a new type of website…you won’t want to miss this, its super cool!”
Fashion Focus wrapped up on Sunday October 25th and ended a long weekend beginning on Thursday night. From exclusive backstage coverage, fashion shows featuring designers from students to up-and-coming – everything was about fashion.
figphoto photographers & videographers covered the shows and backstage during Fashion Focus Chicago! Check out photo galleries, & videos. You can also view the coverage on factio magazine, chicago reader,chicago magazine, Style Admirer, & More. Make sure you check out the videos done by billy rood on vimeo!
