Subaru: Subaru Impreza

Still photographer Toshi Oku recently spent five days in L.A. and on Venice Beach chronicling young people interacting with their new 2015 Subaru Impreza. The shoot was completed for agency The Designory in Long Beach.

Asset Building
The purpose of the shoot was to build of library of both car and lifestyle images for the new Subaru Impreza. According to creatives at The Designory, ten images for the shoot will be incorporated into the car model’s latest brochure. Toshi shot four days of car images and one day of lifestyle shots. The production involved shooting five car shots per day around Los Angeles and six locales on one lifestyle shoot day at Venice Beach.

Challenging Location
Some of the shooting locations were in and around the Venice Beach boardwalk. “It was a very challenging location in terms of crowd control, but an amazing place to shoot,” says Toshi. “We were going for beautiful lighting but we did not go crazy on the lighting as I wanted to keep things natural in look and feel by playing with the sun’s natural light."

Long History Working With The Designory
“I have a long relationship with The Designory,” comments Toshi. “ Steve Davis is very talented creative director. He is a great leader. He paints a big picture for the brand and lets his art directors go for it. Marco’s (Cortes) passion and talent for the car business really shows. From the first time I worked with him I felt like we shared a very similar creative vision.”

Advantage TOSHI
Key to the project was Toshi’s approach to the very ambitious shooting schedule. His experienced production crew combined with his own custom camera equipment made for a very streamlined shoot. Having crew and equipment in place allowed Toshi to concentrate on the content. “My strength on this shoot was being able to compose shots without needing to work with a detailed layout,” says Toshi. “I work really well with just the overall instructions from agency creatives. The results are memorable lifestyle and car campaigns.”

Toshi is represented by artist representative Andrea Stern at 310-574-0076.