Travel shoot. Corporate tone. Moody lounge setting.
I’ve been traveling a lot lately and wanted to share a breakdown from this LinkedIn shoot in New York — flying in from San Francisco with a lean crew and a focused kit.
We didn’t get to scout this location beforehand, so the goal was to travel with a flexible lighting kit that could handle both a two-person conversation and single-person interviews.
We used a cross-key approach using two @aputure.lighting 600d’s with Light Dome SE modifiers. Each light worked as the key for one subject while naturally becoming a rim/backlight for the other subject — creating shape and separation without needing additional backlights or overcrowding the space.
We leaned into the mood of the location.
Dark walls.
Teal seating.
Warm practicals glowing in the background.
The keys were tuned slightly warmer than daylight (around the 4800–5000K range) to keep skin tones natural while letting the practicals stay warm and rich in the background.
For fill, we used a 200w @colborlight with a lantern and skirt, raised between the cameras on a baby boom arm. The skirt kept the lantern from spilling onto the walls so it could gently lift shadows on the subjects without flattening the room. Placed a few MCs to lift the back wall.
Shot on three REDs
We flew in with the lights from SF and rented stands and sandbags locally from a grip shop in New York. Everything moved on a Rock-N-Roller cart — including hauling the full kit nine floors down during load-in for this location. Elevators, hallways, tight turns… the cart definitely earned its keep.
Overall it worked out and keeping it lean worked out well for us.
Crew
Director: @shpottin
DP: @johnu_dp
Camera: @oliverlthompson
Agency: @watertowercreative
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Wrapping up an incredible year of projects big and small! We are grateful for our clients who trusted us, our trade partners who made it happen, and our team who brought it all together.
Looking ahead to 2026, we’re ready to dream bigger, build better, and keep investing in our community.
What an incredible experience it was covering the #TalentConnect event in San Diego! Our team was proud to produce the highlight video showcasing the brilliant minds in talent acquisition.
Step inside Zoom’s Executive Briefing Center; where collaboration, innovation, and connection come to life. Take a look at what makes this space truly special!
Exciting progress continues at the Santa Clara Family Health Plan South County Community Resource Center! From significant sitework to a first look inside...we’re proud to showcase recent highlights made possible by the tremendous effort of our field team! Projects like this take shape through strong collaboration, thoughtful planning, and the dedication of every crew member on site. It’s truly inspiring to watch the vision for the Santa Clara Family Health Plan South County CRC come together, one phase at a time!
Exciting things are taking shape in Gilroy! We’re excited to share a look at the exterior progress of the Santa Clara Family Health Plan South County Community Resource Center project. In partnership with siTe Landscape Architecture and @studiogarchitects , our team is proud to help bring this vision to life—creating a space that will serve the community for years to come. We can’t wait to see the progress along the way!
@scfhp@scfhp.southcounty.crc@techconcorp
We flew ✈️ and drove 🚐 to Arizona on a mission!
That mission was to create a package of 3 event recap videos (overnight edits), film 6 conversational interviews, and edit 18 animated social media videos.
All for the amazing team @linkedintalentsolutions
This is our Day 1 sizzle reel - shot and edited all within 24hrs 🤯 Just a small piece of the content we created.
This project required months of planning and execution, and high levels of communication once we were on the ground.
Run and gun AND edit at lighting speed? There isn’t really a term for it 😉 Except that when our clients need it done, we deliver 👊
We had a blast working with everyone on the crew for this one:
@watertowercreative & @shpottin - producer and director
@peterdendrinos - 🎥 & grip
@antwon 🎥
@davezini - 🎥 and dit
@neilroche_ DP
@the_colbs - editor
@peerthrough & @marks.gram - animation
The importance of having great partners 💪
To achieve any large scale production involves collaboration, and the team must value getting the job done right over everything else. Choose wisely 👊
Earlier this year we partnered with the great people @sandbarsolar@opposite.of.east@nhs_inc & @watertowercreative to produce 8 commercial video pieces.
This was a massive undertaking and it took focused collaboration from all these amazing people to achieve our goal ✅
This is just a sneak peek of the project, we can’t wait to show you the real thing!
