The E-commerce Content Creation Podcast

Summary We welcome back yet again Lauren Stefaniak Smith, who recently served as chair of Photo Studio Ops for Henry Stewart’s smash hit New York event, which is crazy to say was even bigger than London back in March, but it was. Lauren and Daniel tackled the subject of onboarding and training for creative team members, which has as many elements to it as there are distinct creative roles, but as usual, Lauren knows exactly how to break it down. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Matthew Schulert was lead photographer and one of the earliest studio team members at HauteLook, a flash sale site that Nordstrom bought in 2011. Matthew and Daniel talk about the the history of that studio as it grew from just 3 sets, to over 10 times that size across many iterations of studios throughout Southern California. Why is this episode called building the plane in the air? No one really knew exactly how to build a high volume e-comm studio to support a flash sale site back then, so everyone had to figure out as they went, and as we mention during the episode: At that time, no one was talking to each other. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary At that the time this episode releases, Henry Stewarts Photo Studio Operations New York is just over a week away. Joining Daniel for this episode is the chair of the photo studio ops track, and old friend of the podcast Lauren Stefaniak Smith, creative operations director at Cricut. For anyone keeping score at home, Lauren was with Victoria’s Secret the last time she was on this podcast, so we caught up in advance of Photo Studio Ops to talk about her move from VS to Cricut and what advice she had for others who might be considering a change. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary For two years friend and guest for this episode Terrence Haynes Jr. and Daniel worked in Amazon’s ONT8 Photo Studio, until Daniel left Amazon for Farfetch and T stayed with Amazon as their studio was folded into a new flagship studio just south of downtown Los Angeles. ONT8 was a pretty scrappy studio, mostly being made up of any equipment we could scavenge from other studios storage areas. T and I worked closely together on everything from developing new tools for difficult to style products, to planning and booking talent. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Joining Daniel on the podcast is Karen Williams of Black Visual Queen, which is both her brand and a title given her 10 years of experience as art director, producer, editor, and curator at companies like Masterclass, Barron’s and Netflix. Recently Karen posted some advice on LinkedIn to help photographers more effectively showcase themselves to creative directors and producers seeking out talent for their next project. We already had time booked with Karen but had to change topics shortly before our recording session, and we thought it would be helpful for the photographers in our audience to go a little more in depth. Portfolio Links https://paulawattsphotography.com/https://www.rcrivera.com/www.danieltjester.comDiscount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Our guest for this episode is Caitlin Andrews. Caitlin and Daniel are colleagues at Creative Force and they realized recently that we both come from similar backgrounds in the e-commerce creative production space. Caitlin spent close to 10 years prior to joining Creative Force working for Snap36, working with robotic photography systems to capture 360 spin assets for a variety of brand clients. Much of that time was with hard goods, which is where our experiences intersect. For two years Daniel worked at a small start up studio for Amazon product imaging, where about 80% of their volume came from hard goods (typically defined as anything that isn’t apparel, shoes, or fashion accessories). In this episode of the podcast we compare notes on unique challenges we encountered in our various roles and how we overcame them. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary We’ve been thinking a lot about planning ever since the recent Creative Force webinar on editorial production. Specifically how planning differs from editorial to product photography. On the editorial side, you know when you start a project you’ll need photo, video, h/mu, styling etc. for a set number of days. Running an ecomm studio adds an element to that, the idea of carryover. How much product will I have left over at the end of the day, and what does that mean for staffing tomorrow, or next week? All of this thinking about planning reminded us of this conversation with Scott Willson of Patagonia, specifically when he talks about how a well functioning, efficient studio often looks like things are running smoothly and easily. Due in no small part to planning. Let’s flash back to Episode 24, process vs. product with Scott Willson of Patagonia. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Joining Daniel for this episode of the podcast is talented photographer and studio operations leader Joe Polifrone. In this episode the pair reminisce about working for Amazon circa 2016 at what was likely the peak of the Product Imaging organization. They worked in a studio of over 20,000sf (over 1800sm for our European listeners) that employed hundreds of people during peak seasons. They talk about how this particular studio was mind blowing, futuristic and so incredibly efficient at moving high volumes of product for not only handbags and apparel, but jewelry and watch as well. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Joining Daniel for this episode is Juliana Vail, longtime creative operations veteran with an emphasis on FashionTech, most recently Director of Service Development and Innovation at Farfetch. This is a bit of a different episode than normal, we have a handful of industry news bits to cover, so we’ll be talking about variety of topics from the Levi’s AI model announcement to some interesting job posts for Amazon Imaging News Links https://www.fastcompany.com/3034975/75-of-ikeas-catalog-is-computer-generated-imageryhttps://www.linkedin.com/posts/kristaskustad_hiring-creative-artist-activity-7046653425958191105-gYZb?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktophttps://adage.com/article/marketing-news-strategy/levis-uses-ai-models-increase-diversity-incites-backlash/2482046https://petapixel.com/2023/03/24/levis-to-use-ai-generated-models-to-increase-diversity/https://www.levistrauss.com/2023/03/22/lsco-partners-with-lalaland-ai/https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1146542/a_pro-innovation_approach_to_AI_regulation.pdfDiscount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary It’s easy to get really hyped about new technologies, especially in creative functions, but in creative production for e-commerce, we need to make sure that we are staging focused on the customer, and providing the information they need, and not just a new content experience for the sake of it. Our guest for this episode is Dan Hyde, creative production and ecommerce strategy consultant, to talk about this. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Our guest on the podcast today is Franz Tschimben CEO of Covision Media, a company that produces 3D scanning devices capable of capturing pretty incredible detail to produce high quality 3D models. Franz discusses what his company does, what his customers are currently doing with their technology, and how working in high quality 3D models throughout the production process isn’t only great for business, but great for sustainability too. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Last week we were in London for Photo Studio Operations put on by Henry Stewart. Creative Force sponsored the event and we used our speaking opportunity to record a live episode of the podcast. And we did, we totally did. Our guest Josie Diamond and I had a great conversation, we got some good questions from the audience. But somewhere between recording the session, and getting the files onto my computer, I lost them. Whether it was my fault or something errored with my travel recorder, I lost those recordings. Thankfully Josie was kind enough to take a few minutes to rerecord the session out in the hotel lobby. I’m disappointed we don’t have the original audio to share, but here is our Live Episode from Henry Stewart Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary As of this recording it is the week after the Pixelz FLOW event in Los Angeles, and the day before Daniel heads to London for the upcoming Photo Studio Operations event by Henry Stewart, so Daniel is flying solo this week to talk about some takeaways from FLOW, some talk about 3D adoption in creative teams, and a couple of bits of interesting industry news. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Raphael Ruz is the Photographic Operations Manager at Hogarth Australia and imaging technologist, researching and testing emerging technologies and how they might impact or influence the creative production industry. In this episode, big surprise, we’re talking about AI. But more specifically, we spend some time talking about how creative ops teams today should be thinking about a future implementation of some iteration of these tools, and how leadership has a responsibility to their team to have a plan when these tools may impact roles. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Creative production for e-commerce is a relatively young industry, and that means that we’re learning as we go when it comes to the growth and development of our creative and operations team members. In this episode we are highlighting one journey, Scott McLean, manager of studio operations at Arc’Teryx. Scott shares with us how his interest in learning about roles and processes adjacent to his gave him important perspective that has helped develop his approach to managing studio teams. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary As we move into 2023, we’ve watched as economic uncertainty has triggered waves off layoffs. While they mostly have been hitting the tech sector, in the couple of week leading up to our 100th episode, we’ve now seen the wave hit many friends and colleagues in content production and Creative Operations. A very fun fact we recently learned about this podcast is some past guests have use their appearances on here during the interview process for a new role. So for our 100th episode we are going to support our community and give a couple of people an open interview of sorts. Key Takeaways Thanks to all of our listeners for being there with us on our 100th episode. Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary We have a tendency to focus on visual content on this podcast but that isn’t the only content you need to be able to sell your products online. Copywriting is another critical element to a telling your products story, and just like photography, it’s a process that needs to be managed, with controls and guardrails in place to make sure you’re saying the right things to the right people in the right places. Joining Daniel for this episode is Brian Hennessy, co-founder and CEO at Talkoot, an AI powered copywriting platform with elements of PIM systems and a lot of cool features to make sure you’re not just telling a story, but telling the right story. Key Takeaways Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Continuing our theme exploring near future tech in e-commerce content production, my guest today is Sergey Arkhangelskiy of Wanna. Wanna creates 3D experiences for brands that are intended to help customers make more informed decisions, but interestingly, that decision isn’t always simply to purchase. Key Takeaways Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Just about a year ago, Mark Milstein of vAIsual joined Daniel to discuss what he referred to as the future of image creation. He described the synthographer, some might now call a prompt engineer. An individual who inputs the correct set of instructions to an AI tool that produces photorealistic images. Flash forward to the second half of 2022, when these tools made a huge splash in creative and marketing circles as they were released to the public, sparking tons of conversations about the future of content creation as well as the legality and ethics of it all. Mark joins Daniel again today for this episode to give an update on the legal side of the AI conversation, make some predictions on commercial use of AI tools, and share with us forthcoming tool that could accelerate an already quick moving technology Key Takeaways Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com

Summary Daniel has been pretty vocal in his skepticism of NFTs, Crypto and by extension, the blockchain, but the guest today, David Iscove, director of technology consulting at Cella has cautioned him against throwing the baby out with the bathwater. As David describes this technology and what value it has beyond the applications that most casual observers are familiar with, it becomes pretty clear that there may be some interesting applications in the e-commerce content creation space. Key Takeaways Discount Code Reminder to use code ECCP to get your first month of PhotoRoom Pro for free! Thanks to the PhotoRoom team for the generous offer. Credits Produced by: Creative Force - creativeforce.io Edited by: Calvin Lanz Sound - clsound.net Hosted by: Daniel Jester - danieltjester.com