Here’s a new ad project I shot for The Field Museum’s “Extreme Mammals” exhibit with DDB Chicago. Extreme Mammals showcases some of the rarest fossils & taxidermy specimens from animals both small and large. Definitely be sure to swing by the museum and check it out in person if you’re in Chicago. More info is at extrememammals.fieldmuseum.org

The creative team came up with some ideas for wild cross breeds of creatures and we had custom shipping crates built based on their sketches. Since the crates had such irregular shapes we originally thought we might build miniature versions of them along with small sets and shoot in a studio. After exploring the underground layers of the the museum and finding some nice gritty corners and corridors, we decided to have them built to scale and shot them on location. Special thanks to the crate dept at The Field who did an excellent job crafting the mammal parts to our tastes. We scuffed up the wood a bit with hair dye & charcoal and then I enhanced them a little more in post production. Images were captured with the Phase One IQ180 megapixel monster for maximum detail in the wood grain. Look out for the ads running now in print and on a couple bus stops around town. Scroll downwards for a few behind the scenes photos and some snapshots from the construction of the crates.

Credits:
Client: The Field Museum
Agency: DDB Chicago
Creative Team: Matt Collier & Wayne Robinson
Creative Director: Karin Rose
Executive Creative Director: Ewan Paterson
Art Producer: Suzanne Koller
Assistants: Mark Markley, Andrew Lawrence, Maureen Peabody
Crate Builder: John Zehren