Lou Lesko started shooting fashion photography in San Francisco in 1984 when he was 19 years old thanks to an amazing man named Michael DeMartini, who took him under his wing and kicked his butt into a decent photographer. After a few years in San Francisco, he took his new trade down to Los Angeles so he could continue shooting fashion while also attending the University of Southern California. He graduated with a double major in writing and literature. Naive and idealized, he ventured forth to save the world through photojournalism. An all night party followed by an early morning cappuccino landed him his first assignment, which was in the Soviet Union in 1989.
Being a photojournalist for two years was a bliss; he never learned so much and made so little. He’s still unclear how much of the world he saved as a result of his journalistic efforts, but ended up very well traveled with a completely new perspective of storytelling. He returned to fashion photography to turn that new perspective into a paycheck. Seeking more than a starving-artist living, he went on to pursue commercial photography, which was extremely difficult to get into as an editorial shooter. To be completely candid, if the advertising industry had not trended toward an editorial look, he never would have broken in at all. But it did, and he did, so there you have it.
In 1999, he caught a lucky break and was asked to write and direct a public service announcement (PSA) for breast cancer awareness. The damn thing had legs, and it ran for three years nationally. More importantly, the PSA was the catalyst for a healthy addiction to writing and directing. Which is mostly what he does today.
He is currently the managing editor at the National Geographic Assignment Blog. He is also one of the founders of PhotoCine News and the founder and chief chaos master at Blinkbid Software, business software for creative professionals.
On most days, you can find Lou in his office in Sausalito writing some such nonsense or other. Or you’ll find him in his favorite city and second residence, Los Angeles, where he is usually pitching some nonsense he wrote to the entertainment industry.
Michael Britt came to Los Angeles with his wife, actress Cheryl White, and started as a unit stills photographer on film and TV sets, which he did for ten years. In 1995, he purchased his first Apple computer and discovered a passion and inherent aptitude for computers and digital photography. This quickly earned him a fantastic reputation in the emerging digital photography space, and he soon found himself as the consultant to high-end photographers converting to digital.
All of his experience—technical, creative, and marketing—culminated in the creation of Image Mechanics, where Michael was managing partner until 2009. It was during his development of the brand for his new business that he was tapped as a writer/speaker for digital imaging workflow and archiving. Some of his speaking credits include Thomas Knoll’s Soup-To-Nuts event, PDN on the Road, PIDE, Imaging USA, and the Digital Media Festival in Sydney, Australia. He was also asked to consult for the tech industry, and he wrote the quick-start guide that shipped with Adobe Lightroom 1.0. He is a certified digital photography expert for the State of California Community College system, where he was instrumental in developing a Digital Tech program for Cypress College, and he is on the Santa Monica College Photography Department Advisory Board.
As someone who sees technological shifts coming, Michael co-produced the critically acclaimed Collision Conference, the very first event focusing on the collision of stills and motion, bringing together speakers like Shane Hurlbut, ASC; Rodney Charters; and Vincent Laforet for the first time. He followed up the Collision Conference with the PhotoCine Expo, which focused exclusively on video DSLR filmmaking. His recent projects include an instructional video about DSLR filmmaking using the Canon 60D for PhotoshopCafe.
He is currently serving as the Director of Education for Samy’s Camera, which is the perfect place for him to continue the high level of seminars and workshops he’s been teaching and creating around the world.
Snehal Patel is a director and cinematographer based in Los Angeles. Originally from Chicago, he lived and worked in the mainstream Bollywood before tackling Hollywood. His first foray into HDSLR filmmaking was in the fall of 2009, when he asked the formidable Rodney Charters, ASC, to be the cinematographer on his short film project, “Indian Gangster.” This was one of the only films to use a Panavision mount and Panavision lenses on the 5D before they decided not to support it. This experience started a fire in Snehal to push the technology to find new, innovative ways to produce high-quality HD content for less.
Snehal is a trainer for LA’s Canon Boot Camp (www.canonbootcamp.com) and has traveled the country speaking at conferences about DSLR cameras in professional production environments. Snehal films with the Canon 5D, 7D, and 60D on a regular basis for projects ranging from feature films to television shows, to viral web videos. Snehal handles much of the editing and post-production on his jobs, so he has a lot to say about the DSLR workflow. Check out his blog at www.fearlessproductions.tv.