Jonsar Studios Photo Experience at an Idea Festival in Historic Los Angeles

At a gathering of Visionary creatives and Global business leaders, the Jonsar Experience invited individuals to be their most open and authentic selves.

Client: Summit

Venue: The Los Angeles Theatre, Downtown Los Angeles

Mobile Studio Dimensions: 15’ x 20’ x 10’

Guests: 3,000+

Sessions: 70+ per day

Booking Duration: 3 days, 4 hours per day

Equipment: 2 D800 camera bodies, Nikkor 24-70 f2.8 mm lens, Profoto lighting equipment - 1 7’ umbrella, 2 4’ strip lights, social media kiosk, printer, edit bay, video hub, router, mobile hotspot, sharepoint, wind machine, 12’ x 10’ classic black background with support system and side panels, assorted texture overlays, PA system and headsets, 2 iPads for guest sign-in

Jonsar Personnel: 2 photographers, 2 editors, 1 guest experience coordinator

THE STORY

For three days, Summit took over Downtown LA’s historic Broadway Theater district with a sprawling ideas festival “designed to foster relationships and inspire new perspectives.” Attendees from around the world came to enjoy workshops, classes, performances, art and talks from presenters like Jeff Bezos, Shonda Rhimes, Marie Kondo, Brené Brown and more.

Events took place across multiple venues, including top DTLA hotels and restaurants, but the heart of the festival—where talks, music and comedy programming took place—was four vintage theaters. Summit felt our unique approach to photography fit perfectly with the festival’s theme of transformative experiences, and asked us to bring our mobile studio to Los Angeles.

THE EVENT

Our location was a lower-level lounge in the Los Angeles Theatre, which was completed in 1931 and is on the National Register of Historic Places. It boasts sweeping staircases, tall columns and chandeliers, but as is so often the case with historic venues, we had to take some extra steps during set-up… literally. Since the theater was never modernized, it has no elevators, so all our gear had to be carried up and down those grand staircases by hand.

The next challenge was internet signal: There is none in the theater’s lower levels, and our show requires a strong signal so images and videos can be shared, streamed and displayed. We ran a cable upstairs and outside the building, all the way to the top of the theater’s trademark marquee, where—with the help of a tall ladder and some nimble assistants—we placed our router. This gave us the signal we needed to power our equipment.

We were on-site for three days, shooting for four hours each day. Event attendees moved back and forth from the main auditorium to the lounge levels, and enjoyed watching videos and GIFs of our sessions on LCD displays outside our studio. We were happy to see that attendees took full advantage of our unlimited print option, as they were eager for a fine-art keepsake that captured their inspiring experience.

IN THEIR OWN WORDS