It’s all in the picture

Every year for the past three years TimeLine has had the opportunity to work with our friend and photographer Ryan Robinson (check out his Web site to see an amazing portfolio!) to create the images that we use to promote each production throughout the season. It’s an intensive (and for me, somewhat nerve-wracking) process to distill an entire play into one image that can both encapsulate the plot and theme of the play AND look really cool on a poster. We work with Ryan, the individual show directors, Artistic Director PJ Powers and our graphic designer, among others, to brainstorm ideas, settle on a plan, and then pull all the elements together to actually create the image.

This year we took the promo shoot on the road, doing all four production shots on location rather than in Ryan’s studio. I have to say, that made me more nervous than usual. There are already a lot of variables to take into consideration — did we really have to make weather another one?!

Happily, despite days on end of rain leading up to our chosen photo day, the weather could not have cooperated more beautifully. We started bright and early on the steps of the south portico of the Museum of Science and Industry, moved in the afternoon to a (very hot) garage in Bucktown with an antique television set, and finished at sunset on the fields around Montrose Harbor. And despite a handful of potentially derailing snafus along the way (a not-quite-right costume piece here, a prop malfunction there), our team was able to make it all come together in stunning fashion. To all who were involved: thank you Thank You THANK YOU!

It’s been a couple of weeks now, and we’ve sorted through the 1,000+ images Ryan took that day and settled on four to make their debut in the season brochure that will arrive in your mailbox soon. In the meantime, we’ve got some behind-the-scenes photos of our marathon day for you to enjoy:

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