Architectural & Interior Design Photography, Corporate Commercial Photography, Advertising & Portrait Photographer | Ottawa | 613-558-7585 | justin.vanleeuwen@gmail.com
I photographed this series as a part of a creative campaign with Character Creative for the business’ along Wellington West in Ottawa. I enjoyed being able to create commercial photography in my own neighbourhood, with some of my favourite shop owners.
I’ve always been a photographer whose style reflects his client’s needs. While I certainly put my own creative and technical spin on everything I do, it’s rare that I take the time to create images that are reflective of what I’m purely interested in. So, despite the popularity and praise I receive for my interior […]
After waking Fred up for sunrise at my Ottawa Magazine Hendrick Farm photoshoot, he must have thought “I want to do that again” as they brought me back in to work on their custom commercial portrait photography for the team. And, what started off as a dismally foggy day, with delayed portraits, ended as a […]
Most of my photography work is corporate-commercial which means I’m often shooting environmental portraits, interiors, or whatever for a pre-determined output; like brochures, reports and, most commonly, websites. There’s no doubt that having a strong visual to accompany your website is an important factor of design, and sometimes the framework of that website needs the […]
One of my favourite Editorial projects last year was a three-shoot series on “Rethinking the Art of Living Green” for Ottawa Magazine. It explored three different home-based (it was for the Interiors issues) lifestyles that are being explored in Ottawa. With a general theme on communal living, we visited an organic farm, a building in […]
For the second year in a row I visited the Parkdale Food Centre to make portraits for a new batch of thirteen youths. The “Thirteen” is a social enterprise for youth under the Parkdale Food Centre in Ottawa. The year-long project is an entrepreneurial training program for teens aged 14-18 with help and support by […]
It’s very rare that sitting at home, wishing you had more editorial photography assignments and portrait work, pays off. But that’s pretty much exactly what happened when the folks at Grocery Business Magazine contacted me to to photograph local entrepreneurs, co-owners of Kardish Health Food Centres, and brothers Carey and Robert Assaf. The creative agency, […]
I love a good personal branding photoshoot. More than just a headshot, personal branding will give a subject the opportunity to showcase their personality over a series of different looks and setups. Shelley contacted me after a recent life-shift. She moved to Ottawa and has also left the boring life of a scientist to start […]
I love being an editorial photographer. With almost no effort at all, I get to meet some of the most fascinating and wonderful people in the world. Barbara McInnes has recently stepped down as the president and CEO of the Community Foundation of Ottawa. Having spent six years working in the not for profit sector, […]
It’s no secret that my favourite thing about photography is all the people I get to meet. I especially love taking their portraits in environmental situations that are relevant to them as a person or, at the very least, look cool. That’s why I was so happy when the editors at Ottawa Magazine asked me […]
What do you do if you’re approached by a beautiful, charming, and good friend to help her with a collaborative fundraising calendar portrait, including some of the best wedding, portrait, and commercial photographers in Ottawa? Of course, you say “yes!”
First workshop taught. Check that off my to do list. I had a great group of students at Saturday’s “Learn your Lights” Photography workshop at the JVLPopUp studio here in Ottawa. I chose to do a one-day intensive so we could all keep our Sundays as a weekend day and not run into any trouble […]
It’s been an incredible first week at the JVLPopUp photo studio. We had an opening party which (though I didn’t tell anyone this) marked two years in full-time photo business for me, with incredible food by Essence Catering, drinks from Beyond the Pale, perfectly rendered and HUGE canvases by CanvasPop. I’ve entertained a few headshot […]
My friends over at MediaStyle called me in to cover some stills for a commercial video shoot they were on. In-between takes, I was to create some portraits to update photography for their client Jonathan Chant, CEO of Fitness for Freedom. Jonathan and his team are personal trainers who make house calls, trying to keep […]
It’s been a busy couple months around here, and while I’ve taken the time out to post some tutorials, there’s some stuff going on outside of this blog that I should link to.
Some people just prefer to be in the water. For the third year in a row (I think I’m onto something here), Julie Cole invited me to come photograph her wonderful family of 8. For the second year in a row, they chose to do it in their bathing suits. Julie and I realized the […]
Some subjects have no interest in having their portrait taken, they don’t want you there and even 5 minutes is too much to ask. Max wasn’t one of those people. What a delight to travel an hour out of Ottawa for an editorial photography job to come to the welcoming face of Max Hamlyn. A […]
Often I get caught up in the day-to-day of my work, prep, pack, shoot, load photos onto my computer, cull, process, proof, deliver – repeat. You can lose a bit of your creativity in this repetition, relying on more comfortable techniques and “safe” shots. There’s also the need to meet your clients vision, which, in […]
We worked pretty hard on the image above. Had them move, adjust, and straighten the ambulance in place. Set up our lights in and around the vehicle, then drafted someone to come and start the truck, to get the lights *going* for about 30 seconds as they ran out of the cab and ducked out […]
Honestly one of the weirder shoots I’ve been on, while walking with a man dressed as a giant shoe, across a street with traffic and into a large park on a windy spring day. It was windy enough that Kathleen, my editor slash assistant, was almost blown away holding the large octa box I gave […]
Knowing your subjects always helps. Often getting to know your subjects means doing some research, google, a bit of social media stalking, to get a feel for who they are, what they’ve accomplished, so that you have a familiarity going into the shoot. Of course, actually previously knowing your subject makes it all that much […]
Steve came to me asking for help conveying an image that he had in his head, it was a visual representation of how he felt. Scared, sexually abused, and silenced as a young boy, Steve has grown into a very capable and accomplished man. He’s a professional athlete, Iron-man competitor, and barefoot runner. You look […]
Spring is in the air here in Ottawa. Which is basically the familiar musk of rotting leaves and the leftovers of many a dog-walker from the winter, I swear, it’s worse than Paris in my Hintonburg neighbourhood. That said, I don’t think Winter is quite done yet, there’s always some sort of snowfall come April. […]
One of the problems I encounter as an editorial photographer is that the medium can dictate how we’re supposed to shoot. Newsprint, for example, doesn’t reproduce details well, and prints “wet” which can lead to ink transfers when the images contain too many black or dark colours.
