A CONVERSATION WITH SCOTT HIGHTON, PART 1
The first half of a 2-part conversation.
by Doug DeRusha
Likely the most successful VR photographer in the industry, Scott Highton is a consummate professional who is as widely recognized for his savvy business approach as he is for his photographic prowess. He was the very first photographer to be involved in virtual reality (VR) technologies at the encouragement of Apple, and his client list includes such notable companies as Eastman Kodak, Toyota, BMW, Disney, Toshiba, and Microsoft.
He was hired by Apple to shoot the first commercial QTVR project ever produced (the Apple Company Store in Cupertino) and his notoriety as a VR photographer grew again when he shot the Masco Show Home - a QuickTime VR tour of a multimillion dollar show home built to display all the product lines that Masco and its subsidiaries (such as Delta, Baldwin, Thermador, etc.) offered to buyers. Scott was also first to produce cubic panos before the technology was released by Apple, and his cubic work is exemplified by his cubic VR shots of rock climbers (one of them is Scott) hanging in mid-air part way up the sheer face of El Capitan in California.
In addition to still photography and VR, Scott also enjoys documentary film projects, and he has an impressive list of film credits to show for it. From "Lost World of the Maya" shot in Chiapas, Mexico and "The Free Willy Story" produced in 1996 about Keiko, the killer whale, to "Wild World of the East" and "Challenge of the Seas," two extensive (26 episode) wildlife series shot in a variety of locations around the world. As the director of photography on several films in a documentary series for the Discovery Channel, he climbed Mt. Kenya accompanied by a tribal holy man, two of Africa's top climbing guides and 38 porters, and shot a one-hour film on the 17,000-foot mountain.
Whatever drives Scott to push the boundaries of immersive imaging from a creative standpoint, is also what drives him to ensure that his work is managed professionally in terms of contracts, copyright, and control over the images that he creates. In a recent post to the QTVR listserv he writes, "preventing people from being able to see (or copy) your work is generally counterproductive to promoting or advertising that work. U.S. and international copyright laws offer protection against unauthorized copying or usage of any creative work, and copyright protection is automatic to the author from the moment that work is fixed in a tangible form (i.e. recorded on film, digital media, paper, etc.) When you register your copyright with the U.S. Copyright office, you protect that work with real teeth."
And he has some steadfast opinions on the value of a photographer's work - the creative output - as well as the value of the photographers skill set, which ultimately determines the quality and value of the creative output itself. As Scott points out, "If one individual is willing to undervalue their work (whether intentionally or simply because they don't know any better), they foster a reduction of the entire market place, as others are forced to lower their standards/prices to compete. When the "lowballer" eventually goes out of business (and they usually do), those who survive are left with an industry that is often tarnished and may never recover from the price war game they played."
Scott also takes a very pragmatic approach to the creative process in the pursuit of excellence in the photographic field. One quote of his in particular seems to drive the message home with eloquence, "Truly creative individuals look at a challenge in front of them, look at the tools that they have available, and develop their own approaches or solutions. You don't have to have the most expensive camera or lens, the most sophisticated hardware/software, or follow the route of most danger. You simply have to create the most efficient and elegant results you can within whatever limitations you face."
For those of you wondering how to tap into Scott's brain to extract a little of that knowledge and experience, you'll be glad to know that he's currently writing a book on Virtual Reality Photography which will also include an extensive section on Business Practices.
If you just can't wait for the book to come out, you can join us right now in an in-depth interview with Scott Highton....
 One of the first QTVR demos I saw of yours was the Apple Company Store, which was on the original QuickTime VR Authoring Tools Suite CD. With the VR hardware and software available at the time, you must have run into some problems in the creation of this very notable piece of work. Maybe you could give us a behind-the-scenes perspective on what it took to accomplish this job, and some background on being chosen by Apple to do the work.
 This was one of those situations that arose out of being prepared, and being in the right place at the right time. My office phone rang at around 8:00 on a Friday night in August of 1994. I happened to hear it because I was playing catch with my son in our yard, and the door to my office was open. The call was from the R&D group at Apple that was developing QTVR. They were looking for professional photographers to interview for a shoot using the new technology. They wanted to see how a photographer approached the process, rather than relying on the experience of their engineers, who up until that point were the only ones who had worked with it. I asked how they found my name, and they said it was from a five-year old ad I had run in a local film & production directory.
The following week, I showed up for the interview with Ted Casey and Tod Junkin, and was a bit surprised when they only looked at one image in my portfolio. I was offered the assignment the next day, and we shot the Apple Company Store following about two more weeks of planning and preparation. The shoot itself was done over a three-day, two-night period. We did it at night for two reasons: 1) it allowed us to work around the schedule of the store's normal operating hours and 2) it eliminated the need to put color correction gels over all the windows to color balance the interior and exterior lighting (a savings of about $1,500 and half a day’s work). We did wind up having to gel all the fluorescent light fixtures in the store to match the dominant tungsten lighting, and then used a corrective filter on the camera lens to balance for the daylight film we used.
We shot with a Nikon 35mm camera and a fairly expensive Nikkor 15mm lens - the standard at the time for QTVR panoramic. We mounted this camera on a Bogen cinema tripod (on locking wheels), atop an assembly of two Bogen heads, a variety of brackets and several bubble levels that allowed us to level the camera, adjust the nodal point and determine our pan increments properly between shots. There were no commercial VR heads available at that time, and Apple wanted QTVR authors to be able to produce content using exclusively off-the-shelf hardware. This shoot was the proving ground for all these ideas.
During the shoot, I asked Ted what factors led them to hire me to be the first QTVR photographer. His response was: A) You answered your phone late on a Friday night (they didn't leave messages for other photographers who didn't answer personally), B) You had some experience with digital technologies (not because I was being asked to do anything digitally on this shoot, but because I would have an appreciation of what THEY would be doing on the post-production end of the project), and C) Because it was evident during your interview that you were a working professional photographer, rather than a wanna-be or hobbyist.
At this point, I couldn't help reminding him that he had only looked at a single image in my portfolio during the interview, and asked how he could tell the quality of my work from that one image. He responded that they had interviewed three other photographers prior to me on that day, and that one had forced them to look at over 100 tear sheets of his. They were absolutely sick of looking at pictures. The first image of mine that they saw, combined with my professional portfolio presentation, left them with no doubt that I was capable and competent as a professional photographer. They also quickly sensed that I was open to learning about what they had to offer, rather than feeling a need to force my way of doing things upon them. My limited digital experience, which was relatively uncommon at that time, was an added plus.
I look back at the way an opportunity presented itself to me (simply because I was willing to answer my phone late on a Friday night) and the tremendous impact it had on my career. I realize that success is often founded on an ability to recognize opportunities when they come along and to keep an open mind to possibilities along the way.
I know one of your favorite VR shoots was in the Galápagos Islands, where you worked with TerraQuest and World Travel Partners on their landmark "Virtual Galápagos" online web expedition. How did you become involved in this pioneering 10-Day project, and what kind of experiences did you have with the underwater shoots?
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