Commercial Photography
by Doug Garrabrants
During the 1980s Doug Garrabrants was a commercial product photographer in Los Angeles, CA. By 1990 Mr. G. had developed a still life style of studio photography which was the precursor to the Photoshop manipulated images so ubiquitous today. These effects were achieved using fiber optic “painting with the light” and image layering in camera and in the dark room. His painting with light is evident in a 1993 two page spread in The Workbook featuring “Madame Wong” and “Odalisque“.
In 1994 he published an archaeological dig exposing “Timberland Shoes” and a junkyard scene with fish in an Evian bottle “Evian, For An Impure World“. This image is hand colored by Lena Fransioli.
1995 brought his examples of photo compositing, “remember, Photoshop was in it’s infancy”, said Mr. G, with his take on the ubiquitous Absolute ads “Absolute Gothic” and Apples advertising with “da Vinci’s Workbook“.
In 1996, Lena, gave Doug a workshop with Joyce Tennyson and that pushed his interest in the direction of fine art portraiture. This new path in photography for Mr. G. was illustrated in his final spread in The Workbook with “Mave And Lauren“, (a Christmas portrait of the children of Jim Wilson, the Director of Dances With Wolves), and “Lena In Snow“, (an iconic portrait of his wife and Muse).
By the turn of the millennium Mr. G had shifted his focus from photography to graphic design and wallpaper. His photography skills help him digitized Lena Fransioli and Brooke Sheldon’s murals with accurate, high resolution reproductions of the original artwork which are available in archival mural papers from Zoe Design.
