As you may know, whenever a photoshoot is planned for a specific season or marketing campaign, it always needs to be scheduled a couple of months before the actual season change - which can be tough in the winter - but for fall, it’s not so bad. We only had to hope for sunny days and that the temperature wouldn’t be too hot since our models were going to be wearing long sleeves and knit sweaters. We actually were really lucky because during the days we were shooting for our fall and back-to-school campaigns, the temperature was not too hot and it was really sunny and bright outside! 
Frames: Dior Black Tie and Esprit Et17569
We had the chance to explore many locations during our shoot, one of them was the Marché Jean-Talon. For those of you that have not had the chance to visit Montreal, the Marché Jean-Talon is a farmer’s market located in the Little Italy district. During the peak summer period, the market’s open-air stands are occupied by about 300 vendors, mostly farmers from the countryside north and south of Montreal. Amongst the places where we were kindly allowed to take pictures, people who often go the Marketmight recognize the kiosks of the Fleuriste chez Michel, the Café Saint-Henri, the Verger Éric Lécuyer, Les Trottier Fruits et Légumes and the beautiful kiosk of the Ferme André Plouffe.
Frames: Seraphin Montclair
We also had the chance to capture some shots on the beautiful terrace of the Pizzeria NO.900 on Bernard Avenue. The location was ideal for us because the restaurant was not very busy in the morning and the owner generously allowed us to shoot both inside and outside the restaurant. The best thing about taking pictures in a pizzeria is obviously the mouth-watering smell. It literally smelled like pizza the whole time we were shooting and we could not wait for our lunch break to eat their delicious Neapolitan inspired pizza.
Frames: TLG 037
Many of our photos were also taken in the Saint-Viateur park, which is located right next to IRIS Outremont. Shooting our fall campaign photos during the summertime can actually be a little challenging because the trees and the grass are really green. Of course, a little editing can help to make the background look a little less ‘’summer-y’’, but we had to be careful not to include too much vegetation in our photos. We were also extremely lucky because in this park, there was a tree from which the leaves had already started to fall! This poor tree probably suffered from the many heatwaves we had in Montreal this summer because its leaves had even started to yellow, which was perfect for our fall shoot!
Frames: Steve Madden Threadded Honey and Isaac Mizrahi IM30030
This year, we also wanted to take some time to take our own photos for our back-to-school event and our team had the idea to cast the models! IRIS truly is a big family and we thought it would be a great idea to ask our team members if they would agree to have their kids or teens be the face of the brand for our back-to school campaign. We were thrilled to be able to take some photos of the extended members of the IRIS family. We have to admit that we were a little nervous for the shoot with the little ones because we did not have much experience shooting with children, who can sometimes be a little harder to direct, even if their parents were to be on set with us. We were mentally prepared for an organized mess with joyful kids, but in the end, they were really calm and they listened carefully to our instructions. This shoot definitely was a success! In the end, we realized that the key to having kids look comfortable on camera was to take pictures of them while they were actually playing, running and colouring with chalk. Our shoot with our IRIS teens also went super smoothly! They were all really photogenic and easy to direct. If they were to pursue a career in modelling, we would definitely encourage them! We had so much fun shooting these photos and we are definitely looking forward to organizing more shoots that feature the members of our big IRIS family!
In the end, we feel that we were really lucky because within these 3 days, we were able to take plenty of photos that we will be able to use for our printed promotions, website and social media postings. It truly was a wonderful shoot and we couldn’t have hoped for better weather and better models!
