Capturing the journey
Another successful brand photography project has been delivered for our clients, East Midlands Railway (EMR). Over the last 20 years, we’ve cultivated a strong and collaborative relationship with the EMR brand and marketing teams, and we are thrilled to unveil the results from our most recent photoshoot for them.
Working closely with the EMR brand manager, m360 was once again entrusted with orchestrating a complex, multi-faceted photoshoot that captured the essence of EMR’s services and brand values. Our brief was to produce a comprehensive set of brand images categorised into key focus areas: customer experiences, onboard atmosphere, station life, destination locations, and trains in motion.
This week-long shoot saw our dedicated production team travelling to various locations across the country to capture authentic, candid moments of genuine customers using EMR services with photography by Guy Bettison. We aimed to reflect the diverse and vibrant community that EMR serves, portraying travellers from all walks of life. Emphasising Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) was important to truly represent EMR’s commitment to celebrating and embracing diversity. This involved capturing a wide range of leisure and business passengers, each representing different demographics, backgrounds, and lifestyles.
The primary goal of our shoot was to capture EMR’s unique blend of heritage, railway culture, and high-quality services. We aimed to replenish the EMR brand photography library with fresh, dynamic image assets that can be leveraged across a full spectrum of marketing channels, including social media, marketing literature, and their website. These new images will be pivotal in upcoming campaigns, helping to tell the EMR brand story and engage their audience more effectively.
Managing a project of this scale required meticulous planning and execution. Our team expertly handled all aspects of the production: from location scouting and logistics to train tracking, photography and art direction. In order to ensure a smooth process, we liaised with front-line teams at EMR, whilst securing the necessary documentation from each person photographed.
During post-production, we carefully selected the stand-out images, followed by editing and colour grading to enhance the visual appeal of each image. To streamline the organisation and retrieval of these images for EMR’s future use, we utilised AI technology to tag the image descriptions accurately to ensure that the EMR team can easily locate and utilise the relevant images whenever needed.
We look forward to seeing these images in action across upcoming campaigns and continuing our dynamic partnership with East Midlands Railway.
To summarise the scope and scale of our project:
- 5 days of creative shooting
- 16 locations across the country
- 100+ of authentic moments captured
- 200+ trains photographed in various settings
- 1000+ images curated and edited for EMR’s brand library
