Very creative people at Masterlift Forklifts in Oakville Ontario have produced a 2019 print calendar, which means they have photographed and published a large format print collection of beautiful images and detailed captions. This functional office decoration captures and displays behind-the-scenes glimpses inside nine Toronto area factories, and three more images show the inner workings of the famed forklift rental shop. The very first image is December 2018 in which Gary Wilson the company’s CEO himself appears and introduces the collection.
Every Masterlift forklift job site depicted in the calendar details a different use-case scenario with different equipment requirements. In some places shown in the calendar, the equipment is wholly owned by the enterprise, and Masterlift only services their machines, while in other illustrations, the calendar images show businesses renting the equipment they need to complete specific tasks. You can read Masterlift’s blog about the 2019 Calendar project on their website. Some are true moments in time, like the pictures of Lauren Alders at work on a Masterlift Forklift at Hub Climbing in Mississauga.
Hub Climbing Mississauga is a super gym with very high walls. The builders used forklifts to paint and set the ‘boulders’ along the base and the first twenty feet, and the remaining thirty feet had to be completed while suspended in mid air.
Regardless of whether the lifts are used to load freight containers or tractor trailers, Masterlift offers a wide variety of equipment for every application. Gary also has created a forklift safety check app, Mastercheck App.
The way the company decided where to shoot was simple; they simply went through their Rolodex of clients and started calling their closest friends. They asked their best and most trusted rental and service clients if they could photograph attractive employees (models and influencers) working inside their busy factory loading docks. By presenting twelve different set-ups, different models and locations in their calendar, Masterlift really does illustrate the diversity of their clientele.
Joel Levy used a Canon 5D Mark3 with a 20MM 2.8 Canon wide lens and Canon 50mm 1.4 lens with an off camera flash with triggers on some shots. Joel’s blog post about shooting Masterlift’s 2019 calendar elaborates on how he executed a commando-style portrait photography campaign with no location scout, and no professional lighting team, and no hair & makeup; he worked with what he found on site, and should be congratulated for creating such breathtaking images.
While digital calendars provide a great deal of flexibility, and can be synchronized with devices and thereby streamline real-time scheduling, there’s something special about a paper calendar. It’s tangible, it’s easy to use, and you don’t need a device or WiFi to see and use this device.
Masterlift’s 2019 Calendar has big boxes for each day and special occasions and holidays marked out for each month. The calendar is purposely built for busy people, and Shippers & Receivers who post this near their workstation will use the item to organize their own objectives but also to focus staff, increase productivity while improving moral throughout the department
AM 640 talk show show host Laura Bilotta posed at Dan’s Welding for the photograph that would become the calendar’s December 2019 featured image. This Burlington area business has provided welding and custom fabrication services since 1960, and Joel managed to photograph the men at work in the background. The photo shoot happened at the back of the 18,000-square-foot shop beside machines for shearing and bending metal, and all around the shoot were welders at work in the background.
Laura Bilotta wrote about posing for the 2019 Masterlift Calendar on her blog, Single in the City in the Sheet Metal Plant.
