There's NOLA Place Like Home

Etsy.com, the web site that hosts our retail shop, Slippin' Southern is currently asking all of its shops for photos for a promotional video that they will be producing in the weeks to come. You can read more about their video project here: (http://www.flickr.com/groups/1947114@N24/pool/). 

The photo criteria was simple, submit a photo of yourself with your art near a famous local landmark. Since we recently moved our studio to New Orleans, Louisiana USA (NOLA for short) this was a no-brainer for us... 

We decided our tactic would be to shoot our new Big Red Gator sign in Jackson Square Park. Unfortunately, minutes into the shoot we quickly learned that you need some sort of permit to shoot any photos that are "staged" in the park if you are using signs. Fortunately, this turned into the setback we were looking for. It forced us to walk around the park and into the French Quarter to search for new backdrops to take pictures with.

Not only did we get our money shot, outside, but everybody just had to stop and ask us, "Hey, where were did you get that cool life-size red alligator?" Our answer always was, "Well at Slippin' Southern of course!" 

Later, we grabbed some coffee at Antoine's Annex (here's the link to the famous restaurant http://www.antoines.com/). As creative endevors go, we got this idea as we were walking around with our big honkin' gator to shoot a "Gator Cam" video. We call our little film short "There's "NOLA Place Like Home" featuring Slippin' Southern's exclusive "Red Gator."

The hardest part about making a video in the French Quarter is making sure that we didn't run into tourists as we all were walking down the street with the life-size gator. And if you ever find your self shooting a video of a reptile walkin' down the street, remember it takes three people, a prop handler, a videographer and a spotter (the spotter is the most important person in the crew).

The Big Red Gator sign will be hung outside our studio in the weeks to come. He is a big fella, if you are interested in purchasing one this size email us at SlippinSouthern@gmail.com. If he's too big for your wall, you might like our smaller Preppy Gator in our shop shown here.

Another funny thing is that a person walking down the street in the French Quarter with a 6 foot alligator looks normal to tourists that are already overwhelmed with the sights of the tourist mecca. Most people didn't give it a second thought and probably assumed that we had purchased it in a nearby shop. We also had several folks say to us as we were shooting "Hey, I really like your gator!"

We've been trying to think of a name for our new Red Gator, something Southern, if you have any ideas we'd like to hear from you... leave us a comment here!

Laissez les bon temps rouler, y'all!