It’s not every day we meet someone who casually drops, “Oh yeah, I’ve been all over the world with Schwarzkopf and Dan Rather.” So if the life of photographer Lou Bopp.
Bopp first moved to New York from St. Louis back in 1992 and started interning immediately at Sports Illustrated. He was there for six months and then began assisting photographers and by 1995 he was shooting his own projects. Lou specializes in corporate advertising, shooting people on location for everyone from Intel, Mercedes Benz, Time Warner to advertising agencies such as Ogilvy, McCann Erickson and Momentum. He has shot an impressive list of people including Madonna, Larry King, President Ford and Dolly Parton as well as a plethora of CEO’s. He toured Vietnam, Normandy and Hiroshima with Rather and Stormin’ Norman for several CBS News documentaries.
When he is not working for ‘da man’, Lou dives deep into his personal projects. Recently he has been shooting old Blues musicians deep in the Mississippi Delta. “There are about 30 guys left and I am trying to capture as many of them as I can before they are gone,” he told us. He has a book out, Hidden History of Mississippi Blues and a documentary about his experience titled, We Juke Up in Here! He is currently working on Moonshine and Mojo Hands has a gallery show of his portraits of the musicians opening up in St. Louis soon.
We caught up with Lou between shoots to hear about his personal style.
It’s all about comfort! I really get into these James Perse tee shirts I have been wearing recently. The quality and fit is great. Everything I wear always circles back to comfort. When shooting I am climbing, crawling and on my stomach, but I am also with clients so I can’t look like a total shlep.
When I am in the Delta I wear tees and camo shorts from the Gap. I’m just down and dirty there so no use even trying to wear something relatively nice.
I have a good amount of Kühl shirts and pants since they are made for rugged wear. I’m also a big fan of Levis 501. I like AG jeans too. In the winter you can usually find me in shirts from Ice Breaker, Prana and Patagonia. I have a NorthFace Harbor Down Jacket I wear when it’s really cold and go to Patagonia for rain jackets.
When I’m in dicey places for work I wear an old Seiko diving watch with a velcro band I got in high school. It’s great when I am traveling. Otherwise I’m sporting an Omega Sea Master. For shades I have a pair of Smith’s and Raybans. And you can usually find me in Merrill hiking boots.
Every winter I buy a black knit cap off the streets of NYC since I always loose the one from the last season. And in the summer I wear a baseball cap to tame the mane.
I have have a couple of suits in case I’m heading out to a nice place to eat or shooting on Wall Street. I like Hugo Boss and I have a pair of Ferragamo shoes to pair with my suits. The most expensive boot I ever bought was from John Varvatos! They were actually worth the price since they are really well made and always a pleasure to put on.
I have a couple of ties from DKNY and a lot of Gucci ties from the 80s that my mother would give me when she worked in retail.
I wear three bracelets at the moment, all made by my daughter, Rose.
Photo courtesy of © 2013 Joanna Kaslow All Rights Reserved.
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