Architectural Photography: BoysPlayNice

More than ever before, clean photography is indispensable to the presentation of architecture. It is a way for architects to record their work and allow it to be shared vastly through the extensive networks of social media channels and editorial platforms. In a recent interview with Architizer, Steven Holl of SHA exclaimed that he found photographs today to lie: “They’re distorted, with a wide angle or whatever, and when you actually go to the buildings that you think you’re going to like, they’re not as good as you thought in the photographs.”

Is this a fair reflection of the discipline? To give the photographers themselves a say in the matter, Architizer talked with Jakub Skokan and Martin Tůma ofBoysPlayNice, a Prague-based photography and concept studio that has captured the works of many Czech architects including Mjölk Architekti, DDAANN, Mar.s Architects, Mimosa Architects and FAM Architects. Skokan and Tůma studied commercial photography together at the Tomas Bata University in Zlín, Czech Republic, where they founded their studio in 2008.

BoysPlayNice photographing The Fence House by Mjölk Architekti

Architizer: What is your background with architecture and how was your interest for it born?

BoysPlayNice: We knew from the beginning that we wanted to aim our focus on inanimate objects and started out working mostly on products and product campaigns. After a few years, we gradually turned to architecture. This happened for multiple reasons: we didn’t want to spend the rest of our lives in studio, and we felt that focusing on architecture would bring us many opportunities to create interesting visuals. We also wanted more opportunities to publish our work, something that architecture photography brought us.

Guest Apartment by DDAANN and Mjölk Architekti

How do your experiences as photographers in advertising affect the way you behave with an architectural project when you are photographing it?

Our work in advertisement always centered around the creation of interesting and sophisticated pictures and visuals. Little by little, we developed our services to include concept design. Clients started to choose us for our approach to photography, which is different from that of a mainstream agency or studio. It is similar with architecture and architects. We enjoy working for those who are looking for new ways to bring their projects forward, who want to innovate. We strive for quality and interesting visuals in our work.

Chillin by DDAANN

How do you reconcile the experience of a three-dimensional space you visit with the final two-dimensional project (your photographs)?

In every project, we are trying to create the visual equivalent of non-visual features, the sensory experience of the depicted objects — fingertips on a smooth façade, raindrops on a metal rooftop, the scent of an old house. Inspiration sometimes comes directly from the architect’s personality or the object itself. It is never a matter of simple 3D to 2D conversion. Behind the photography, there is always an experience.

Nejen Bistro by Mar.s Architects

Where is light most important in your work?

Light in our photography is usually subjected to concept. For one project [the Carbon House], we photographed a house throughout the day, using the same aperture and shutter setting. The result is overwhelming, while the concept is quite simple and humane. At first, the house is indistinguishable from the darkness. It emerges with the sun and vanishes again at midday, when the sun is brightest. In the evening, it materializes again, this time from the light inside the building. At the end of the day, the house is swallowed by darkness again.

How do you consider the visual distortions that photography is capable of having on architecture?

Photography is only one of many ways to look at architecture. Distortion is a price you pay for the conversion of a 3D object to a 2D image.

Carbon House by DDAANN and Mjölk Architekti

Should spaces look lived in? What is your instinct for including humans in your shots?

That’s a difficult question. For us, it always starts with a discussion with the architect. Our view is usually a bit more distant. We prefer to have less things on the scene and prefer to take stuff out of the scene, rather than add to it.

Carbon House by DDAANN and Mjölk Architekti

People (and animals) in our photographs have relatively defined roles in relation to the project. We photographed a dancer from the National Theater, and through his movements, we explored the space of a newly built gymnasium by Mimosa Architects.

Gym by Mimosa Architects

For FAM Architects’ redesign of a public plaza [in Zbraslav, Prague], we photographed a man falling on the newly built stairs. Using cameras set at different viewpoints, our aim was to show that architecture functions in time, and that is very difficult to capture.

Public Plaza by FAM Architekti

Other than architecture, how do you enjoy practicing your art?

Whether working on architecture or other subjects, we try not to change our way of thinking about photography. Advertisement and architectural photography are art in themselves.

Gym by Mimosa Architects

The proliferation of social media platforms has changed the way the public consumes architectural imagery. How do you feel about sites such as Instagram and Pinterest? Do they conflict with or complement your profession?

What is changing is the way of presentation and proliferation of information, but the content is the same. “Good” things are getting to the top, “bad” things are forgotten. Old forms are vanishing, new forms are emerging. Social media is helping us present our work and the work of architects to a wider audience. Even with the array of social media and web platforms, there remains a wide variety of specialized web and printed media.

Interview edited for clarity