Behind the Tip-Off: The Making of the NBA’s 2025 Ad Campaign

Some advertising photographers equate the degree of stress during a high-profile shoot as a metric of their skill as a photographer: If you’re stressed, then perhaps you were unprepared or lacked knowledge, they might say. I don’t think that’s always the case, as sometimes the extreme challenge of a complicated image requires stress to realize its full creative potential.

When I received the phone call asking me to photograph the key art for the NBA’s 2024-2025 season, I was excited. I had worked with many of the players previously, so I was comfortable with knowing what limitations to expect on set.

However, upon seeing the storyboard for the image, I realized this was going to be a very challenging photo shoot that required complete precision and focus in both the planning and the execution on set.

The parameters were that approximately 50 people would be in the image, all to be photographed separately and recomposed back together. By that small description alone, you can probably already see multiple complications.

The Men’s Olympic Basketball Team was practicing in Las Vegas, so our best course of action for the production was to close down half of the Bellagio and utilize their ballrooms for the studio. However, compounding the difficulty was the fact that there were multiple media outlets doing interviews there and other commercials being filmed during the very busy week that the athletes were in town. To say that it was a circus is an understatement.

During the planning phase of the photo shoot, I entertained three different cameras because all of them had different pros and cons depending on how we would approach the image. When I learned from the client that we would not have athletes for more than a minute each (yet another complication and point of stress), the decision was made that the Nikon Z9 was the best camera for the job. When combined with Profoto Pro-10 packs, we would be shooting ten frames a second with each athlete, as every second counts when you only have them for a minute.

My production team traveled from their home bases across multiple states to Las Vegas and, thanks to extensive pre-production planning, was immediately on the same page. We set up a lighting scheme that would be dynamic yet broad enough with its contrast ratio so that the players would not be lost in shadows.

The idea of the campaign was to show an image featuring the tip-off. The players would all be lunging for the ball while surrounded by fans that existed almost in a pyramid around them, showing the support upon which the NBA lives. Its fan base is special, and you could tell from the players’ enthusiasm on set that they knew this as well. With the ad agency, Glow, and NBA marketing team by my side, the enthusiasm and energy on set was electric. However, we knew that the schedules of the players were going to be sporadic at best, and on one of the days, there were almost five hours between athletes.

Five hours of waiting for 60 seconds of photos is taxing. It was difficult as I had gotten into a rhythm quickly with the first three athletes, and then having to put on the brakes was mentally challenging. I actually took a second camera up to my hotel room during the time off and practiced with it for a couple of hours so that when I came back to set for the next basketball player, I would be sharp.

All of the players are the best of the best in the league, and that carried over into their on-set decorum: every single one of them worked hard on set and carried himself in a manner of complete professionalism. While it takes a lot of trust for a client to believe that a photo shoot of an athlete can be done in less than a minute, it is a two-part dance as the artist can only create it when the subject works together with them. The result of this campaign is just as much on the shoulders of the players as it is on mine.

Beyond the players, we photographed tons of fans, celebrities, and even a mascot to serve as the support characters in the frame. Heck, if you look closely enough, you may even find yours truly in the crowd, supporting his home team, the Phoenix Suns.

While the time limitations of a minute did not exist for the non-athlete extras in the frame, this didn’t mean that they didn’t work equally as hard to put forward the emotion justified by the shot. Again, a photo shoot is not the result of just the photographer but the support of the team around them on set.

Please enjoy the image and the behind-the-scenes video from this campaign, and more importantly, have a great week.

About the author: Blair Bunting is a Phoenix commercial photographer. You can see more of his work on his website, blog, Facebook, and Instagram.