Frequently asked questions about working with Studio Ballena

Studio Ballena is a Belgian commercial photography and video studio founded in 2011 and based in Welle, near Aalst in East Flanders. We specialise in food, drink and product photography and video for advertising, marketing and e-commerce, working with brands directly and with creative and advertising agencies. The studio is equipped for tabletop and packshot work, motion control, high-speed video and full food styling productions.

Studio Ballena was founded by Bert Balcaen, who shoots and directs the work himself. For larger productions we bring in a trusted core of freelance specialists: food stylists, prop stylists, set constructors, special effects artists and graphic artists, chosen for what the brief needs.

Studio Ballena was founded in 2011. Bert Balcaen spent five years working alongside a mentor in the photographic industry before that, and more than a decade before that running production at a flexible packaging company. That's where the understanding of FMCG brands, print production, colour accuracy and quality control comes from, and it's a large part of why complex briefs from agencies and brand teams tend to land as familiar territory. More on that on the about page.

Our photography services cover food and drink photography, product and advertising photography, packshots and e-commerce imagery, and creative concept development for clients who need it. We shoot in our own studio and on location, and we offer full post production including compositing, retouching, colour correction and image adaptation for all formats and applications.

We produce tabletop and studio-based video for food, drink and product — including advertising films, social media content, explainer videos and training video productions. We shoot with an 8K high-resolution camera and a 5K high-speed camera for slow motion footage. On top of standard video production we offer motion control using robotic camera systems, which allows for precisely repeatable camera moves that are essential for premium advertising content and composite shots.

Two ways to work with us. We can produce the film ourselves, from concept and previs through the shoot to final delivery, with the robot as one tool among the studio, the lighting and the effects rigs. Or we come in as a specialist unit on your production: the robot, our operator and the effects rigging, working to your director and DOP.

The second one is how most production houses use us. You keep the production, we handle the part that needs a robot and someone who runs it every week. Full detail on the motion control page, day rates on the rental page, and the practical questions about previs, VFX handoff and shoot days are answered in the motion control section further down this page.

We run a Camerabotics CRX1440 with 1440mm of reach, an 11kg payload, moves up to 3m/s and repeatability of ±0.04mm. It runs on 230V mains or battery, and it's small and light enough to fit through standard doors and most lifts, so it travels. Full detail on the motion control service page, and day rates on the motion control rental page.

The base rate is from €2,500 per day. That covers the robot, our operator and the studio in Welle. A prep or pre-visualisation day is from €1,250. Cameras, lighting, lenses and effects rigs are priced per item, and transport is from €150 within 250km of the studio and from €250 within 500km, which covers Benelux, northern France and western Germany. Everything is a "from" price, and multi-day and bundle rates apply. The full rate table is on the rental page.

That's for hiring the rig and operator into your own production. If you want us to produce the film, that's quoted against the brief rather than by the day. Ask on the contact page and we'll come back with a number rather than a range.

No. We don't do dry hire. Motion control precision depends on the person programming the move as much as it does on the machine, so the robot and an operator come as a pair. Your wider crew is a separate question: bring your own DOP, gaffer and stylists, or scale up with ours.

For a straightforward robot shoot without complex special effects, around three setups in a day is realistic, provided the moves have been prepared and roughly pre-programmed in advance. That's what the prep days are for.

Complexity moves that number in both directions. A set that has to be rebuilt between shots, or effects rigs that need syncing to the move, will bring it down. Tell us the shot list early and we'll give you an honest figure rather than an optimistic one.

It gets reprogrammed. How long that takes depends on how invasive the change is. Nudging a start point or adjusting timing is fifteen minutes. Rethinking the geometry of the move from scratch can take a few hours.

This is the main argument for a prep day and for signing off previs before the shoot. Changes are entirely possible, they just cost shoot-day time, and shoot-day time is the expensive kind.

Yes. We work in Lensmaster, which has an offline 3D previs mode: we can build and simulate the camera move, the lens changes and the framing in a virtual scene without the robot connected, then export a previs for you and the client to look at.

For agency and brand work this tends to be the most useful thing we do before the shoot. Everyone sees the shot, argues about it while arguing is cheap, and signs it off. Then the shoot day is execution rather than discovery.

In both directions. Moves export as FBX, so the exact camera path goes to your VFX or 3D team for compositing and post: they get the real camera data rather than an approximation matched by eye afterwards. But we can also import moves and 3D assets designed by your 3D team in Maya, Blender or Cinema 4D to use as a base for the move programming.

The setup also supports genlock and timecode input, so the robot syncs cleanly with other cameras, LED wall refresh and anything else on your production's clock. Raise it at the briefing stage and we'll configure for it.

Yes. Camera, robot and target tracking stream live to Unreal Engine over FreeD or Live Link, so virtual and physical elements stay aligned for real-time compositing and LED wall shoots. With genlock and timecode in the same setup, the wall, the camera and the move stay locked to each other.

We can also preview and align the virtual LED wall content inside our own scene view before the shoot, which means the move gets planned knowing exactly what the background will be doing behind it. Fewer surprises on the day, and the previs you approve is a real representation of the final frame rather than a camera path floating in grey space.

Yes, and this is where motion control stops being just a camera and starts being the whole shot. Effects triggers, lighting changes and connected devices can all fire from the same animation timeline as the camera move. A drop releases on the exact frame, every take, whether that's take three or take thirty.

We build our own special effects rigs for this: droppers, launchers, a liquid drip system, turntables, a product rotator and a conveyor belt. Focus, iris and zoom are keyframed on the same timeline too, so a rack focus lands identically on every pass.

Yes. The 180m² studio is available to photographers, filmmakers and production companies, with or without crew. Gear can be hired separately or alongside it. Rates and what's included are on the studio rental, gear rental and motion control rental pages. The motion control robot is the one exception to hire-it-yourself: it always ships with our operator.

For stills we shoot on a Phase One IQ4 150MP medium format system with Schneider Kreuznach Blue Ring lenses, a Sinar P3 technical camera with Sinaron HR lenses and eShutter for perspective control, and a Nikon Z9. Lighting for stills is Broncolor and ProFoto flash.

For video it's an 8K RED V-Raptor X and a 5K Freefly Ember S5K for high-speed work, lit with Aputure LED (3× 600D, 1× 600C, 2× STORM 1200x), which is flicker-free at high frame rates. Post runs on high-performance workstations with a triple backup storage system. Everything is listed page by page under gear rental, since most of it is also available to hire.

Every project starts with a conversation — either a call or a meeting — where we ask the questions we need to understand what you're looking for. We want to know the brief, the intended use of the images or video, the timeline and the budget parameters before we put a proposal together. Getting this right at the start saves time and avoids misalignment later.

A typical project moves through these stages: briefing and creative concept development, pre-production (prop sourcing, product delivery, shot list planning), the shoot itself, post production (retouching, compositing, colour work or video editing), and final delivery of digital files in the required formats. For simpler projects some stages are condensed; for complex advertising productions there may be additional review and approval stages built in. We'll map this out clearly when we scope the project.

When a client comes to us without an agency or an existing creative direction, we take on the concept development ourselves. We'll develop visual proposals based on the brief, your brand references and the intended application of the images, then refine the direction based on your feedback before moving into pre-production. This is a service we offer as part of a full production package — not as a standalone creative consultancy.

The main variables are the type of photography or video, the number and complexity of the products, the number of final deliverables and their intended applications. Additional services — creative concept development, food or prop styling, set construction, location fees, motion control and post production complexity — all have a bearing on the budget. We provide a detailed quote based on your specific brief and are transparent about what is included and why.

Yes. For packshot and product photography involving a large number of SKUs we work with graduated pricing depending on volume. Contact us for a concrete quote based on your product range.

Files are delivered digitally via a download platform — we typically use Digital Pigeon. Download links are active for a limited period. If you need a new link after it has expired, just send us an email and we'll generate one.

Yes. We deliver in whatever file formats and specifications your application requires — whether that's high-resolution print files, web-optimised images, social media crops or specific technical formats such as GS1 compliant imagery. We're experienced across all common use cases and can liaise directly with your printers, packaging suppliers or platform partners where that's useful.

Turnaround time depends on the scope and complexity of post production. Straightforward shoots can turn around in a few days; more complex productions with compositing or video editing may take a few weeks. We agree on a realistic delivery timeline at the start of the project and communicate any changes along the way.

Confidentiality is a standard part of how we operate. We regularly work with brands during the development and pre-launch phase of new products, and we handle all associated materials — documents, products, images — with appropriate discretion. This extends to the freelance partners we bring in for your project. If you need a formal non-disclosure agreement, we're happy to put one in place before work begins.

Yes. We're experienced with the technical requirements for retail packaging imagery, including GS1 standards. If your images need to meet specific technical specifications for packaging, retail listings or print production, let us know at the briefing stage and we'll ensure the deliverables are compliant from the start.