It’s not every day that Migos opens a car wash, but in a recent campaign with Taylor Rainbolt for Finish Line, they did just that. Taylor met up with the hip hop trio to pop off on the whips, for the latest in the ongoing Shoes So Fresh campaign. Taylor captured a series of images that highlight Migos’ favorite products from Finish Line’s current selection. “We’re trying to create the vibe that it’s a party all the time, so it’s a lot of loud music, a lot of talking to talent and getting them excited and recreating almost an 80s party scene with the lighting and everything,” Taylor explains. “[Migos is] like actors in a sense where they just want the product to be amazing and do the take over and over again until they felt like it was right, so that was really great, it was a really great collaborative.” Riverdale actress Vanessa Morgan was also in attendance for when the party moved out to the pool.  You’ll notice a lot of the images are from different mediums, including digital and Polaroid, and that’s something that Taylor really enjoyed. “It was really cool because [Finish Line was] really adamant about me using film and stuff like that so I got to mix digital with film and play around with it,” Taylor says. “People like having tangible things and being able to process really fast. So, I’m getting what they are actually giving me. The mood is more authentic and we’re taking our time because I only have so many Polaroids in my camera.” With each moment being precious, a ton of care was brought into the creation of every image. The results are calibrated and carefully constructed in such a way that feels effortless. And when you’re partying with Migos and Finish Line that’s exactly what you want.

The Digital Age has done more than merely change how we interact with one another socially, it’s also reshaped the entire economy. With these new relationships have come new jobs, and some of those jobs are super niche. Emoji Designers, playlist curators, international tutors, all these specialized jobs (and hundreds more) are only possible thanks to our online culture. And some of them are a little hard to explain. The Economist recently started a series on the 21st-Century jobs and asked Ryan McAmis to help bring them to life. Each article describing the stories behind these particular careers is preceded with a 3D mixed media collage from Ryan that offers a characterization of the worker and their unique career. Because Ryan uses a bevy of different materials, each creation is filled with different textures and colors, as well as surprising depth and emotion. Because of the sophisticated simplicity of the compositions, Ryan has to be careful about the choices he makes, and that affords him the opportunity to experiment a little bit. In the latest piece about the Emoji Designer, Ryan saw the chance to include a special light feature for the first time ever. He used a dollhouse light to give the designer’s phone a familiar glow. “I don’t know why, it just kind of pops into my head and it just works,” says Ryan. “And then after I photographed it, I tweaked it in Photoshop to make it look even better.” Part of the fun of these pieces is introducing whole new careers to an audience that’s generally of the traditional capitalism and commerce model. Ryan similarly doesn’t run into these unique careers frequently, so he’s finding it to be an educational experience himself. By approaching it this way, he’s become the ideal voice to introduce The Economist’s readers to this newer edge of the economy. “I’m terrible with technology so the one I’m doing today I had to do a lot of research on so I’m learning a lot,” explains Ryan. “I’m trying to explain it to people that don’t know either.” All of us, whether we’re creating brand new jobs for ourselves or watching them form from the outside, are better served by actively pursuing a greater understanding of the new economic landscape. Thanks to Ryan and The Economist we can learn a little more every day.

Jonah Hills’ big break came more than 20 years ago when he starred in Superbad alongside Michael Cera and Christopher Mintz-Plasse. He continued to prove himself a formidable actor over the coming years, but his original pursuit was always to be on the other side of the camera. This year we’ll finally see Jonah Hill in the form he always imagined for himself, the role of Director. This week’s New Yorker features a cover story about the writer turned actor turned director with photographs by Marco Grob. Marco offers two portraits of Hill, the cover is a complex black and white while the inner photographs is a much more straightforward color image. On the cover, Marco engaged every bit of light mastery, employing a collection of sources that cover together on Hill’s face, freezing him into a dynamic representation that is scarcely offered in traditional portraiture. The composition is exacting with an entire light meant just to highlight his left eye, creating a look that is striking. It pulls Hill out of the expected trope of a youthful funny man into the aesthetics typically reserved for Orson Wells and Alfred Hitchcock. A duotone blur at the edges of red and blue add to the otherworldly quality of the image.  On the inside of the magazine, Marco offers a more convention photograph of Hill, one dressed in the clothes he wore to the companion interview, once that invites us to the table to sit with him and hear him and his story. It’s not the same story that we’ll see in Hill’s upcoming mid90s, nor is it the story whose lines he’s spoken for the last two decades. It’s his story, one that he’s still writing but we’re welcome to hear.

Calm is an elusive emotion. It seems like the world is set up to stress us out – and for good reason. When we’re stressed we act impulsively, and not always in our best interest. That can mean buying products we don’t need or indulging when we normally wouldn’t. That’s for most of us. But some of us have to act valiantly under pressure, under stress. For those people, they have to find a calm in any situation where they can work from a place of power. That’s the topic of this month’s cover story of The Observer Magazine, and the publication invited Kyle Bean to bring the concept to life in a single image. Of course, Kyle went above and beyond. Teaming up with London-based photographer Sara Morris, Kyle invested in an inventive concept that he was able to explore in a series of different executions. Remembering the old steady hand buzzer games where the player is meant to navigate a metal wand over a fixed pathway or risk a light and buzzer, Kyle created the same game but used the pathway as a way to communicate. In the first incarnation, Kyle spelled out “CALM” to be emblazoned across the front of the magazine. He kept it going by also engaging the light, and with those two images was able to create a GIF that shows the light blinking as if there were failure. A second version of the concept uses the metal path to illustrate an EKG’s reading of the human heart. Both versions of Kyle and Morris’ creation play on what it means to stay calm under pressure, even when the challenge is the calm. These moments are indescribably crucial: Sully Sullenberger landing US Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River or South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster ordering evacuation ahead of a hurricane. These choices can often involve the lives of thousands and depend upon acting with a clear head. Finding calm under immense stress is a skill and a tool, and one that you never know you may need until everything is on the line. Does that stress you out?

Sometimes sneakers are more than just sneakers. Foot Locker’s latest collection with ASICS, the Dojo Collection, tells a whole story about integrity, courage, and discipline – thanks to Shotopop. Before the shoes released, Shotopop directed and animated an anime series of five episodes with Luka Sabbat on his own samurai adventure. Ghosts, ramen, and a lot of akido converge in a campaign that extends beyond the animations. After all, the Bushito code is all encompassing, so why shouldn’t a sneaker campaign be, too? The Sun and The Snake is the name of the collection and the animations, but it also represents the two dojos of two classes of samurai that Sabbat’s character is torn between. The Snake is where he has been training while his shoes were stolen by the nefarious Rising Sun. Over the course of five episodes, Sabbat is tested. His skills, his courage, and his loyalty all come under fire and the question is how he will come out the other end. Creating five minutes of original animation is a massive feat, especially when creating a new world. Shotopop developed the characters and aesthetics before Sabbat was even cast, so while Shotopop had some images locked down, they tailed the characters to match the actors who would play them. (You can see the behind the scenes development and how these changes were implemented if you head over to their Instagram.) But the artistry didn’t stop there. ASICS even used art from Shotopop on the packaging and distribution of the sneakers. The series is a lot of fun (and plenty funny). We won’t spoil it, but you may find that ultimately everything is not what it seems.

When brands come to photographers it’s for one of two reasons: either the photographer fits exactly with the brand’s established aesthetic or they want to explore something new. The Selby’s latest campaign with Polo Ralph Lauren is in the latter camp, an opportunity to play in the middle ground between the brand’s heritage and Todd’s techniques. And the results are a lot of fun. “Polo Ralph Lauren has such a strong singular image around what they do and then I have a strong point of view about what I do, and they have such a clean aesthetic and I’m a maximalist, but we connect on the positivity,” Todd explains. “Everything I do is an endorsement of the people that I photograph. I find these amazing people and share them with the world. And I think that Polo really celebrates people and personal style, and I think that celebration of American style was the way that we connected.” The shoot was an exposition of families preparing to go back to school. We think of Polo Ralph Lauren as an exclusive fashion brand, but this was a great opportunity to present a more accessible identity. “It's nice that Polo Ralph Lauren is a fashion brand but it’s also embracing people,” says Todd. “They’re not preaching exclusivity or exclusion, so it’s very inclusive which is very American and also very positive. I really appreciate that.” Todd’s work has always been an expression of authenticity and an invitation into the lives of his subjects, and they were able to do that while still showing off the best from what Polo Ralph Lauren has to offer. “It was really cool,” Todd says. “They were really open with me doing my thing. Once we found these great families and got them in the clothes, it was very them but it’s also very me. So, it was kind of one of those ideal situations.”