Commercial Work — What Happens When the Client Trusts You
The portfolio you see on this site is the artistic work — the editorial films, the underground nights, the portraits that exist only because someone gave me complete freedom.
This is the other side.
Commercial work is not a compromise. It's a different kind of challenge — one where the constraints are the brief, the brand, and the expectation of a client who has invested real money in what you're about to make. I approach every commercial project with the same passion I bring to a personal editorial. The client is different. The energy is the same.
These are some of the projects I carry with me.
Fila — Genova
The brief was for the Asian market — Korea and China. The location was Genova: the historic center, the seafront, and a tall ship anchored in the harbor.
I was alone. No crew, no drone. For the sequences on the ship, I filmed from a rubber dinghy on the water — circling the vessel, shooting upward toward the sails and the deck, managing camera and boat at the same time. It was one of the most physically demanding shoots I've ever done and one of the most beautiful.
There are days on the job that stay with you permanently. That was one of them.
Doppelganger Roma — The Artist's Workshop
I've worked with Doppelganger Roma for several years — both e-commerce content and creative video. The relationship has given me the chance to grow alongside a brand that knows its identity.
My favorite project with them was shot in the workshop of a Roman artist who creates sculptures in iron. The space was raw and extraordinary — metal, fire, physical labor, beauty made by hand. The film captures something about craft and material that I find more interesting than any polished studio shoot.
Le Pupille — Morellino di Scansano
This has nothing to do with fashion. Le Pupille is one of the most important wineries in the Morellino di Scansano appellation — their vineyards face almost directly toward the sea.
I shot exclusively with drone. The work was about light and color — warm tones, the relationship between the vines and the horizon, the particular quality of Tuscan afternoon light close to the coast. Color grading was everything on this project. The landscape does the storytelling; the filmmaker just has to get out of the way.
Garage9 — Porsche d'Epoca, Roma
Garage9 restores and sells vintage Porsches in Rome. When you're filming a car that beautiful, the question isn't what to shoot — it's how to do it justice.
We used a camera car combined with aerial drone footage. The combination of ground-level speed and elevation creates a visual tension that static shooting never achieves. A vintage Porsche is a moving sculpture. It needs to move.
Andrea Casta — Circo Massimo & Aeronautica Militare
Andrea Casta is an electric violinist. Over the years we've shot together in extraordinary situations — but two stand out completely.
The first: the opening of a Vasco Rossi concert at Circo Massimo in Rome. 70,000 people. Andrea performing before one of Italy's most beloved artists, in one of the most iconic Roman venues. Filming that night meant being inside something much larger than any single frame could contain.
The second: a music video for the Aeronautica Militare, shot in flight aboard a cargo aircraft. The cargo door was open. We were flying between Rome and Sardinia. The wind, the altitude, the impossible light from that open door — it was one of the most technically and emotionally intense shoots I've done.
Porsche — Faroe Islands
Thirteen days in the Faroe Islands for a confidential Porsche project — a new model, shot in the submarine tunnels that run beneath the archipelago's islands.
My role was backstage video for this photographic campaign. The Faroe Islands are one of the most visually extreme places on earth — dramatic light, constant weather change, a landscape that feels genuinely prehistoric. Working there for nearly two weeks changed how I think about location.
Patty B — Made in Italy, Made by Hand
Patty B is a Roman artisan brand — all women, making leather bags by hand in a workshop in the city. It's a small project compared to Porsche or Fila. It's also one I love most.
The video is about hands. About the relationship between a person and the object they're making. About what "Made in Italy" actually means when you remove the marketing and watch the work happen in real time.
Every client deserves that same attention. The scale changes. The care doesn't.
Ballandi — Aurora Blasi, French Roulette
Ballandi is one of Italy's historic television production companies. My collaboration with them has produced several projects, but the one I remember with most affection is the music video for Aurora Blasi's French Roulette.
The reason is simple: they gave me creative freedom. Within a commercial brief, inside a professional production, I had space to make real decisions. That combination — structure and freedom together — is where I do my best work.
The Thread That Runs Through All of It
I don't have a single favorite commercial project. I remember each one for the people it brought into my life — the Fila team on that dinghy in Genova, the Porsche engineers in the Faroe tunnels, the women at Patty B cutting leather at a wooden table.
The camera is how I meet the world. Commercial or editorial, the work is the same work.
Every frame is an attempt to transmit something — energy, beauty, presence — to someone who wasn't there.
That's the job. That's all of it.
Nicolas VS is a photographer, fashion videographer and film director based in Rome. Available worldwide for commercial video production, editorial commissions and fashion film direction.