Stan McMeekin of Southworth is trying several light colors to give the room the right ambiance before an interview with Senior Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Ione George for Forensic Files at the Kitsap Courthouse.

The most meticulous part of Stan McMeekin's work is largely invisible. And that's how he knows his project is a success: When no one thinks about his part. McMeekin, who owns video-production company Solana Productions Northwest in Southworth, says another way his work achieves success is by creating emotions in people.

Solana Productions Northwest's clients range from reality TV shows like “Survivor” and “Extreme Makeover” to the “Today Show,” Discovery Channel and MTV. McMeekin has filmed all over the country and even abroad, but in September he landed a job close to home: for the filming of “Forensic Files,” an episode about the murder of Poulsbo teen Tracy Parker in 1986.

On the screen, a “Forensic Files” interview doesn't betray the kind of work that goes behind the scene. The viewer may feel the escalating drama or the emotions - but only if the photographer did a good job.

“My artwork is in the lighting,” McMeekin says. “On TV, everything is invisible” except the person talking, he says, but off the camera, it's a seemingly chaotic picture of wires, lights and equipment.

To achieve a cinematic effect, McMeekin uses light and filters to cast a certain color on the walls, give the room a certain feel, complement a person's clothing, or even reduce glare from eyeglasses.

As he gets ready to tape an interview with Kitsap County Senior Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Ione George at the county courthouse for “Forensic Files,” McMeekin goes through several choices of color to achieve just the right effect in the office of Prosecutor Russ Hauge. The filming around Kitsap, which lasted about a week, used a crew consisting of only McMeekin, show producer Chip Selby and Mark Iler, a sound recordist from SeaTac.

Working with small crews is not unusual for McMeekin, but what makes it challenging is the fact that no two jobs are ever the same — not even if he's shot for a show before, which is the case with “Forensic Files.”

“You have to be a people person,” he says. “It takes a day or two to get in synch with (the other) people.”

McMeekin is a former television photographer who used to work for KIRO-TV. When his show ended and he was set to be moved to the news department, he decided to take it solo. After working for television companies in Los Angeles and San Diego, he called one of his former co-workers, who owned a company called Solana Productions, and asked if he could open a Northwest offshoot in 1997. Although the two companies are separate, in addition to sharing a Web site (www.solanaproductions.com) and promotional materials, they sometimes trade clients. McMeekin says the name recognition helped a little in the beginning, but he had to go after his own clients. Now, as he's ventured into commercial video as well, most of his work comes from word of mouth.

While commercial and television projects pay the bills, McMeekin's hopes are set for other kind of work: documentaries. He hopes some day to be able to go completely independent and pursue his own projects. “I really love the arts,” he says. “Some of my best pieces is telling people stories. Everybody has a story.”

Even as a TV station employee, McMeekin tended to go after the people stories. He would rather find the owner of a burned house the next day than shoot another house go up in flames. Of course, those kinds of ideas don't always go well with TV news producers - one of the reasons McMeekin took the risk of becoming self-employed.

McMeekin's work received numerous awards and recognitions, including 13 regional-level Emmys, the Feature Photographer of the Year award from the National Press Photographers Association, and a U.N. award (for a Microsoft documentary). Despite the uncertainty that comes with having a small business, he wouldn't trade what he's doing for steady employment. What other job would allow him to fly in a helicopter or a blimp, be in a race car, climb the roof of the Space Needle, go to All-Star games, visit the Winter Olympics in France - plus meet a lot of nice people?

“It's a heck of a lot of fun,” he says. “Every day is different.”

As he waits for the right time to take his career to the next level, he continues to search for people stories, and is researching his ideas for documentaries.

“I'm an author whose pages are digital,” he says.