To most, two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, and onions on a sesame seed bun looks like either a somewhat tasty meal or indigestion waiting to happen, but to L.T.B. Productions director Oscar Bassinson, it’s a work of art.

Specializing in food and people, l.a.-based Bassinson has spent more than 20 years making what’s on the supermarket shelf and under the heat lamp at the fast-food joint look good enough to eat.

‘When food is placed in front of you the smell of it has a great deal to do with whether you like it or not,’ he says. ‘I have to create something that goes beyond the aspect of smell, and that means I have to make it as beautiful as possible, and the best way for me to do that is to treat it as a sculpture.’

Bassinson walked out of the University of Kansas with a degree in advertising and another in journalism and directly into a job as agency producer at Bernstein Rein Advertising in Kansas City.

Being at a small agency with small budgets, Bassinson ended up wearing a few hats, but the one he found himself in most often was that of director. As the agency and the budgets grew larger, he was ultimately performing two full-time jobs, and as a result left the agency to give directing his full attention.

Bassinson has shot plenty of spots for McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Betty Crocker and Pam cooking spray. Pizza, noodles and casseroles are always a challenge, while ‘anything God put on this green earth in its raw form’ is the easiest to work with and, according to Bassinson, the most beautiful.

Repped by Aviator in Western Canada and by Shadowrock Productions in the u.s., Bassinson has also helmed ads for cars, ‘the largest tabletop in the world,’ appliances, models and toys, and he loves working with kids. A recent spot for Frisch’s Big Boy, shot on bluescreen, showed a boy diving off a glass of milk into a stack of pancakes, mentally trying to escape a piano lesson.

The funniest spot in Bassinson’s repertoire opens with a beautiful, deserted California beach. Chariots of Fire music plays in the background and water sweeps across the sand, when out of the blue 30 pigs come squealing down the beach. What was the spot for? Cooks Ham.

Like most in his profession, Bassinson has a pile of scripts and ‘a drawer full of ideas,’ and while he wouldn’t pass up the chance to shoot a feature (as long as it was something he liked), right now he is happy doing what he does. ‘When it comes to food and comedy and lighthearted stories, I like it. . . it’s worth getting up in the morning.’