If you haven’t created a book on A&I’s Indigo Press, you are missing out. It is a very addictive process that produces a professional looking softcover or hardback book. Use it to support a gallery show, to promote yourself, or as a great holiday gift.

Join Greg and myself for a look at how to produce custom books without the custom price tag. We will show you how to take control of the design process in Photoshop and then generate print ready PDF’s or drop your designs into the free but limited A&I book software.

Keep an eye on our workshops page for more upcoming events at A&I as a result of our new role as resident digital experts.

If you are planning on attending PDN’s Photo Plus Expo this year, I will be giving a Lightroom Seminar on Friday Octoboer 24th at 3 PM. This seminar will focus on using Lightroom in the field on a laptop and then merging with your master catalog back at the studio. I will also go over some techniques and tools that we use on these types of location jobs. If you attend, be sure to say hello and let me know you read our blog - there might be prizes involved.

Be sure to check out all the great speakers and programs at the expo - http://www.photoplusexpo.com/ppe/5300/conference/conference_list.jsp

I realize that readers of this blog come here for technical advice but any of you who have heard me speak realize that branding and marketing are all part of the big picture of being a photographer and should be part of your business workflow. I had the pleasure to meet and work with Mary Virginia Swanson last year during the PDN On the Road tour. We traveled to 5 cities as part of a two day seminar series dealing with many aspects of running a photo business and being a photographer.

I can’t speak highly enough of Swannie and I wrote about her in a previous post about the Chicago event:

“During the portfolio share, I arrived at a table the same time as Mary Virginia Swanson and had the opportunity to listen to her give a quick portfolio review. I have worked with Debra before and I could tell from her and Mary’s presentations that they knew what they were talking about but Wow! She made a comment to me after hearing me speak about being amazed at all the technical knowledge in my head and I felt the same about her after hearing her give a review. Off the top of her head she rattled off several out of print books and organizations that the photographer should research and contact. I was blown away by the depths of her knowledge. Photographer beware, you better be ready to take notes if you get a chance to speak with her about your work.”

Mary is offering a marketing workshop for photographers in Tucson, Arizona November 6-9:

MARKETING WORKSHOP
for PHOTOGRAPHERS

This workshop, led by Mary Virginia Swanson, will provide participants with an overview
of the fine art photography market and how one can effectively target galleries,
collections and publishers most likely to respond to their work. Participants will gain an
understanding of presenting work to industry professionals via competitions and portfolio
review events, as well as the value of attending Gallery Expos such as Photo LA and
AIPAD. Examples of successful promotional tools with be shared, as well as self-
published image catalogues and limited edition books. Ms. Swanson will share her
extensive library of reference materials with participants.

Guest Instructors: artists Lisa M. Robinson (.com) and Ken Rosenthal (.com)
Site visits: Center for Creative Photography and Etherton Gallery

The workshop begins at 6 p.m. on November 6th and concludes at 12:00 noon on
Sunday November 9th. Optional sessions include Rosenthal/Robinson Studio tour and
one-hour consultations with Ms. Swanson. Discounted hotel rates have been arranged.

Visit www.mvswanson.com for complete details.

A lot of you are already using hard drives for long term data (image) storage. Lets look at some of the costs and how to save some cash. After all, spending money on storage isn’t sexy.

An external hard drive (enclosure) is a container for a bare or internal hard drive that uses a “bridge chip” to allow conversion from the native drive format (currently SATA) to Firewire 400, 800 or USB. In addition to paying for the storage on the drive, you are also buying the design, marketing, packaging, shipping, metal or plastic shell, power supply and often an assortment of clutter cables.

A 1Tb LaCie external hard drive currently costs about $250 from online vendors. That comes out to .25¢ per gigabyte.

A bare 1tb server grade hard drive like Seagate Barracuda currently costs about $120 from online vendors. That comes out to 12¢ per gigabyte.

That works out to about half the storage cost going to the enclosure. If you don’t mind paying for all those extras an enclosure does provide easy portability and protection. They also look like something from Battlestar Galactica with their glowing eyes all stacked on top of each other - generating heat and consuming power.

The average commercial photo shoot that we service generates about 50 gigs of Raw data. That breaks down to each drive holding 20 average commercial photo shoots. Adding redundancy by creating a backup of each drive will double the storages cost. So after you back it up, you have safely stored your data for approximately $12 per shoot.

When you are buying bare hard drives, most major brands are good choices just be sure to choose drives with 3 or 5 year warranties instead of the consumer drives with 1 year warranties. Those drives are usually quality controlled better and made for demanding markets.

We have blogged about our archiving systems before and shown you how we store and access bare hard drives. In the next archiving article I will show you options for getting data onto your bare drives including tray-less enclosures and adapters.

Technorati Profile

Check out the site redesign over at ImageMechanics.com. While you are there you might be interested in our new workshops page. We are doing a great 2 day lighting/digital workshop with Michael Grecco.

“This workshop will focus on digital lighting and the dramatic portrait. Join renowned photographer Michael Grecco and digital imaging expert Michael Britt for this two day intensive workshop built around Grecco’s best selling book Lighting and the Dramatic Portrait“.

For those of you who are interested in private Lightroom tutoring but not interested in paying $125 per hour, check out the semi-private 4 day workshop that only costs $187.50 per day.

“These 6 hour sessions spread out over 4 consecutive Wednesdays will explore how to use the powerful editing and organization tools in Lightroom. Take control of your workflow, optimize your digital images and customize your post processing experience while discovering new tools in your digital arsenal.”

It’s been over a year and a half since first developing the unique archiving system that we have since used to safely and efficiently store the terabytes upon terabytes of image data that our clients consistently generate. In that time, the system has barely changed, and we feel that we can safely say this is still the most economical, practical, and easiest long-term archiving solution out there. (For our purposes, anyway.)

However, in that time we have also finessed certain aspects of the system, and figured that it has matured to the point where it would be a good idea to revisit and show exactly how we currently make it work.

Read the rest of this entry »

Register now at www.apa-la.org
Breakfast and Lunch will be provided

Early Registration: (on or before May 1, 2008)
Free for APA/LA Assistant ($125 Annual Fee)
Student Members ($55 Annual Fee)
$60 Non-members

Late Registration:
$10 APA/LA Assistant and Student Members
$70 Non-members

* Black Book Raffle
Details Below

Course Details:

With so many photographers seeking work, how can a photography student gain an edge? Until you can build a stellar portfolio and use it to market your photos, learn the business behind the business. Whether your goals include gaining more commercial experience or learning about being an assistant, this moderated panel of leading photography apprentices will provide the knowledge and confidence to send you in the right direction. We’ll cover career opportunities and the ins and outs of getting hired in the industry. A good resource for film assistants, prop work and film crews.

In this course, you can expect to learn:

Insight into industry expectations
Identifying potential markets
Effective communication and marketing strategies
Whom you should know and how to develop a professional relationship
Whom to contact to get hired
What is expected of you when you are hired, & how to get paid for your work
Managing self-income taxes
What not to do, and things to look out for
Demos of various lighting, camera and grip equipment

In addition each participant will receive a copy of the APA/LA Assistant Handbook

* The Black Book will be raffling off a FREE 10 Image Online Portfolio. Our
Blackbook.com website focuses on the work of the artist. This is your chance
to showcase your portfolio to the industry’s best.

APA - LOS ANGELES
5455 Wilshire Blvd. Suite 1709 Los Angeles, CA 90036
p 323-933-1631 f 323-933-9209 e office@apa- la.org

Got back recently from several days spent in Aspen with Hugh Stewart working on another catalog shoot, this time for a British clothing company. This job provided some good challenges and considerations to take into account for dealing with shooting in cold temperatures and the occasional bad weather.

Being out in the middle of snowy nowhere meant a lot of downloading cards to laptop. Some tips for coping with the cold and snow:

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