This blog has been more of a monthly deal than anything lately and once again I’m aiming to change that.

For the last while I’ve been trying to get some slideshows done that feature music by local artists. Finding good music is HARD!!! I found two good songs that work well with two slideshows but have had to go through some channels to get permissions to use one and that’s taken some time. However, by this weekend the new Glamour gallery and slide show will be live and I will start on the people and pets ones.

So keep checking back to the main web site and see what’s happening in the next few weeks!

Cheers!

So today I spent a bunch of time with the buggy Joy to the World Web Summit.  Buggy because I kept having to reload them to get them to fully download before I could listen…But once they did run, they were awesome!

So many ideas and new things to try out.  I don’t even know where to start!  But be assured, new things are going to happen.  Get ready!

Trees!

People people people! Everywhere there’s people! Here’s a shot showing the crowd downstairs. In the far end are two shooting stations and three editors to the right crowded up on a liitle table (seen with the blurry armed girl below). Moving forward there’s Michael at the print station, and a couple of editors on the couches. To my left (out of shot) are two more stations, two more on my right. Heading upstairs is the makeup/prep room and another shooting space. The main theatre has three shoot stations.

Well, the day is here and true to form I’m late! But I’m on the way and it should be a great day!

Okay, I’ve not been doing so good at updating this blog but one of my goals for the coming months is to change that.  Expect more from me here.

This Saturday is the official Help Portrait day.  This international event has some 7000 people at more than 600 locations in about 58 countries all coming together for the common goal of providing a nice portrait for an individual or family who may not be able to afford a professional portrait session.

It’s really quite amazing.  In Edmonton alone we have around 40 photographers helping out in 4 different locations around the city plus a number of volunteers doing everything from greeting people to hair and make up to serving food.  It should be a great day!

If you know of any families who could benefit from such an event, please let them know to visit the Paramount downtown (now the City Centre Church) between the hours of 11:00am and 6:00pm.

A few months ago I became aware of a movement that I felt I wanted to be a part of.  It’s called Help-Portrait (check out their main site here www.help-portrait.com) and it’s goal is to provide professional portrait photography to folks who don’t have the means to access it themselves.  For Free.  The homeless, single mothers, low income families, and anyone else in need.

The movement is growing but there is little going on here in Edmonton.  I want to change that.

December 12th is the Worldwide date for the Help-Portrait sessions.  Virtually every major city in North America will be holding these photo sessions.  Let’s take part!

We’re going to need a few more photographers, make up artists, stylists, and co-ordinators and anyone else who can assist in making this happen.  I can likely secure a main location, possibly catering, maybe Radio time, maybe more.  If you have anything to add or any other ideas to make this work, please let me know here, on Facebook or by phone at 780-945-3281. 

We may also need someone to provide a lot of Kleenex!

So a few weeks ago one of my idols dropped a bomb on the world, to me, without warning.   Maybe he mentioned it to some people while he was working on it but obviously I’m not inner circle enough for such info!  hehehe

At any rate, rave reviews seemed to be just flooding the interwebs and even miss Ralna spoke highly of it.  However, I had no room on my credit card and so had to wait a while to get my own copy.  I know, it was only $2.99 but us lucky Canadians can’t use our iTunes store credit for software!  ‘Nother rant for another day.

What is it?  It’s called The Best Camera and it’s an iPhone application that goes along with the website www.thebestcamera.com and was released in conjunction with a new book called “The Best Camera is the one that’s with you”, a philosophy that Chase Jarvis subscribes to and to which I generally agree.  However, if the camera you have with you just really, really sucks, then it still won’t do you any good.  More later.

Over all the idea of The Best Camera app is great!  Take great pictures, edit with any combination of 14 filters, and publish online to Facebook, Twitter AND e-mail with the push of a single button!  A very cool feature is that at www.thebestcamera.com the front page is a constant live feed of images being shot with the software.  Cool to sit and watch and be inspired by, but not exactly useful as a whole.  And while I haven’t puchased the book, or even browsed trhough it, I understand it’s all Chase’s own work.  Awesome, inspiring, but again, not useful in the context of me taking pictures with my iPhone.

So yes, it is a nice program and is a very good start.  But I somehow expected more from an application created by a photographer who has stated “I’ve tried all the different apps out there but none of them did what I wanted them to do”.  I had high hopes.  Maybe I shouldn’t have.

What’s my problem?  How can I not like it?  Well, I do like it, but let me share with you my wish list.

I have mine set up to go to the camera as opposed to go to the editor.  I figured it would be faster than loading up to the editor and switching to camera.  And it is.  But not much.  It’s a very slow load as far as I’m concerned.  Faster would be nicer.

Of the 14 filters, only 4 are actualy effects, and one of those is really just a stylized deasturate.  The rest are just minor adjustment filters such as warm, cool, fade, contrast, and white border.  My big problem with these is that most of them bump up the contrast and completely destroy highlights.  Could they NOT have set things up so that contrast isn’t so extreme?  Could they not include controls to allow me to edit how much contrast or any other effect is applied?  Again, hopefully something that will be addressed in the future.

Now, for this one, I must first ask, am I really the only person on the planet who would like to be able to sort his photos into other folders?  Maybe I don’t want my kids birthday photos mixed in with my work dinner photos mixed in with my night out with my girlfriend mixed in with my 365 photo project photos.  Why do ALL of my iPhone photos have to go into the one folder?  Please Chase!  For the next version please include a way to create new folders and save images to the new folders or any folder of choice!

Lastly, I keep encountering a bug.  I go, I take a picture, I switch to edit screen, and all I have is my picture from BEFORE my one I just took.  I have learned that my new photo IS there, it’s just displaying the previous one.  if I apply any filter it will switch to the proper photo and everything is good from then on, but still, something I hope I’m not the only person to encounter.

I did catch an article where Chase said that the app will be supporting Flickr in the future, as well as possibly other phones and devices, so my concerns about those are gone, not that I’m concerned about other phones.  Unless of course Apple continues to decide to ignore Flash long after all other phones support it. 

Anyway, yes, a very good app, well worth the $2.99 price tag.  And really, it can only get better from here.  Chase is a very talented and skilled photographer so I imagine that the app will only improve.  Here’s hoping!  Way to go Chase!

Well, I’ve hit the one month mark on my 365 project (http://daves365challenge.wordpress.com) and will soon be entering into the most difficult time for it.  Winter!

I hate the cold and with winter fast approaching I’m going to have to put in extra effort to get my shots for the day.  Winter will provide some excellent opportunity for great shots, but the cold will be a factor to work against!

Personal projects are an awesome outlet for your creativity.  You can experiment in ways that clients may not be willing to when it’s their dime!  Of course, when it’s your dime you may often have to take short cuts to your goals due to limited budgets.  But all this can work together to make better imagery than if you had a massive budget and every tool at your disposal.

Personal projects don’t have to be difficult, year long endeavours.  They can be absolutely anything you want.  From spending an afternoon individually photographing every flavour of Jelly Belly jelly bean to spending your entire life cataloguing ever species of bird on the planet.   Some people have projects of photographing their dog once every day or keeping a record of their children’s lives (not on a daily basis).  One of my personal projects is to photograph dead trees that are on their own amongst living trees.  It’s not something I’m actively pursuing but when I’m out and about I’ll keep my eyes peeled for options.  After 8 years I think I’ve come away with about 5 or 6 images I like.  Here’s the first one, it measure 4′ x 4′.

The White Tree

Wow.  Things are getting busy!  Several new shoots coming up soon.  Looking forward to those!  Plus trying to redo main website isn’t going as planned so it’s taking much longer than expected.  And trying to catch up on things I’m behind on isn’t going so smooth either.  But I’m getting there!

I’m a big advocate of personal projects but they can be daunting.  You want to explore new horizins and sometimes it’s for your own sanity and release, but sometimes you hope to potentially find a market for your experiments.  I’m currently falling in to the second group.  I love photography.  But my day job alone can’t cover my costs while having a part time AND full time job make it extremely difficult to properly start up a full business.  And they also can’t help me keep up with the changing technology.  For that I need extra funds and the only place I can see to get those funds is through the sale of my images.  The trick is finding the outlets to do it that will actually work for me.  I will begin that search soon.  If anyone has suggestions, please forward them along.

Clouds Below

Found out tonight that we are one of three photographers to be shooting for the 91.7 The Bounce Radio stations upcoming 2010 Bounce Boys calendar.  This is gonna be a quick one!  We’re shooting 4 of the 12 guys an will likely have less than two weeks to plan, organize, shoot and deliver!   Should be fun!

The Bounce