It's Halloween and it's Molly's birthday...

My Daughter Molly turns 14 today and I am not really happy about time stealing my little girls.

When she was really little molly thought all the hoopla for Halloween was to celebrate her birthday, and of course I did nothing to dissuade her from thinking that.

Let me share two quick stories that shows what kind of person my Molly is.

Story 1:

She was 6 at the time, had long hair, way down her back long hair and one day came into the kitchen and announced to us that she wanted to have her hair cut off so she should could "donate to the company that makes wigs for sick kids", then she turned and walked away. Her mom and I just looked at each other until one of us finally said "where did that come from?".

Our plan was to just wait and see if it was something she still wanted in a few days. Well, by the end of the week she had bugged us so much that I was ready to let her shave her head, get tattoos, and join a biker gang.

So down to the hair solon, off came the hair and sent off to Locks of Love.

Story 2:

We really get into Christmas at our house, for weeks we'll tell elaborate stories about what we want most and why, and that year (it just happened to be the same year Molly cut her hair) I wanted a telescope. We had marked the day on the calendar when Santa was going to be at the fire station (he lands on the roof and comes down the big ladder to see the kids) and when the day finally arrived it was cold and the line was long, long, long, so it took some time before we reached the big guy. When it was finally her turn Santa asked Molly what she wanted and without hesitation she said "I want you to bring my dad a telescope".

Ya, I was speechless.

Now she is taller than her mom, has mounds in her sweater that are absolutely unnecessary, and looks far more like a woman than I like. But she still kisses me before she leaves the house, will tell me she loves me in front of her friends, and is still the same caring girl who gave her hair to another and used her time with Santa for someone else.

Happy birthday Molly, I love you!

Review of the new book "PhoDOGraphy"...

Never ever have I gotten a new photography book and had every person in my family pick it up and thumb through it from cover to cover, but the new book "PhoDOGraphy - how to get great pictures of your dog" by Kim Levin changed that.

Why?

Every other page has a full size dog portrait on it while the opposing page not only has the chapter content, but often has 1-3 more thumbnail images. And these images aren't there as "window dressing", every single image is an example of what that chapter is covering with a full explanation of the "how's & why's" behind each of the sample images.

The first thing that came through was that Kim is a real dog lover, and of course this hit home with me as I am the proud dad of two miniature schnauzers, one of the ways this was apparent is Kim's emphasis on the safety of the dog when shooting outside of the confines of the dogs home.

While the book covers every topic you can imagine regarding photographing dogs, it's a quick read, I read it from cover to cover (each time) in just a couple hours (which means normal people could read it even faster).

Kim covers it all, from photographing dogs indoors, outdoors, dogs in motion, how to make use of different weather and seasons, photographing single dogs, multiple dogs, puppies... and more.

Ever see a picture of a dog and they're looking into the camera with its head cocked to one side? Kim walks you through how to capture that exact image.

One of my dogs is black and I can never seem to get a good picture of her, well Kim devotes and entire chapter, "The Black Dog", to this problem.

If you haven't picked up on it yet, I loved this book. It is well written, extremely informative and stuffed with outstanding images from cover to cover.

If you put a copy on your coffee table I guarantee that not only will every person who walks in your house pick it up, you will here things like "oooooh" and "aaaaah".

And you'll learn a heck of a lot about photographing dogs too.

After I finished reading the book I had a few questions regarding the business of dog photography, so I emailed Kim and she was kind enough to answer them:

WPT: When you started your business as a dog portraiture photographer, what were some of the successful techniques you used to market your business?

Kim: I had worked in advertising for almost seven years at that point, so I had a good background in branding and marketing. When I first started out, I made postcards and placed them at local pet boutique stores and vet hospitals in NYC. I also partnered with the Center for Animal Care and Control and the ASPCA and created adoption posters to help animals get adopted. My name was on the posters and that also helped promote my photography.

WPT: Now that you are a success, has your marketing changed, (other than word of mouth) if so how, and what works for you?

Kim: I still rely on many of the marketing techniques that have worked for me in the past. I just recently made new promotional materials for my pet and kid portrait business (i.e. postcards) and placed them at various pet boutiques, kid clothing and toy shops and vet hospitals. I also from time to time, run advertising in my local area as a reminder that I am available for commissioned assignments. I also continue to donate a portion of my proceeds from my books and products to animal humane organizations. This is a way for me to give back to the animal community and it also serves to keep my name and brand in the spotlight. For four years I photographed the ASPCA annual calendar as well as my local Monmouth County SPCA calendar. This time of year there are a lot of animal events (fundraisers for shelters) and I always have a vendor booth where I sign my books and promote my photography business. I invested in updating my website and it has really helped showcase my portfolio of work.

WPT: How did/do you arrive on your pricing, do you charge the same for humans and dogs?

Kim: I actually do charge the same rate for animals and humans. Most of my shoots are dogs and cats but in the last year or two I have been trying to promote my family and kid portraiture as well. I have focused my energies on specializing with kids and pets - which is a natural fit for me. So when someone hires me to photograph their baby and their dog, they get the best of both. I will photograph the baby alone, dog alone and them together. Most photographers tend to focus on one area vs. the other. This is an area that I am still exploring and trying to carve a niche for myself.

Below you will find some of Kim's favorite images from the book, clicking on any of the images will open them in a new & larger window.

Enjoy.

Adobe releases Lightroom 2.1...

If you have been wringing your hands and pacing the floor until late into the night waiting for the Lightroom update, your fretting and worrying is over.

;)

Adobe has released Lightroom 2.1.

You can get the Windows update here, and the MAC update here.

If you are one of the folks (like me) who installed the 2.1 release candidate I would suggest uninstalling it first as Adobe did not included an auto uninstall as part of this update.

To stay on top of Adobes Lightroom updates and news releases you should keep an eye (bookmark) "Lightroom Journal".

Some new resources for Lightroom 2...

I've come across some new resources for Lightroom 2 that I have found very informative/useful and thought you might as well.

The first offering comes from National Association of Photoshop Professionals instructor Raphael "RC" Concepcion.

In "Welcome to Lightroom 2" RC will walks you through all of Lightrooms powerful tools and features with his hands-on, easy to follow, easy to understand instructional style. Does anyone know more about Photoshop and Lightroom than than the folks from NAPP?

Next is "Pixelicious" which is not dedicated exclusively to Lightroom (you will find entries dedicated to Photoshop and digital photography as well), but has too much good stuff not to be in your bookmarks and iTunes list.

Lastly, Jared Platt has a brand new Lightroom podcast (it's just a month old and still got the shine on it) "Adobe Lightroom 2.1 Podcast". If the first two episodes are any indication, there are good things in store from Jared in the future.

So, there's your homework for this weekend and if you know of a Lightroom 2 source that has yet to be covered on this blog PLEASE let us know so we can share it with everybody else.

Have a great weekend.

Here's some exciting contest news!...

We now have a sponsor for the Weekly Photo Tips monthly photo contest.

EDGE Tech Corp has generously offered to sponsor our monthly photo contest by providing great gifts to the winners!

Beginning with this months contest, each winner will receive either a 2 GB memory card (appropriate for their camera) or a 4 GB flash drive.

Now, a shameless plug for our new sponsor. ;)

EDGE Tech Corp is a leading supplier of computer memory upgrades , portable computing products, storage devices, and other technology solutions. Their flash card lineup allows digital photographers to upgrade the devices' memory for maximum performance. EDGE's card line consists of various formats including Compact Flash, SD Memory Cards, SmartMedia, (and other) memory cards. EDGE also offers Flash Drives, Digital Frames, and Portable Hard Drives.

I am extremely happy for our contest winners that our prize packages have taken a huge leap forward and want to thank Edge Tech for making it happen.

Now get your contest entries in!

Horse show part II…

I was pleasantly surprised by how many emails I got from last week’s post of horse show images, thank you for taking the time to write, and for your kind words.

Because you liked them so much (and the fact that I get brownie points from my daughter when she gets blog space) here are a few more images from that show.

Click on any image to view it larger (and in a new window).

Deke McClelland on CS4...

For those of you who are familiar with Deke, you know he is smart and funny (okay, and kinda cute).

And for those of you still thinking about CS4 here is his video "Photoshop CS4, buy or die!" to help you in your decision making process.

You will also want to bookmark his blog as Deke offers great insight and instruction on his blog.

Thanks Mike for pointing this video out to me.

If you have already made up your mind, you can get Adobe Photoshop CS4 here.

I am off to shoot a wedding in Cape Cod, have a great weekend, see ya next week.