Last minute shoot

Sometimes we get assignments/jobs at the last minute. ( I am not a daily newspaper journalist, I know they deal with this all the time...) But as a magazine features/commercial photographer, I usually have some lead time.

My girlfriend is a makeup artist. And one of her clients has a client that needs a hand model (did ya follow that?) So they called her and asked to see a shot of her hands asap! The shoot is in a few days and the client of the client needs to see hand samples. She asked: "Who has professional photos of their hands just lying around?!"

That is where I come in. So we got right to it. Very simple lighting. Pop a few shots. Then up to my office for a few minutes in Adobe LightRoom. Her client needed this photo with in half an hour of asking for it.

So here is what we came up with.

Site changes in store

I know, I know. I've said this before... I'm making changes to my site. Seems like every 2 years I'm saying the same thing.

Well, I've been self publishing my own site for years now. One of the many hats that must be worn as a self employed photographer. As I have come to learn, true success needs focus. And to focus one must delegate tasks to others who are better suited to them.

One of these tasks I am giving up control of is website design. I am deciding between two hosted solutions, and will have a decision made within a week. Shortly there after going live.

So, keep your eyes tuned in for these changes. When this is done, my site should look more polished and be updated more often. I also hope to have my blog published under the sites domain to keep everything together.

Speaking of the blog: I plan on setting aside time to work on it more frequently. Here's to good intentions.

The Economy Hits Home

As some of you may now I have kinda been Harrisburg Magazine's main squeeze when it comes to photography for the last few years. With the downturn in the publishing industry, and the downturn in the economy in general, there has come a perfect storm of sorts. Periodicals are facing their toughest times ever. With media migrating to the web, and the economy making companies think long and hard about parting with advertising dollars, Magazines, and other print media, are faced with making hard decisions. Just look in the news these days and see how many daily newspapers have folded, or filed for bankruptcy.

Take a gander at this link: News Paper Death Watch. The name alone implies what it is all about. The first post there declares: "The [UK] Guardian announced today that it will cease print publication after 188 years and go Twitter-only. All future content will be formatted to less than 140 characters and the newspaper has launched an ambitious effort to retweet its entire archive. " Can you imagine getting your daily news in clips shorter than a Text message? Wow!

So these hard times have finally hit home, I had wondered how long it would take. Bench Mark Group Media, parent company to Harrisburg Magazine, have had to make some hard decisions lately, and trying to cut costs for image production is one route the powers that be chose to go. They are still trying to decide what route exactly they will take, I may still shoot some images for them, but no where near what I had done in the past.

I shot many a story for them over our 10 year relationship, and have met a lot of people in that time. I used to Joke that I had photographed everyone in our city at least once. I made a lot of friends and shot a lot of interesting subject matter. And created, what I hope will be, some life long friendships with the employees in their office.

Over the next few months I plan to highlight some of my favorite stories that I shot for them. I will be creating slide shows and posting links to the images here on my blog.

Onward and Upward!

4/2/2009- Update

I have just heard from the publisher at Harrisburg Magazine that I will still be shooting images for the publication. Back on a more traditional freelance basis. This is good news. I can't wait to work on my next assignment for them, looks like it will be the cover of their June Regional Guide Issue.