Jan 12
Wow. Brain melt-down. There was a LOT of good information we gathered today and I’ll be glad if we even retain and use a tenth of that information. I’m having brain overload! In fact, I think I’m going to collapse real soon.
We have to do this again tomorrow – back at the show at 7AM. Ick.
Jan 10
It hasn’t started yet, but we’re here in Phoenix and have done some early reconnaissance to find out where we should go, where to park, and how to get there. It looks like we will have to really push getting up early – the convention starts at 7AM. Luckily for us, that’s 7AM Arizona time – 2 hours earlier than where we come from [that’s actually 9AM “our” time].
We first found some things to eat [which of course is VERY important] and then headed to the downtown convention center. We walked around getting our bearings and then made a few more stops for groceries to keep in the room. We’re going to have to get up so early, that most breakfast places won’t be open, so we had to get our own to keep in our tiny little fridge.
I’ll try to post as the days go on about interesting things that may happen here – or I may collapse with exhaustion and not type a single additional word until we leave. I hope to get some great perspectives on running a photography business as well as some additional technical education on both photography and the tools associated with it.
None of this blogging or email would be possible without the help of my mother-in-law Norma. So, Thank You Norma! for staying up late and obtaining for me the decryption key for my laptop which failed to boot up properly on the first night here. She painstakingly read out the 400 digit code [not really, but it SEEMED like 400 digits] to unlock the machine so that I could boot into Vista. I have since turned off Bitlocker for the duration of the trip. I needed to anyway since I’m going to upgrade to Windows 7 Beta soon. I hear it’s much faster… 
And I have to try out CS4 and Lightroom 2 on the next version of Windows!
Oct 4
Over the years, I’ve collected many thousands of pictures. I’ve spoken in times past of the “photo backlog” and how much work I have left to do. This started in spades after I got my 5D and I’ve been building a backlog ever since.
So, I’m about to go on a trip for training and I wanted to bring some photo projects with me – only I don’t have enough room! I needed about 10GB more space on my hard drive, so now I’m biting the bullet and finally moving some directories off to my archive storage. I guess if they’ve been there for over 18 months it’s likely I’ll never get to them or put them on the web. Sorry – you won’t see these any time soon.
I’m almost there, so I’ll have the space I need. Hopefully, I’ll get my new laptop soon which has over twice as much space on it. Soon…
Aug 5
Having done nothing recently on the photography business at all, Laura and I attended a seminar last night: the “I Shoot People” tour. I have to say it was AWESOME! I was so fired up that I volunteered to be the one to create the albums for our customers. Go figure. Laura was the one who wanted to do that! She says I’m not stepping on her toes, so maybe she’ll feel more free to help me with less of a burden of stress on her shoulders.
We also picked up some great business advice on how to avoid bad things in the business and how to appropriately price our services. All in all, it was the best seminar I’ve attended yet.
Now all we need are some customers!
Apr 26
It’s Saturday and our class is over for the day, but I’m still at the office. Why, you ask? Well, it’s like this: I’d like to do some work on our photo backlog [which is still very large, especially since we got our scans back from ScanCafe] and post some pictures to the site. However, doing that from the hotel room is very slow since their link is weak.
it’s much faster here at the office, so here is where I sit and upload pictures.
Of course, I don’t want to leave the building while they’re grading my exam. I’m pretty sure I passed, but I don’t want to leave in case I hear the good news!
So, I upload pictures and bite my nails while I wait…
Mar 16
If you use Adobe Lightroom or CS3, don’t update your applications to the new versions released this weekend [that is Lightroom 1.4 and Adobe Camera Raw 4.4]. These programs apparently introduce bugs in EXIF and DNG image handling (explained here).
I did, but fortunately didn’t do anything with it to cause me the problem. Just beware, those of you who use these products.
Dec 26
Last week, unbeknownst to me, my camera surpassed the 10,000 pictures taken mark. This is a milestone – and a lot of clicks. The shutter is supposed to be good for 100,000 or so clicks before it needs service, so I’m good for a while. However, this milestone answers the ongoing question for me – what will the in-camera file numbering system actually do? I know what it’s supposed to – it’s supposed to go from 100-9999 [folder 100, image 9999] to 101-0001. I have been anxious to see if it would actually work the way it’s supposed to since I’ve seen some discussion around this not working as advertised.
Now, the question has been answered. I started my numbering at 200- so, my images went from 200-9999 to 201-0001 – just like it’s supposed to. Nice, eh?
Dec 23
I’ve been a bit busy, what with my new project [which is way fun, by the way] and the increased commute time needed to drive all the way from here to the other side of DC. That leaves me with less free time than before, so between that and the extra work generated by the wedding we have not had time for much else – not even blogging!
That being said, we’ve just last night delivered the proof prints to the clients and so the first [most dificult] part is finished, and we should have some more free time in the upcoming weeks. Laura might have more work to do, though, with the creation of a photo album.
And speaking of Laura, we were not very impressed with how her camera performed under a few conditions at the wedding. She was using the Rebel XTi, which in most circumstances has been a wonderful camera. But, with special flash conditions, it didn’t do what we wanted it to. So, we sold it. We got $499 cash for it, which I used to trade her up for an early birthday present – a brand new Canon EOS 40D. It’s quite nice and has some features that make me a bit jealous… 
But, she deserves the best – and even if this does not have as many megapixels as mine, it is certainly as good as or even better in many respects. It’s a little heavier than the XTi, but still lighter than my 5D, which is good for her. I’m also releived that the menuing system works almost like mine and will be easier to translate between the two models when we try to set them up the same. The performance of the 40D at high ISO is also just as good as the 5D – which is quite impressive.
Of course, we have yet to test it under the same conditions that made the XTi underexpose horribly. So, I made her open her present early – so that when our friends come over tomorrow [Christmas Eve] she can experiment with it on the kids.
Dec 8
On our way to the wedding rehearsal yesterday, we stopped in to the camera store and bought the Light Sphere II by Gary Fong. Skeptical at first, we only bought one. We tried it out for a few shots last night and decided to try it for the wedding.
I have to say that it totally rocks. It really brought out some nice soft light for portraits and group shots when the available light wasn’t good. I used the “fong” up until the reception when the low, white ceiling provided a good bounce light.
After many hours of shooting, though, we are done for the evening. We’re presently downloading the many hundreds of pictures to the server for processing. That’s the tedious part.
Dec 8
After much preparation and stress, today we will embark on the begining of our true professional career in the photographic world. We will be photographing a wedding, having planned from the beginning and today we execute the shoot. This is the fun part, as well as seeing what we took and finding some great pictures in the pile.
The few weddings we’ve done so far have been pro bono, or as sub-contractors. This time, though, it’s us from start to finish. It’s a little stressful, knowing that our clients’ memories are in our hands. We hope and expect to capture the best we can.
We were concerned about the weather at first [since it has been unseasonally cold and snow and ice are still on the ground], but it seems that we have been given a small break. It’s now sunny outside and more mild than yesterday. It’s above freezing, so we are seeing some melting, too.
All told, even with the stress building up to the event, I think today will go wonderfully.
