How to get hired for a video shoot in 43 minutes on facebook.

Business, Jobs, Photography, Web presence No Responses »
Apr 092011

“Facebook is a waste of time. I don’t need to know what you had for lunch today” is a common response that I hear when I speak with people about why I am involved in social media – hmmm, what did I have for lunch today … but back to the point of this post: I wanted to share with you how I got booked to shoot a video shoot from my facebook post in less than an hour.

I have been getting into shooting video over the last few months – you can check out some of my films on vimeo – and I have been seeing that there is a lot to learn from a photographers perspective. I purchased my first HDDSLR 3 months ago and got booked on my first paid video production last week, so I posted a blurb about editing this shoot on my facebook page.

Blurb I posted on Facebook about editing the video last Thursday.

I tagged my wife (the beautiful model in the photo) and left it at that. I also did not design the post to be anything special my comment on facebook merely read: “Spend most of the day editing a commercial movie project, while learning Adobe Premiere, incidentally the client was very happy with the rough cut :)”

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Posted by admin at 6:17 pm

Packing for a commercial Time-Lapse project

Business, Gear, Jobs, Motion Picture Equipment, Photography, Photography Equipment 1 Response »
Feb 222011

2. Pack it

Packing for the shoot

An overview

Now you know where you’re shooting from. You know how many shots your taken. You got the power and storage issues figured out. It’s time to pack. If you’re shooting a time-lapse sequence for fun, this will seem a little over the top just remember we’re talking about a commercial professional application. Redundancy is the name of the game, although I want to be able to walk into my time-lapse set up in one trip.

All gear needed for the time-lapse project in it's cases and on the hand truck.

Everything I needed for this project fits on this one cart. I like this specific one, since it can double as a shooting table, once it’s unloaded.  I’ll go through each bag in detail with everything that’s in it, but here is the overview: slung over the back of the cart (on my back when I go to location) is Continue reading »

Posted by admin at 6:59 pm

Planning a commercial Time-Lapse project

Business, Gear, Motion Picture Equipment, Photography, Photography Equipment No Responses »
Feb 182011

I just finished shooting a four day time-lapse project at the Miami Boat Show for one of my new clients Meridian Yachts. Our goal was to show the 3 day set up process, which no one visiting the boat show gets to see. It’s fascinating to watch the Miami Beach Convention Center transform from an empty cavernous warehouse to the biggest boat show in the States. In my research I have found numerous video tutorials, examples, web posts, … on time-lapse projects; but I have not found one that speaks about the process of preparing to shoot one in detail. This blog post will talk about how I planned, produced and photographed a commercial time lapse and how I put it all together after all the pieces were been shot.

1. Plan it

Scouting the location

I’m gonna assume that you already have a project in mind. So the first thing I do is to scout the location that I will be shooting in. What is the subject that you’re going to be shooting? Where will it be? Are there vantage points that will become obstructed in the course of your Continue reading »

Posted by admin at 10:46 pm

How to make facebook safe for your confidential business information:

Business, Photography 1 Response »
Feb 072011

How many times a day do you need to show a client a file, concept, video, photo, …? If you’re anything like me, it’s all the time. Many of our files are pretty big or proprietary and confidential, so it’s hard to send them through email or over a social network like facebook (I mean do you really want to be discussing the terms of an upcoming shoot on your fb wall?)

Would it not be great to have one place that is like facebook, just secure? A social network for business that is more personal than LinkedIn? A timeline like Twitter that shows your whole team what is happening in your business? A place were you can work together with your vendors, clients and crew to produce, review, share and comment on the projects that you are working on?

Find out how you can do all this for free after the jump.
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Posted by admin at 7:21 pm

I hired you and not the other photographer, because ...

Business, Photography, SEO, Web presence No Responses »
Nov 242010

We spend a lot of thought and time on advertising, promoting, website design, SEO, CRM, email marketing, … to be on top of mind of our potential client at ‘the moment of relevance‘, as Google calls it. So now you’re on the phone with him – what do you talk about? Obviously there’s the information you need about the production of the shoot, how many images, how they’ll be used, … but all photographers should be doning this. So what sets you apart? What makes you the guy or girl that this potential client is going to hire?

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Posted by admin at 8:22 pm

Advance your Photography club opens a chapter in Miami

Business, Photography 1 Response »
Nov 132010

Over the last few weeks I have been thinking about my involvement in the photographic community in Miami. I am an active member in ASMP, and I attend events that are held in South Florida, but I asked myself: “What do I give back to the photographic community?” This introspective was caused by reading Chase Jarvis’ blog, who challenges photographers to share their knowledge of what goes on inside the ‘black box’ of photography with the world. In a recent panel discussion at Photo Plus Expo, Chase had a group of his photographer and blogger friends together in a pannel.

One of the members of the pannel in the end of this video is Vincent Laforet, who’s blog I’ve been reading for the past few days, where Vincent is interviewed by Marc Silber. Long story short Marc had this idea a few days ago about something he calls “Advance your Photography”.

Since I am looking for a way get involved in the local photography community in South Florida and Marc was looking for pros that were willing to launch the AYP (Advance your Photography) Club pilot with him, this seemed like a great match.

We will be launching the Miami Chapter of the AYP club soon and we’ve put up a facebook community page to encourage people to keep in touch with us on this opportunity. If you know someone, who is a photographer (amateur or pro) that want’s to learn from Marc’s library of interviews with the best photographers in the world, as well as have a commercial photographer critique their photography, with the intent of advancing their craft – please share this with them. I’m looking forward to our first meeting …

Miami AYP club

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Posted by admin at 4:24 pm

4 must have products to build your photo website.

Business, Photography, SEO, Web presence 1 Response »
Aug 272010

[Listen to my interview on the new media photographer podcast this coming Monday, as Rosh and I talk about the basic building blocks of your photography website(s) that you should have - stay tuned to this blog on how to save some money!]

•••

You have to be online. No one questions that. But how do you go about building a website? Now before I go any further, I have to remind you that I am a photographer first and foremost, not a coder, not an HTML pro, not a webdesigner, … but my business (in one form or another) has been online  since 2004 and the majority of my clients find me on the first page of their search results on Google.

Sure you can hire someone to do the work for you. This post will talk about a do-it-yourself approach. It will require you to be willing to hack a few things, to find work arounds to what people say is not possible and do be willing to learn, but it will also show you a few short cuts, save you some money over the custom website design or the high end services.

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Posted by admin at 10:21 am

Why you should (not) advertise on Yelp

Business, Paid Advertising, Photography, Web presence 2 Responses »
Jul 012010

I’ve been looking at local search for a while now, being listed in Google places has helped my business tremendously by being ranked well in a Google organic search results, so much so that my business is a favorite place on Google. (I got the fancy QR code sticker and everything.) In the last few months I have been studying other local search such as foursquare and yelp. I have been asking experts in the photography field about how local search affects photographers online and had an interview with Rosh Sillars, co-author of “The Linked Photographer’s guide” on his podcast the new media photographer. Yesterday I got a call from a very kind and knowledgeable sales rep from Yelp and I had a long phone call with him this morning. I learned a lot about Yelp and thought I’d share it here.

the free business profile on Yelp

Yelp’s business listings let your customers write reviews about your business and also give you a chance to add some basic information about your business, similar to a profile on Google local. It includes your address, contact info, link to your website, map of the business location, room for a special offer, your opening hours, some options for sharing this listing and writing a review and a space for an add of your competitor (more on that later).

Below the fold your business listing continues with your reviews and some more information about your specialities, your businesses history and a brief bio of you the business owner. Continue reading »

Posted by admin at 11:22 pm

The secret ingredient to a great portrait.

Business, Jobs, Photography No Responses »
Jun 262010

I am a commercial photographer. I don’t shoot the portrait session with the 4 wallets and the 5×7. I shoot mostly models, i.E.people that have been hired to represent the company, fashion line or product that we’re shooting. Often there is a crew of art directors, fashion stylists, hair and make-up artists, clients, assistants, product stylists, prepers, caterers, …

However I have been getting more and more requests lately to photograph people for the people themselves, where the person is the hero of the shot and everything else becomes secondary. This genre of photography requires you to take photos of the person that’s being featured. You can’t use a stock shot for this. It needs to be this human being that has to be in front of your lens.

Grammy award winning producer, composer and conductor Julio Reyes.

Take for example this environmental portrait of Julio Reyes, the grammy award winning producer for Mark Anthony. Julio had asked me to photograph a recording session a few months ago and I had a great time documenting 35 musicians laying down a beautiful track for the new album. Mr. Reyes had asked me to photograph him for his media collateral at that point and we got our schedules lined up a few weeks ago to shoot in his sound studio. So what’s the secret ingredient that you always need for a great portrait?

(find out after the jump)

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Posted by admin at 11:22 am

Capture One on Sale saving you over $250!

Business, Photography, Photography Equipment No Responses »
Jun 112010

I wrote a blog post about Capture One acquiring Microsoft’s Expressions Media a few weeks ago about a great offer they were making through the end of June: If you bought Capture One for $129.- they would give you Expression Media (Retail $199.-) for free!

That deal just got better, for one week Phase One is selling Capture One software for half price, so you can get Capture One for $64.50 – but only to June 18th.
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Posted by admin at 2:30 pm
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