Wanna spend 3 days with Zack Arias?...

I know what you're thinking, "Hell ya!".

Followed by "but he's not coming to my town" and "even if he was I probably couldn't afford it".

All wrong, regardless of where you live you can attend this 3 day workshop (without leaving town, heck, without leaving your house) and you can attend it for free.

Yup, free, zip, nada, nothing.

So let me ask again, wanna attend the 3 day "Studio Lighting Workshop" with Zack Arias?

The catch? you need to register at creativeLIVE before all the "seats" are gone. That's it, that's all you have to do.

creativeLIVE is the brainchild of Chase Jarvis and how it works is simple, you can watch their seminars live (and free) no strings attached, but should you not be able to "attend" live you can buy the entire 3 day workshop (recorded) for a ridiculously low price.

The Zack Arias 3 day seminar (8 hours each day) is free when you watch it live and only $79 to purchase the downloads.

So head over to creativeLIVE to sign up for the Zack Arias workshop, or one of the other (free) outstanding workshops they have coming up.

Back to Zack for a minute, I was listening to one of his interviews last night and he had a great suggestion for building your business/portfolio. He mentioned a specific piece of glass that cost almost $1,900, and too often folks will buy it because the think it is important to their photography business. Zack's suggestion was if you really want to build your business purchase the same glass used and with the money you saved spend 2-3 days in the big apple shooting/building a "New York Portfolio" for your website. I thought that was freaking brilliant.

You can listen to the entire interview here.

Let me close with one more piece of hero worship, this is one of the most innovative portraits I have ever seen, it's of 30 people shot with a single flash.

Lastly, watch the video below to learn how you can win a real/actual seat at the 3 day workshop in Seattle, yup, you can be one of the studio attendees, sipping that great Seattle coffee and that would be free too (well, the seat would be free, not the coffee)!

Win a Scott Kelby instructional DVD...

Not sure if you caught this at the end of my review of Scott Kelby's "Mastering Camera RAW", but we are giving that DVD away to one lucky reader.

To be eligible all you need do is comment on ANY blog post between now and June 30th, there will be a (random) drawing on July 1st to determine the winner.

There is no limit on the number of post you can comment on, the winner will be announced here on July 2nd.

Good luck.

A Pet photography must!...

Some of the most important information contained in this post is included in the very last paragraph, so if you skip anything DON'T skip the last paragraph.

I can describe Jed & Vicki Taufer and their photography business in just four words "great people, outstanding products".

Their latest offering is "Unleashed", a pet photography resource full of detailed information and resources for any photographer that is considering adding pets to their business, or if you already offer pet photography "Unleashed" will help you do it better and with greater success.

You will get a DVD with 72 folders, 165 files, and stuffed with over 2 1/2 gigabytes of information.

What you'll get isn't theory, or what someone thinks is a good idea, what you will get are the tools and blueprints the Taufer's have used (and continue to use) to make their pet photography so successful.


You name it and it's in there, email marketing, press releases, Photoshop .psd samples and templates for cards, prints, and canvases, how to videos, price lists, and more.

They've even included almost a dozen royalty free stock video clips that you can use to fill out slideshows and promotional pieces you may want to create.

And its not just about making money, its also about giving back. They show you how to team up with local animal shelters and organizations to run fundraisers that benefit the shelters, your clients, and your studio. True win, win, win.


I could go on and on about the depth of information that's included on the DVD but the video below will give you a great visual demonstration of the contents of "Unleashed", so please take the time to watch it all the way through.

Here comes the REALLY important part(s) - until the end of the day on Friday (June 4th) you can purchase "Unleashed" for only $84.50. That's half off the regular price! Simply use the discount code "UNLEMAIL" during check out and you'll receive the 50% off special. And because I am so impressed with "Unleashed" I'm going to do something I've never done before, guarantee someone else's product. The first person who purchases this and doesn't think they got their moneys worth, I'll give you your $84.50 back. How's that for believing in a product I review?

Strobist just got better...

I know that's hard to believe but it has.

If you want to learn how to light, Strobist is THE place to go.

Because it has been in existence so long (4 years) and has had so many posts (over 1,000) it is easy to miss or not find articles that would be significant to your learning.

That has changed as David Hobby has taken the time to index the most useful posts for us.

Thank you David!

Follow this link (bookmark it) and let the learning begin!

Free Lens Hoods! Seriously...

Every once and awhile (while wandering aimlessly through the net) I stumble across a sight that A) is phenomenally useful and B) I can't believe I did not know about.

This is one of those sites.

The importance of lens hoods cannot be overstated and if you are missing one, head over to Free Lens Hood, print out the hood you need (on a firm gray card stock) and you are good to go.

They have hoods for:

● Canon

● Nikon

● Olympus

● Pentax

● Sigma

● Tamron

● Tokina

And if you can't find your lens in their long list, you can even design a custom lens hood too.

Free Lens Hood is just that, FREE, but if you find it useful (meaning you print out a lens hood or two) you might want to consider donating a buck to help defray the cost of keeping this valuable resource available.

3 1/2 hours with Scott Kelby...

If someone asked who you wanted to learn Photoshop from who would you pick?

I am willing to be that the vast majority of people would say one name - Scott Kelby.

Over the last several days I watched his DVD "Mastering Camera RAW".

All 3 1/2 hours of it.

There were things I liked about the DVD before watching the first frame, like being able to load it onto an iPod or iPad for "mobile" learning, it also comes with all the same images that Scott works on during the lessons, so you can follow along with the same techniques on the same mages. For me, if I try following along with a dissimilar image the results are different and the lesson becomes less impactful.

Another thing I liked was that on four occasions during the learning process Scott stopped and using the techniques he just taught, he used them in a workflow. He then will teach you more techniques, then using all previous lessons perform yet another workflow. And he does through the entire DVD, adding knowledge and incorporating it into an ever expanding, more in-depth workflow.

Shortcuts. I love shortcuts. They save me time and they make me more efficient. My goal is to be behind the camera, not in front of the computer.

Throughout the entire DVD Scott shows a ton of shortcuts, both keyboard and software.

How frustrating is it to make a slider adjustment, not like the results, but not remember what the default setting was? Double clicking on the slider button will get you back to default. Want to move around an image you've zoomed into? Regardless of what panel you are in, holding down the space bar will give you the "grabber hand" allowing you to move freely around your image.

Scott covers every button, panel, and slider in the camera RAW interface and then stirs in his real world experience to make the "Mastering Camera RAW" DVD an incredible learning experience. With what he does to images in camera RAW Scott makes Photoshop look almost unnecessary.

If you have never used Camera RAW you will be able to follow along without being overwhelmed, if you are an experienced user I promise you will learn something new.

I prefer DVD to live learning as I can always throw in the DVD and refresh/relearn something. It's like having Scott Kelby teaching when it's most convenient for me.

If you would like to be in the running to win the "Mastering Camera RAW" DVD all you have to do is comment in any Weekly Photo Tips blog post between June 1st through June 30th (2010) and your name will be put into the hat, with the winner being drawn on July 2nd.

One last reminder, Weekly Photo Tips will be coming down tomorrow (May 28th) and to be replaced with our Memorial Day slideshow. We will be "back online" late in the day on May 31st.

MY LOVE OF GREAT PHOTOGRAPHERS

Being in the wedding industry not only do I have the opportunity to meet the many photographers we are so lucky to have access to in the Ottawa area but as a wedding coordinator I also have the privilege of working with them and let me tell you, the truly great ones amaze me!

Planning a wedding as you may or may not know is a long process and a lot of hard work but the end result is always worth it and I love the role I play in making it all happen! I get to be the support my couples need throughout the planning process and the one who makes sure all their hard work pays off on their wedding day. And when their wedding day arrives I tell all my couples the same thing – It may have taken many long months to plan this day but now that it's here it’s going to fly by so take the time to savour each and every moment of it… and thank God you have a great photographer! Okay, maybe I don't say the photographer part out loud but I definitely think it.

I remember looking back at my own wedding pictures and thinking just that – thank God we had a great photographer! The details I worked so hard on to make sure our wedding day was a reflection of "us", the chair I had reserved at our ceremony honouring the memory of my dad, the professional pictures I'm so happy to now have with my mom, and the beautiful posed shots of our wedding party, family and friends. All these pictures make me smile. A good photographer will provide you with these wonderful images of your wedding but it's a photographer who is truly able to capture the emotion of your day that makes him great! The loving way my husband looked at me, the laughs (and tears) we shared, the special moments between us. If our photographer had not caught these on film I never would have known they happened.

These pictures were not posed for nor planned, they were just moments throughout our day that our photographer captured because he knew they would later mean something to us. Pictures that, regardless of the time that has passed since our wedding, are still able to bring back all the emotion I felt on that day and make it seem as though no time has passed at all.

Taken by a few of the great photographers in the Ottawa area, here is a small sample of images I absolutely love simply because of the emotion you can't help but feel when you look at them.

Blair Gable

Derrick Rice (wedding coordinated by Weddings Unveiled)

Andrew Geddes

Mike Dickson - And to prove my point, here is a quote from the bride: "I love this photo because when I was thanking my Dad in my speech I was very emotional and didn't have the guts to look at him. However his reaction to what I was saying was important to me and I would have never seen it had this photo never captured it... thanks Mike."