Choosing an Event Photographer - Cont.

Today I continue with selecting a professional event photographer.

Professionalism, reliability and price are the remaining factors to consider when selecting a photographer to photograph your event. Today I will talk about professionalism... perhaps the most important factor you will consider.

Professionalism means a lot of different things to different people, but Webster defines it as: 1 : the conduct, aims, or qualities that characterize or mark a profession or a professional person . Professional is further defined as: 1: characterized by or conforming to the technical or ethical standards of a profession 2: exhibiting a courteous, conscientious, and generally businesslike manner in the workplace.

When considering a photographer to take photos for you, you would be well served to gather some information about the professionalism of the company. Some great questions to ask would be: 1. How many years have you been in business delivering photographs onsite? 2. What professional associations are you members of? 3. Are you a member of PPA (Professional Photographers of America) or SEP (Society of Sport & Event Photographers)?

The number of years a photographer has been delivering photographs onsite will significantly impact your event's success. It takes a wide variety of skills and talents to be able to deliver quality photographs quickly, while maintaining a consistently effective connection with your guests. New photographers rarely realize the complexity of this type of photography, and find themselves ill-equiped to handle the numerous challenges that inevitably present themselves. It is absolutely imperative that you hire photographers that have a good deal of experience handling the specific type of event that you are putting on. Every type of event has nuances that can "trip-up" a photographer that is not well-prepared. You don't want your event to be their "test-shot".

As for membership in professional photography associations... being a member of one or both of these organizations (PPA & SEP) assists a photographer in staying current with digital photography trends, and gives them access to information about "conforming to the technical or ethical standards" of their profession. While membership in these organizations does not ensure that a photographer will adhere to professional standards, it does indicate a desire to do so.

Photographers that are associated with other organizations such as the Better Business Bureau (BBB), International Special Events Society (ISES), National Association of Catering Executives (NACE) and Meeting Planners International (MPI) are indicators that they are attempting to stay current with event trends, network with other industry leaders and adhere to ethical standards for the event industry. Long-term membership in associations such as these indicates a company that is tried and true. Because they are attended by other industry professionals, photographers that do not adhere to professional standards lose interest quickly from the lack of leads generated by their attendance.

The other part of investigating professionalism is by gathering information on their ability to "exhibit a courteous, conscientious, and generally businesslike manner in the workplace." I will discuss this along with reliability and price in my next post.

New Get The Picture Location

Wow! It has been a crazy week! In the last week we have moved our entire home, office and studio from Austin to Lago Vista and completed seven photography event projects. Everyone on our staff is feeling a bit dizzy from the whirlwind, but it is going to be soooo worth it! Our new location allows us to move the office and studio out of our home and into separate buildings. We are so excited about the new studio and offices. Of course most everything that is not essential is still in boxes, but we are quickly getting things organized for the business to expand.

With our new studio location we will be able to accomodate many more clients for portraits. Our focus will be on families, couples, business photos and senior portraits. We can hardly wait to get started!

Stay tuned... we'll be posting new studio client specials soon!

The Smile Never Fades - Austin TX

I"m going to take a break from my blog on event photographers to talk about a wonderful event we participated in on Wednesday night. Our dear friend and colleague Bill Bastas held an amazing fundraiser for breast cancer research at The Mansion on October 15th, 2008. The event was to commemorate the release of his sencond book "The Smile Never Fades: Caring and Sharing". It is compiled of portraits of breast cancer survivors, their friends and family and other supporters, as well as intimate essays written by the survivors themselves. All of the proceeds from the book and the event will go to the Breast Cancer Resource Center of Austin.

Everyone who turned out for the event had a fabulous time! Third Language played great music and Complete Music provided Emcee services. The food was amazing, and the speech that artist William Stidham gave to honor Bill was heartfelt and nothing short of inspirational.

Some of the other sponsors who participated were Sterling Affairs, Sparkling Engagements, Twin Liquors, Emerald Entertainment, Third Language Band, Austin Party Central, Floral Renaissance, Amazing Ice Designs, Michelle's Patisserie, RK Group, The Inviting Pear, Steve Armstrong Photography, Wild Parrott Video & Simon Lee Bakery.

It was terrific to see our friends and colleagues come together for such a wonderful cause. Thousands of dollars were raised to fight breast cancer while bringing together the event community to honor Bill and his beloved wife Michelle who lost her life to the disease.

Next year I hope to see all of you there too.

How to choose an event photographer. Continued

So, what do these different types of event photographers have to offer the customer?

As a customer, you will be looking at several factors in your decision-making; quality, speed, reliability, professionlism, and price. You will also be interested in how the photography company will be assisting you in meeting your goals for your event. There may be other factors that you will want to consider, but these tend to be the ones most clients that we have worked with focus on.

If quality is important to you, there are a few things that you may want to keep in mind. Quality photographs can be produced onsite using only two methods, inkjet or dye sublimation. Both of these printing methods require high-quality input. In other words... photographic talent and professional cameras will be needed regardless of how good the printer is. Assuming that the person taking the photographs has a good eye, and they are using professional capturing devices, then either inkjet or dye sublimation printers can create a quality image onsite. However, there are two major differences between the two that must be considered. The first is that dye submlimation prints are produced in such a way that they are much more immune to handling and water damage (an important consideration if you will be having alcohol served at your event). The other factor, and most important for your purposes, is speed. Ink-jet printers take a long time to produce an image. The dye sublimation printers that we use produce a 5x7 in less than 15 seconds.

For the photographer this choice usually comes down to cost and features. A professional photographer who owns a studio may select an inkjet printer because of the flexibility it offers them in their studio. Inkjets can print photos in many different sizes and paper types making them a better choice for someone who owns a storefront. The inkjet printers are also usually much less expensive. However, a professional event photography company that delivers photographs onsite would only use dye sub. The speed of these printers keeps the photography line moving quickly, the delivery process seamless, and the quality of the image as high as possible. Inkjets simply can't keep up with an event that needs a high volume of quality photographs to be produced.

In my next blog I'll continue with the other factors I listed above.

Photographer Austin TX - How to choose an event photographer

It has recently come to my attention that there is a lot of confusion about what an event photographer really is. Most people understand the concept of the "photographer", but because photographers specialize in so many different areas, everyone seems to have their own understanding of what one does. For myself, I was trained in a traditional studio environment, taking family, children and senior portraits. This was my concept of photography for a long time. But now the "photographer" is an ever evolving phenomenon. The introduction of digital photography has expanded everyone's awareness of the art form, and the traditional photographer is being forced to evolve with it.

In steps the "event photographer". With digital advancing at a rapid pace the possiblity of delivering a professional quality photograph onsite has become a reality. But I gotta tell you... it ain't cheap! To deliver a high quality image an event photographer needs to invest in quality cameras and lenses, fast & reliable computers with lots of hard drive space, expensive software that will allow you to show, print and deliver the photographs quickly onsite, and dye sublimation printers. You also need a way to carry all this equipment, transport it and workflow systems in place to manage it all. All of this costs big bucks!

So what you will find in the marketplace are three varieties of event photographers. One... the professional event photographer who bites the bullet and invests many thousands of dollars to run his/her business effectively with numerous systems capable of producing high volume and high quality portraits onsite at events. Two... a photographer who owns a studio and is "getting into" event photography with purchase of one dye-sub printer to expand their current business. Or Three.... an opportunist who sees event photography as a quick way to make money, but refuses to invest in quality equipment to do so.

I will be blogging further about the types of event photographers and giving suggestions on how to select the best photographer for your event in the days and weeks to come.

NACE Austin Chapter Eat The Heat - Austin Event Photography

Last Thursday night we had the pleasure of participating in the National Association of Catering Executive's (Austin Chapter) yearly fundraiser... Eat The Heat. Through the efforts of dozens of local event companies, caterers, djs, photographers, bands, local venues, and fabulous local chefs, NACE was able to raise thousands of dollars to help support local charities in Austin.

It was a blast! We all celebrated the 102 degree temperature of the day with fabulous food and drinks, great music, and wonderful friends. Maggie Mae's had a brand new event space and Buffalo Billiards created delicious authentic African cuisine to tantalize our taste buds. The Blue Lights played at Maggie Mae's and did a terrific job! Wow! What great sound! Tons of people even showed up from San Antonio to support the charities, and at The Omni, the local chefs put out a spread you wouldn't have believed.

We even took greenscreen photographs and put people on an African Safari background. Pretty Funny!

I was on the silent auction committee, so I got to help grab up the silent auction sheets just as time ran out. It was so much fun. There were people all huddled around the papers up until the final seconds waiting to quickly put in their last bid before it closed. It was really cool, and all for a great cause.

If you weren't able to attend this year, make sure you come out for Eat The Heat next year. It's going to be fabulous... as always!

To view our photos from the event click on the following link:

http://web4.sendtoprint.net/proofbook/0838/base.asp

Our dear friend Bill Bastas also took photos that night. You can view his photos here:

http://www.4shared.com/dir/8767448/4dde7caf/sharing.html

Kate

Austin Chamber of Commerce Awards - Get The Picture Finalist

In 2005 we were honored to receive the award for Excellence in Innovation for Small Business from the Austin Chamber of Commerce. Today, we received word that we have been selected as finalists again for the same award.

The Austin Chamber of Commerce 2008 Greater Austin Business Awards will be held on August 27th, and we invite all of our clients, friends and colleagues to join us for the festivities.

2008 has been a great year so far, and we are excited to be part of this fabulous group of businesses once again!

Wish us luck!

http://www.enewsbuilder.net/grtraustinchamber/e_article001153922.cfm?x=bd47nwK,b1mDw5sL,w

Austin Event Photographer - Crockett High School Prom

The proms just keep getting more and more exciting! This Saturday we photographed a prom for Crockett High School at La Zona Rosa in Austin. It was fabulous!

With the Austin Cityscape as the students background of choice, we were able to deliver portrait packages to every student who purchased... On The Spot!

Of course the evening was not without its hiccups. As policy, we always arrive to proms an extra hour early to leave room for any challenge that may arise. And this Saturday was no exception. It's a good thing too, because we ran into a big one! Our Virtual Background system has light module assembly inside it that basically makes the whole system work. On the first test shot we took on Saturday, our flash tube blew. I don't know if it was the massive thunderstorm that rolled in, or just that flash tube's time to die, but we didn't have a way to take any pictures. That's not exactly correct. We could take photographs, we just couldn't see the backgrounds. And when you've promised a school an Austin Cityscape background, you had better deliver.

As luck would have it we have just recently purchased a second Virtual Background system. It has been so popular that we simply needed a second system to handle all of the events. Along with the purchase of our second system, we bought a backup for our entire light module assembly. So with the additional time we had and the new assembly sitting back in our office, we were able to be up and running before our scheduled start time of 8 PM.

Whew! That was a close one!

Tune in next week for more prom adventures.

Kate

Austin TX Event Photographer / Prom Photography

Proms are now in full swing for 2008. We completed our second prom of the year last Saturday night for Stony Point High School. Wow! Did we ever have a blast! With our new Virtual Background system, we are able to offer prom portraits like no other photographer can.

Stony Point High School juniors and seniors we able to select from six different background choices for their portraits. They viewed their photographs on the computer monitors, and selected their favorite pose from the photos taken. Then, within 10 or 15 minutes, the students returned to pick up their portraits.

I must tell you that even though I have been delivering prom photographs onsite at proms for nearly nine years now, I have never been so amazed at the results, or as proud of our team as I was on Saturday.

Event photography is a real art when you are dealing with large numbers of people. And 800 high school students is what I call HIGH VOLUME! Most photography companies wouldn't dream of taking the time to show the students their portraits, but to show and deliver portraits.... with six background options? Well, it is nothing short of miraculous that we have figured out how to do it. And do it really well!

The students were ecstatic! I was so fun watching their expressions as we told them that they could pick their backgrounds, pick their favorite pose, and receive their portraits in about 15 minutes.

And for me, it was truly gratifiying to realize that after nine years of perfecting our process, we finally actually have this thing down to a science.

We have more proms to come... and graduations too. So stay tuned!

Kate

Austin Event Photographer - Virtual Background

Little did we know when we starting using the Virtual Background system how much it would impact how we do business. Prior to the VB (Virtual Background), we were using either greenscreen technology or standard muslin backgrounds for our onsite portraits.... and they both worked pretty well. But with the technological shift to VB, Get The Picture has noticed a significant impact on portraits sold.

If you haven't seen the Virtual Background system in action, you really ought to check it out. It is a projection system that allows the photographer to offer an endless number of background selections in their studio.(Even though Get The Picture doesn't really have a "studio" because we are mobile). We set up our "studios" onsite at events. So we do have to limit our selections, or our customers will go mad trying to choose. But we are actually able to offer up to 6 different background choices at one event. Six different background selections that are relevant to that event! It's really very cool!

Anyway... since having brought on our VB, we have noticed that packages are getting larger and more people are buying portraits than normally would have... bucking the industry trend being seen across the globe. With consumers having more and more control over their own photographs, they are tending to use professionals less and less. What is exciting for us is that the Virtual Background system allows us to produce a level of quality and professionalism onsite that no consumer can create themselves. Afterall... we're not doing "snapshots", we're committed to providing studio-quality portraits... ON THE SPOT!

Kate

Austin Event Photographer - Daddy Daughter Dance

If anyone ever tells you that writing blogs is easy, please pop them once for me! Kate asked me to write a blog about a recent event called a Father/ Daughter dance in which we set up two portable studios with matching backgrounds to maintain continuity and allow the line to move quickly. Prior to the event you would have thought we had this in the bag and bring em' on! Little did we know how many they would bring on! Even though we had two lines and were moving our subjects quickly through our process, the line never seemed to get shorter! Kate and I were on one line and Frank and Patricia were on the other and neither set up was empty at any time. Michaela was taking and processing orders with blinding speed but to no avail. There must have been a recent boon of families with daughters in this part of Austin! Now, I realize I am making this sound out of control but it was quite the contrary, even though we were working with over whelming numbers, we kept working to move as many people through our system until everyone was photographed and happy with their portrait! We even had one couple come up after they had turned the lights on and we stayed to photograph them and gave them their portrait to take home. They were very happy. All in all it was a tiring experience but also a fun one to see these little girls proudly posing in their beautiful dresses with their daddys. Even though some of these little ones grew a little grumpy in line while they waited, my hat is off to their dads for keeping them entertained and smiling when their time came.
I can't wait for the Mother/ Son dance to see those little guys in their suits!

Charles