#564 HoHoHo!

HoHoHo

HoHoHo!

‘Tis that time of year when we celebrate Christmas. We wish you well – whatever you may be celebrating – with big smiles and lots of love.

Between Christmas and New Year we will be relaxing, skiing in Gatineau Park with limited time in the office or studio. We will be checking emails for workshop or photography bookings but will be on a holiday schedule.

The blog will be taking a break for a week, too.

May your skis slide well and your smile be wide over the next week of fun and festivities.

#561 Ottawa Portrait Prices

Running a business is challenging. One of the biggest challenges is developing fair prices for different items. In photography we price by usage and value and complexity of shoot. How will the photo be used?:

  • National advertising campaign in all media?
  • Thumbnail portrait on a web site of a small business?

These uses would be priced very differently.

Anyway there was a recent article in the Ottawa Sun about the price of portraits the city paid Paul Couvrette ( a well respected, veteran Ottawa photographer) to do portraits of public city officials.

Good article. The prices are fair.

Access the article.

Ottawa executive portrait

Ottawa executive portrait

#560 Flash Phobia – Exposed! Photo Newsletter

A student recently sent out a mayday distress signal after a photo event left her perplexed. Flash photography can be a scary thing. Like the student, many people develop Flash Phobia – an overwhelming fear of flash photography. It doesn’t have to be that scary!

In this edition of Exposed! we look at four tips for using flash effectively.

Flash tips - #2 Balancing flash with motion

Flash tips - #2 Balancing flash with motion

#559 – Introduction to Studio Photography Workshop

A couple of weeks ago we ran another Intro to Studio Photography Course at Ottawa Studio Works.

We limit the session to two students to maximize hands on learning – and our students soaked up the experience. The morning was spent learning about equipment, theory and some exploratory light sets.

Intro to Studio Photo Workshop

Intro to Studio Photo Class

In the afternoon two groups came in to test the student’s studio portrait photo skills. It’s a challenging day for the students but they did very well!

Introduction to Studio Photography is now offered to anyone throughout the year. Interested? Just contact us to book your session!

Students success!:

Studio Student Success!

Studio Student Success!

Studio Student Success!

Studio Student Success!

#558 This week

This week we had many adventures.

We started with a nighttime photo safari that brought our photographers out on a near perfect winter photo adventure! We had -4C temperatures with light blowing snow – perfect for some Night Light shooting. Frank captured his version of the fun, below:

Ottawa Photo Safari

Ottawa Photo Safari

We followed with another adventure – capturing corporate portraits in Ottawa. We photographed groups and individual executive portraits for a new client. There were smiles all around including my assistant:

building a set

building a set

I picked up some large prints (thanks Dave Andrews) and have started putting up some fine art in our gallery at Ottawa Studio Works. The walls are coming alive.

The week also includes some teaching – a Creative Fundamentals Custom Course, developing a proposal for a client and  and writing the Exposed! photo newsletter – coming soon.

#557 New Photography Workshop – Photographing Your Children

Christine Denis joins us for another photo course – “Photographing Your Children

This is a regularly run course that runs in the spring that produces better parent’s photo skills to immortalize smiling kid faces!

The workshop involves:

  • A classroom session to understand the magic built into your camera. In the classroom Christine teaches about photo skills but also introduces storytelling concepts and scrap booking resources.
  • Practical shooting session where young models play for your cameras. Christine is there to assist, guide and support your questions.
  • A critique and review session helps you improve your future skills and see different ways others interpreted the same fun. This evening is very
  • beneficial and comes with automatic smiles.

See course details.

Reserve your spot!

Photographing Your Children Photo Course

Photographing Your Children - Photo Course

#555 Who’s doing what in Ottawa Photography?!

Our new studio – OttawaStudioWorks.com – in central Ottawa has been up and running for a few months now – it acts as our client meeting area, showroom, photo studio and hosts events and acts as a gallery.

We run a very simple photo blog highlighting the photo and arts community in Ottawa. Usually twice a week we post blog fun from the working photo community with Friday Photographer Roundup giving a low down on ‘Who’s Doing What in Ottawa Photography.’

It’s fun, simple – researched and posted by one of our team. Do you have a blog with posts worthy of announcing? Let us know. We’d like to share.

Ottawa Photo Studio

Ottawa Photography Studio