Everything You Wanted To Know About Event Photography Software

Author: Ron McNeil

The beauty of photography is the opportunity it provides to those who take photographs. There is a wide array of possibilities for the photographer who is looking to make money taking pictures. Some may opt to take pictures of the beautiful sunset or mountains, while others like to hire themselves out to people to take photographs for them. Event photography is a very popular type of employment within the photography industry. Event photography software serves to make this job a bit easier. Not sure what event photography is and why you might consider it? Read on to find out all the information on it.

What is Event Photography?

Have you ever been to a wedding? That’s a silly question because most likely, you’ve been to a lot of those. What about a sporting event or a concert? Chances are, if you’ve gone to any of these, you’ve noticed photographers there taking pictures of the event. This is, in a gist, what event photography is. It is photography taken at events such as a wedding, sports event, concert, awards show etc. Event photography software will help you with this job.

Do Event Photographers Make Good Money?

If you’re looking for a type of photography that is pretty much sure to earn you good money, event photography is it. While for most photographers it isn’t all about making money, they can’t deny that event photography is very lucrative. Some event photographers have reported making as much as thousands of dollars for taking pictures at one event. That’s certainly a lot of money.

It’s worth noting that not all event photographers make this type of money, although most do provided they’re very professional. Event photography software helps them to take and manage professional event photos.

What Equipment Do I Need?

People will pay to have quality event photos taken, so it’s important for you, as an event photographer, to have quality equipment. This means making a bit of an investment. You’ll need to spend money to get money you need to purchase some of the best photography equipment available, which includes the camera and event photography software.

Let’s start with the obvious: the camera. You’ll want to get a digital camera, but stay away from the very small cameras – those are for amateurs. There are some great digital cameras on the market which have the traditional camera look, but are digital. These have the big lens, great zoom features and excellent megapixel quality. Go for a digital that has at least 8 megapixels. This may cost you from $400 on up.

Grab a good event photography software program, too. A good event photography software program will allow you to manage your photos in the easiest way possible. If you’re not sure which event photography software program to buy, read some reviews online or ask around.

Next, you’ll want to invest in a big memory card. Think at least 2GB, because the photographs with the highest quality tend to take up the most space. Nothing is worse than being at a gig and running out of space, so buy a few 2GB cards and you’ll be set there.

Good batteries are also required. Make sure they are long lasting and hold a good charge (if they’re rechargeable). Get an extra set of batteries, too.

Finally, you’ll want to invest in a good stand and case. The stand will allow you to take great still shots, while the case will protect your investments. Definitely don’t skimp here.

Why Do Event Photography?

Still not sold on why event photography could be a great choice for you? That’s alright, as many people are skeptical of it. We’ll give you a couple reasons here.

-Flexibility. One of the great things about event photography is that it providers photographers with a great deal of flexibility. You are able to choose how many events you do and how many hours you work. Usually, you won’t have to work weekdays, or if you do, it may only be for a few hours. This is good for parents who want to work and still have time with their kids. Using event photography software can help to make things even more flexible and easy.
-Great Pay. Have you ever wanted to make hundreds or thousands of dollars for just a few hours work? You can do exactly this as an event photographer. Event photography pays very well, so it’s very easy to make a lot of money doing it.

Why Event Photography Software?

There are a lot of reasons why you should use event photography software, but we won’t get into all those now. Instead, we’ll just give you the biggest reason, which is that it makes your job a lot easier. Event photography software will automate the process of managing and naming photos, and will even help you when it comes time to edit the photos. That is why you should consider buying event photography software.

About the Author:

Ron McNeil promotes software to sell photos online and to start your own event photography software and run your own stock photography software site powered by Web Scribble software located at http://www.webscribble.com/products/webstore/

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com – Everything You Wanted To Know About Event Photography Software

Mastering the Art of Sports Photography With your Digital Camera

Author: Amy

For sports enthusiasts, there’s nothing more exciting than sports people playing their favourite game. The sight of the field, rink or golf course initiates the thrill and anticipation. This, combined with digital photography, can provide some amazing photographic opportunities. However it’s not a matter of point the camera at the person diving for the ball or puck and snapping away. It’s a lot more complicated than that.

In digital photography sports can be quite challenging. The sports people do not present an easy task of being photographed because of the amount of high movement. However, you can indeed achieve great sports digital photography. Most excellent sports digital photography requires good planning and execution.

Here are some exclusive tips for gaining fantastic sports shots in your digital photography.

First things first; know your digital camera. I recommend taking note and practicing first all the settings that sports photography needed. You may find yourself going for the faster shutter speed, increased ISO and burst mode. Let’s take a look at all these things on your digital camera and see how they can be applied to give you sensational sports photos.

High shutter speeds:

As with all moving objects, in order to capture the “frozen in time” look in digital photography a fast shutter speed is required. The faster the movement the fast the shutter speed will need to be. In digital photography the general consensus is that the shutter speed needs to be faster than that of the subject. For example if you have a sliding puck across ice and there is a someone about to take a dive for it then its necessary to quickly mentally assess how fast that person might be traveling at. If they are traveling at approximately 50 kilometers (approx 32 miles) per hour then you may find a very fast shutter speed is needed for this digital photo.

A very fast shutter speed in digital photography may be anything from 500th of a second or higher. For high speed movement you may want to consider an even faster shutter speed of 1000th of a second or something in that range.

Keep in mind that in digital photography a fast shutter speed works to reduce some of the light which is why a higher ISO is often necessary. (I’ll talk about that in a minute.) Usually a if a ball, such as a baseball going at around 145 kilometers an hour (90.09 miles per hour) a shutter speed of around 1/4000 will get you that “suspended ball in mid air” type of photo. For physical movement, such as someone leaping to catch a football, a shutter speed of 1/500 or over is a good place to start.

Now this is all very well if your scene if well lit. But what if you are taking your digital photography shots indoors at night and the light is not quite enough to provide enough light? In most instances, an indoor stadium at night time will be well lit, but that doesn’t always ensure good digital photos. In sports photography we need to understand that we can only control the artistic value and input of our digital photo and the control of the camera. We can’t control the lighting on the scene being such a public event. In digital photography sports photos we must realize that it’s going to be a challenge to begin with. So here are something’s you can in your digital sports photography to increase the amount of light.

If you have a light tool on your digital camera such as a histogram you can get a good idea of what the light levels are like on your sensor. With this handy tool you can adjust the ISO at the time of your pictures taking.

Increase your ISO: A high ISO in digital photography simply means the sensitivity to light that your digital camera has. In a nutshell the more ISO you have increased the image to, the less light the sensor needs. In sports photography an ISO of 400 or higher can work really well. The downside to this is that it does increase noise. To combat this you can use noise reduction software in the post editing process such as Noise Ninja or increase the LAB mode in the post editing process. Don’t be afraid to try a few shots at 400, 800 and even as high as 1600.

Burst mode:

In most sports digital photography this will be one of the settings you will turn to. Burst mode is also known as ‘continuous shooting’. This ‘continuous’ shooting mode allows you to get a sequence of shoots in succession. You can increase your chances of getting that ideal “split second perfect shot” that you might not be able to get by pre-emption or in normal shooting. This also works so beautifully if your digital camera has a painfully long lag time. I’ve used this so many times to get around the high lag my Sony Cyber shot has got. Some cameras have 3 frames per second and some go up to 12 frames per second. You simply select this mode and hold your finger on the shutter button and it will fire off as many shots in 1 second as it can.

Okay so I’ve been talking about your digital camera and the setting’s used for ideal sports digital photography, so what about any external equipment? If you have been thinking about this you’re spot on. You can take as much time with your settings but there’s not much point if you can’t get close to the action. There’s no point having a picture with perfect lighting and perfect action if the players are like dots on a sheet of paper. You need a good telephoto lens if you can’t get close up. A telephoto lens brings you closer because of its long distance capability. It will get you closer to the action but will need a faster shutter speed.

Many fantastic sports digital photos are taken with an emphasis on a very fast shutter speed, an f stop of around the 2.8 mark to blur the background and focus in on the subject. You may find that if your sportsperson is visually separated from the background and you take the digital photograph with a telephoto lens you’ll have a more shallow depth of field which can give you a more powerful feeling in your digital photo. You can get away with a good optical zoom lens, but you’ll get far better digital sports shots with a proper telephoto.

So what about the artistic side of sports photography with your digital camera? Plenty!

Pre-emption and Emotion is the key to good art.

When taking sports photography you probably won’t find a more public display of human emotion. The emotions of a sports person range from intense anticipation to extreme disappointment or extreme exhilaration. Pre-empting when these emotions take place is they key to getting artistic and impressive sports photos. This comes with practicing your digital photography.

SO much pressure is placed on our athletes, expecting them to perform so we can enjoy the show and the investors can enjoy their returns. This is another reason why I say to get a telephoto lens so you can capture the emotions on their faces and their body language. It makes for superb photography. For ideas on ice hockey, have a look at some ice hockey images that are great study tools.

Don’t just look at these digital photos, you must study them. Take on the attitude that studying sports photography will improve your digital sports photos ten fold. You will have a style to emulate and copy to start with then eventually, when you become confident, you’ll start to adopt your own style.

Happy shooting,

Amy Renfrey

To study digital sports photography check these sites out: http://cbs.sportsline.com/

About the Author:

Amy Renfrey is the author of two major successful ebooks “Digital Photography Success” and “Advanced Digital Photography”. She is a photographer and also teaches digital photography. She’s photographed many things from famous musicians to portraits of babies. Amy also teaches photography online to her students which can be found at www.DigitalPhotographySuccess.com

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com – Mastering the Art of Sports Photography With your Digital Camera

An Untapped Photography Opportunity in Atlanta?

Comp cards are the industry standard “resume” for models and actors and right now is prime time to be marketing this service. Why you ask? With more and more people in Atlanta (and everywhere) drawing unemployment checks many people are looking at the current state of the economy as a great opportunity to rethink their career strategies and pursue dreams they may have given up on or just didn’t have time to pursue. This of course is accentuated by the influx of Hollywood movies being brought to Atlanta for the unique resources and cost savings of shooting here.

As a professional photographer, and former entertainment industry “participant” I’ve seen and talked to hundreds, if not thousands of wanna-be actors, music artists and models as well as agents and people actually making in entertainment. What they all have in common is the need for progression in industries that have been pushed into commercial molds that just aren’t working anymore. We’ve recently teamed up to provide unique solutions to these issues and believe that in the long-run our marketing models will help to set new industry standards. E-press kits aren’t a new thing, but they haven’t been implemented as well as they could be.

As an up-and-coming model, actor, or entertainer you have been limited to this point by your ability to manage yourself without representation which leads to sloppy connections, poor relationship management, and the overall appearance to buyers of being too “green” to rely on for important jobs.

Imagine the possibilities if you could not only hand everyone you meet in the industry a great comp card, but also point them to an interactive website that would allow them to contact you, read your resume, see your work, and book you for jobs.

Now combine this with a passive (yet aggressive) advertising campaign that will show your face and name to quite literally millions of people. Big companies have always known about the power of suggestive selling and name recognition and we can show you how to use technology to increase your exposure for very very little money.

What if you couls also easily send out 4×6 mailers of yourself to every casting company, every talent agency, every management firm in the country for a few pennies more? Well, we can do it for you and show you what name recognition can do for you.

After all, do you really think Tila Tequila got famous because of her talent? No way – she did it by creatively marketing her face through the simple channel of Myspace. In a little over a year of constant and aggressive marketing she had a recognizable face and name – and every company wants to pay for someone that already has a recognizable reputation.

As an Atlanta Photographer, you should be cashing in on this wave of new-comers to fashion and entertainment. As a Model, actor or singer you should be aware of how easy it is when you work with the right people to be your own PR specialist and manager – that is, until someone makes you an offer that you can’t refuse.

So, take your career – or your client’s career – to the next level. You can contact us at info@atlphotographers.com or fill out the form below and we will gladly send you more detailed information, with no obligation. Good Luck!

I get asked all the time where I went to school for photography…well, I didn’t

Amazing Secret!

Most “Professional” Photographers are SELF-TAUGHT!

The truth is, I really did go to school… I studied Marketing, and then Medicine and Biology and never dreamed of becoming a professional photographer. Now I make almost as much from photography as I would practicing medicine, in much fewer hours per week.

Why I Got Started

• I loved taking pictures
• I loved being social and making people feel good
• I needed more money

How I Got Started

In 2005 I traveled to Europe with Canon SD300 and SD600 cameras in my pocket and on the plane ride over I read nearly a dozen e-books and websites I downloaded about taking better pictures and ended up proving everyone that said it was a “pipe dream” wrong.

When I got to my first destination – Lithuania, I snapped away and found that I really did have a “knack” for framing up shots…the funny thing is, I found that I always had things like “the rule of thirds” and “depth of field” in my head while I shot – simply from all of the reading I had done.

As odd as it may seem, I’ve sold more of the photos I took with my SD600 on stock sites than I have since I upgraded my equipment in 2008 to a 40D with “L” lenses – in other words, it’s not ALL about the camera.

I do have to admit – when people see me in a club or at a wedding with a gigantic lens and flash overhead they tend to take me more seriously, which is the main advantage besides being able to access all of the functions I use now that I have total control over my camera. Before my current setup, I was limited to “tricking” the camera into doing what I wanted.

Here are a few of the pictures I took with the SD600 on the first trip to Europe after reading the right books:

Don’t believe I took them? Visit my photography site http://atlphotographers.com

Here is the set-up I use now and how it looks when I’m working…

How Much Can You Make ONLY from Photography Jobs?

Last month (May) I worked 10 nights at clubs, from 11:30PM – 1:30AM

I also did 4 Portrait Shoots, One wedding, and 3 comp-card shoots, sold $300 in stock photos and did one album cover shoot

Here is my price list:

• Nightclubs – Average print sales per night $10 (50% margin = $5 x 10 nights = $50.00) + $150 charge for 2 hours x 10 = $1550
• Portrait Session (2 hours) – $200 sitting fee, average package $100 with 60% profit margin = ($60 x 4) + ($200 x 4) = $1040.00
• Wedding – $1500/day (7 hours) x 1 (I include $750 print credits @ 60% margin so it costs me $300) x 1 = $1300.00
• Album Cover (1hour)= $300
• Compcards (2 hours) = $200 – $50 printing = $150 profit x 3 = $450

Total hours worked = 42 shooting, approx 84 post-process = 126 hours spent with a profit of 300+300+450+1300+1040+1550 = $4940.00/126 = $39.20 per hour doing something I LOVE!!!

Wow – that’s some serious money for investing only $2500 and some batteries for my flashes…

But also keep in mind, I only upgraded after making the money from my $300 “pocket camera”!

Since I got my start, a whole slew of good books have been written about photography technique, but only one that I’ve found has everything you need to know to get started right.

I suggest you download Digital Photography Success and get started…. and if you have any questions, just email me or leave a comment and I’ll be more than happy to help you out. GOOD LUCK!

ORDER DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY SUCCESS HERE

Our Unconditional, No-Questions-Asked %100 Money-Back Guarantee:

MY PERSONAL GUARANTEE TO IMPROVING AND INCREASING YOUR DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY SKILLS AND ABILITY TO REACH A HIGHER LEVEL THAT YOU WILL BE VERY PROUD OF.

If you don’t think the information in these ebooks will give you exactly what you need to take the digital photos you’ve always wanted to, where people stand back and say “my God, where did you learn to take shots like that” then email me and I’ll refund your money immediately.

I’m here to help you. I am not interested in accepting your money if you are not happy. Because I want YOU to experience the same happiness, joy and confidence as I did when I finally learned how to take professional standard pictures.

ORDER DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY SUCCESS HERE

Photography is the easy part, at least for me. Search engine optimization and getting my artwork in front of potential clients…well, that’s another story all together. Since the dawn of the Internet search, man has been on a mission to trick it, twist it, and tweak it for purposes of good and evil. Most wanted to push the ranks of their websites into the tops of results pages, but some wanted (and still want) to exploit them for unethical ways to make money. I’ll talk about business ethics in  a future article, but for now let’s touch on the basics of why search engine optimization, or SEO, is so important to your photography business and how the real “evil-doers” have made it harder for us over the years (and “No”, I’m not a Bush fan).

SEO is a term that covers any action or reaction that is culminated as a direct effort to raise your ranks in search engines like yahoo and google.

I probably shouldn’t be sharing all of these tips with my competitors, but I am certainly a capitalist and believe that only through healthy competition can products, services, business, and people grow faster, better, and stronger. It’s no surprise that in a digital age you will lose your competitive edge very quickly if you do not adapt to new standards. Assuming your work is good, and people hang around your site to look through galleries, optimizing your business online will serve you better than any single ad campaign you could likely afford. It will push new business to you, give you greater exposure, and make you look to the innocent like you have been on top of the game in your market for years. The downside - SEO is a science that people spend years trying to master and yet no one can ever fully understand it. The reason for this is because of the complexity and ever-changing nature of advanced algorithms and countless developers streamlining the processes. “Bots” are the beasts that scour world-wide web using these algorithms to decide what pages are good, what pages are bad, what ones are scams, and what ones hold real value to the reader.

Now let’s touch on some of the major points you should consider when optimizing your website. These aren’t secrets, but they are known to be amongst the most important factors in ranking your site.

#1 -Relevant Content

You’ll read many places that keywords and meta tags aren’t important anymore, and sure, if you’re myspace or FedEx they probably aren’t simply because the traffic to your site is proof enough that your URL is relevant to the search terms typed into any given search engine. If we take a look at 2 scenarios you’ll see why including and updating them is important:

Your wedding photography website is crawled or indexed by google and the first major thing it sees on it’s search through your code is meta data and here’s what it records on your index page(we’ll keep it simple for now):

a. <title>Photography</title>
<meta name=”description” content=”We take great pictures for you.”>

<meta name=”keywords” content=”photography, pictures, photos, videos”/>
<META NAME=”author” CONTENT=”me”>

b. <title>Bella Sorrisa Photography Atlanta, GA</title>
<meta name=”description” content=”Bella Sorrisa Photography is a premier local and destination wedding, on-location portrait, and architectural  photography company in Atlanta, GA. Lead photographer Joshua Camp has made Bellasorrisa.com your best resource for all of your photographic needs.”>

<meta name=”keywords” content=”Atlphotographers, Atlanta wedding photography, Engagement photos”/>
<META NAME=”author” CONTENT=”Joshua Camp”>

Now comes the fun part…analyzing what these tags REALLY mean. It doesn’t take a genius to come to the conclusion that in the first example not much useful information is divulged. While it’s tempting to throw in only major keywords into your title, description, and keywords, it essentially tells a search engine that you are trying to be like 336,000,000 other sites that it ranks for the word “photography”. Guess who gets the ranking…a combination of the sites with the most USABILITY (see ease of use), the best use of LANGUAGE, and the site with the highest CONTENT VALUE (see readership, relevant link-backs, and rate of reader return). Congratulations, you are knocked out of the running and will probably never be seen unless your site seriously excels at one of the other points. You’ll also notice that in the first example that the “description” field is rather short. You’ll be pretty heavily penalized for that because search engines like their users to know what is actually on the page BEFORE they click the link. This makes their job that much more effective.

There are other problems with these tags, but I’ll have to cover that in a future article.

Keep checking back and we’ll be looking at some other points and relate them to our #1 important factor. The coming articles are:

#2 -Usability

#4 -Language

#5 -Content Value

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Joshua Camp is the owner of Caffeine and Cream, ATL Photographers and Bella Sorrisa Photography in Atlanta and specializes in a range of wedding, assignment, destination and abstract photography. His team is available for shoots at very reasonable prices andcan be contacted for quotes by visiting The Website of Bella Sorrisa Photography and filling out the Contact Us Form.

Logos have always been an integral part of branding a company, and your photography business should be no exception.  As I stroll through the pages of various photographers’ websites I often find myself forgetting to note the photographers name. It does little for the person on the reader end to see nothing more than a name watermarked across the gallery. As you may or may not know, the brain’s ability to enterpret sound and sight is closely connected, but not one in the same.

Let’s think about this last statement and find some reasoning behind the importance of a “visual” logo – particularly in relation to photography. When we read, we predominantly rely on the auditory cortex, which is in the temporal lobe, mainly because we have learned to “sound out” our words. If this weren’t true, we’d all be speed readers. When we are browsing through pictures, our brains resources are consumed by image processing in the occipital lobe – a different part of the brain all together. It’s no wonder us men have a hard time listening to our better-halves while we’re consumed by A-team reruns. Similarly, visuals while we browse a photo gallery are soaked up through watermarks or logos in the corner of a page, and yet we naturally “skip” the reading part. This is, in my opinion, is why names are best kept on business cards, in blocks of text, or at a minimum next to a logo. Still not convinced? Call Nike and tell them the $35 they spent on the “swoosh” would have been better spent on a Zeicos tripod.

Continue on to Logo Design 101

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Joshua Camp is the owner of Caffeine and Cream, ATL Photographers and Bella Sorrisa Photography in Atlanta and specializes in a range of wedding, assignment, destination and abstract photography. His team is available for shoots at very reasonable prices andcan be contacted for quotes by visiting The Website of Bella Sorrisa Photography and filling out the Contact Us Form.