AAAnnnywho… What did we discuss?

Well…”The Art of Fashion”.  It was a really fun night and I was super impressed with the turnout. I was told to expect only half of the people who actually turned up and in fact, we had to have the staff bring is more chairs to make room for more.

We talked about fashion industry, fashion lighting, fashion posing, fashion re-touching. All in all it was a fun night. I did love that I got to see my dear friend Jenny Hollis who is a member of that guild  (who received her masters from the PPA this year, congrats Jenny) and she is so talented. the next day as I was leaving she called me on the phone to tell me she was using some of the techniques I taught the night before. woh! that was a compliment, Jenny is amazing and I respect her work a tremendous amount so for her to call me and tell me she was using some of my techniques was cool.

Of course, I also want to thank my sponsors for getting me there, BWC, the MAC Group (Profoto, Sekonic, Pocket Wizard, …), and Precision Camera.  All these guys are awesome.

Here is a photo of the current RGV PPA Guild President, Julio Gonzalez and of me getting my PPA merits for speaking there

For those faithful readers and for those that have asked where I will be because they may want to go see me speak…

I will be presenting “The Art of Fashion” at the San Antonio PPA in March, The Lubbock PPA in September, The Tulsa and Oklahoma City PPAs in May, the Dallas PPA in Jan 2011.

I will also start presenting “The Art of Weddings” in November and I will start that tour in my hometown of Austin for the APPA.

I am so excited tonight and I had to blog about it. Today, I entered prints at the annual print show for the Professional Photographer’s Association Austin chapter (it covers the greater Austin area like Cedar Park, Georgetown, Smithville…etc).  There are three categories of prints: Portrait, Wedding, and Illustrative. I entered in Portrait and Illustrative.  Yes, I am a wedding photographer but I did not enter into the wedding category. Why? I dunno.

Anyway, I am SOOOO excited that I can say that I won BEST PORTRAIT. I can also say that I won BEST ILLUSTRATIVE.  Anyway, both of those were so exciting but, wait- there’s more! I am evern more excited to say that I won BEST IN SHOW.  HOLY COW!!! I was SO not expecting those. I was just hoping to score high enough on my prints to get points on them-but to win BEST in the two categories that I entered in as well as best in show was CRRRRAZY. Our judges were Master Photographers Ross, Dixie, and Jim. (I will update this post with their information on Monday when I get it) None of them are from the Austin Area.  The process is brutal. Your title is announced and then it starts… the staring, the getting up and looking closer, the judges nitpicking everything about your work. They don’t know who the creator of the print is, they only know title and image.  So, the creator of the image is sitting in the crowd and listening to them rip your work apart. Wow-not easy to sit through that.

Thought you would like to see the images that won and their titles and the story behind them..

BEST PORTRAIT (this portrait is much cooler when you see it printed). The detail in it is pretty awesome and Laura (in the photo) looks stunning. Thanks Laura!!!

TITLE: WONDERMENT

BEST ILLUSTRATIVE PORTRAIT

TITLE: ABANDONMENT

Abadonment is a piece about a person who has been rejected by both church and state. There is nowhere for this person to go. This is a composite image. The church is in Freyburg, Texas. The eagle is from an image that I took from the San Antonio zoo, and the person is Jamie Batiste and I photographed her in my studio.

BEST IN SHOW:

TITLE: ABANDONMENT

I was shocked when the master photographer judges chose this as  BEST IN SHOW. I had to ask them why and then I sad “are you sure?” because there were some gorgeous images there yesterday.  They said they loved the story behind it, which they imagined (I was not able to tell them what it was about before they judged it this evening) and they felt that the image relayed that story. hmmm…. well, I am still excited.

Do you like the images? Feel free to leave a comment if you would like to.

WISH ME LUCK, I AM TAKING THEM TO REGIONALS IN A COUPLE OF WEEKS!

m.