Photography Marketing

Rentfrow Design wins Residential Design + Build 2011 Design Excellence Awards. Cover photo by Warren Diggles.

We have been working with Jon Rentfrow for years photographing his Colorado Luxury Home designs. His home designs have won numerous residential awards and this month The Avalon is featured on the cover of Cygnus Publishing’s Residential Design + Build magazine. The Avalon was awarded Cygnus Publishing’s 2011 Design Excellence Award for the Spec/Model category. This speculation home was designed at the request of the developer for a high end development in west Loveland nestled in a valley bordering Devil’s Backbone park. You can see the article on page 42 of the magazine.

The Alpine Visitor Center is located at the intersection of Trail Ridge Road and Fall River Road at an elevation of 11,796 feet.

As a photographer in Colorado I really enjoy getting a chance to photograph well known Colorado places. Alpine Visitor Center at the top of Trail Ridge Road is definitely a landmark of Rocky Mountain National Park. Steve Lane, a local Colorado architect hired me to photograph this newly finished interior remodel. Steve is the founder and principal architect of Basis Architecture, Colorado Architecture Firm located in Estes Park.

One of the difficulties for this project was that we only had a short amount of time to set-up before the center opened for the day. As soon as the doors opened the visitors flood in, so there were a lot of tourists in the visitor center during the shoot. I really don’t mind this because I actually like having people in the pictures when photographing buildings. People could definitely see us working and the people that didn’t mind being in the pictures milled around the areas I was photographing. The staff of the visitor center were also explaining to the crowd that we were there to take pictures of the facility. This allowed them to avoid being in the pictures if they were sensitive to that. Continue reading →

Colorado State University’s College of Business Dedicates Rockwell Hall-West, Holds Open House and Hosts Retired Gen. Colin Powell April 30. Colin Powell’s talk reaches out to the northern Colorado attendees with a message emphasizing leadership and local community… This image is available as a rights managed stock photo download through our online store.

» Download images – rights managed Pictures of Colin Powell.

This post highlights a CSS Only Drop Down Menu that was modified for Photoshelter from Superfish CSS Drop Down Menu for Joomla!. The reason to use a CSS only menu is that for security reasons Photoshelter (Photography Websites), does not allow scripting to be imported into their templates. This is why a CSS only menu solution is the best solution for Photoshelter customization. Not only does a CSS only drop down menu work with Photoshelter, but it loads faster than other web menu methods, and all the while contributing excellent SEO to your website.

Here are some links to working examples:
CSS Only Drop Down Menu Code
Colorado Stock Photography
Stock Photography of Western Canada

Here is a working example of SuperFish for Joomla! menu:
The World’s Best Colon Cleanse – Original Joomla! Superfish component customized with rounded corners

Me with some of the familiar faces of Photoshelter
(Rachel, Me, Allen, Grover and Andrew – Photo by Mellissa Diggles)

If you have read my blog before you will know that I am a big fan of Photoshelter. If you are not familiar with Photoshelter, they are the place on the web where photographers get seen and sell their work. It is my opinion that Photoshelter provides photographers with the most complete set of tools available to maximize the benefits of the web. With my Photoshelter customization website northerncoloradophotography.com, I am able to set up a searchable archive for my stock images, provide traditional customers with access to their images via the web, offer online order fulfillment, and seamlessly integrate all of this with my existing portfolio website and blog.

While on a family trip to the east coast for our niece’s wedding I took the opportunity to visit the hub, the center, the heart of Photoshelter. When we got to Union Square where Photoshelter is located we noticed that a commercial photoshoot was going on, very cool, I thought that Photoshelter was behind it so I looked around a bit but came to the conclusion that they weren’t – the funny thing is that when looking at Photoshelter’s blog today there is a post about it – you can read about it on A Picture’s Worth.

Anyway, we found the building located at 33 Union Square West and headed on up to the second floor. When the elevator opened I saw the Photoshelter logo and knew we were in the right place. First I want to mention how friendly everyone is and how my family and I felt very welcome. After introductions and a brief tour I talked a bit with Allen and Andrew about marketing a photography website. They shared with me some of their insights and let me know they are getting close to unveiling the next set of PSA upgrades – can’t wait to see exactly what they are…

What I gathered from my visit reinforces what I already know, Photoshelter is about photographers. A company that is continuously providing us with web based infrastructure, effective web marketing tools and the knowledge to utilize both with the free SEO resources of sites such as Google, Twitter, Facebook and whatever comes next.

Thank you again Photoshelter for your hospitality. Allen, my family agrees, the pizza at Patsy’s is delicious!

Large interior with 2 studio lights
Commercial Photography Lighting Techniques: Example 8

Equipment Used
* Canon 1ds * 24mm tilt shift * 24mm ISO100 f10 .3sec
* Speedotron Brownline 800ws two M11 heads
* 16″ Reflector (Beauty Dish), about 15′ behind the subjects
* 7″ Reflector, as high as stand will go pointed at ceiling

Shooting interiors is always challenging, but before setting up the lighting there three things that are very important to assess before you start.

1. What is the purpose and goal of the photography session
2. What commitments did you project to the client and what expectations do they have
3. What is the budget or how much time do you have

Since I was hired for this shoot by a magazine the purpose is to create feature and ad photography for their client East Moon Asian Cafe. The restaurant had a limited budget which allowed for 2 hours of photography time. Continue reading →

Speedotron Brown Line and Beauty Dish
Commercial Photography Lighting Techniques: Example 7

Equipment Used
* Canon 1ds * 100 macro * 100mm ISO100 f13 1/60sec
* Speedotron Brownline 800ws one M11 head
* Beauty Dish (16″ Reflector) 5′ away about 45 degrees to the left of subject, ceiling height
* The direction of the light is perpendicular to the subject
* White reflector directly to right of subject just out of camera view

This room is about 12′x14′ with a dining room table in it, we did not have much space to light the subject and background separately! This is an area where the beauty dish shines. Continue reading →

Photography Web Design Facebook Fan Page – click link to see a Photoshelter flash gallery embedded to Facebook fan page and by all means show me some love and click the like button!

Before you can add a Photoshelter flash gallery to a Facebook fan page you need to install
Continue reading →

To my surprise, on 1/09/09 our photographic art was featured on the homepage of ImageKind.com – Colorado Rocky Mountains, Photographic Art by Warren Diggles, I know very nice!! We received over 200 visitors from the homepage link on imagekind.com in one day, this is a good place to be.

Since selling photographic art is new to us we have been perusing the community forum to see how other artists are marketing their work. The ImageKind community is very nice, in just the few short months that we have been members the forum has been very helpful and the other artists have been very forthcoming and responsive to questions.

ImageKind seems to be a very good place to feature your artwork for sale. You maintain complete control over your images, reproduction pricing and much more. Not only does imagekind.com give you tools to create professional works of art they also give you tools to advertise. Check directly above our advertiser’s corner on the bottom right corner of this page to see what I mean.

Thursday January 1st – 22nd, The Cache Gallery located in Fort Collins, Colorado is showcasing the photographic works of Thompson Valley High School’s Photography 3 class.

When we arrived at the show it was standing room only and there was quite a buzz surrounding the exhibit. The Loveland High School students presented a wide range of photographic styles. From this group of students I can see that the future of northern Colorado photography is in good hands. The collection includes examples of commercial photography, photoshop design, portraits, conceptual art and photography for the sake of photography…

Representing award-winning & established photographic artists from the USA and abroad, the Cache Gallery’s current offerings can be seen here. Works such as Adrian Davis’s intriguing neutral density timed exposures capturing the abstract motion and colors of nature; Cole Thompson’s simple scenery and life images carefully crafted into flawless pieces of Black and White photographic art. The Cache Gallery participates in the first friday gallery walks from 6-9pm in Olde Town Fort Collins.

Caption: Rachel Diggles pictured here standing next to 3 pieces from her photography series depicting the constant pressure on teenagers to conform to society’s expectations…