I wanted to share this great website, called the Photographers Ephemeris. It easily shows you the position of the sun and moon any time of day for any day of the year. I discovered this site years ago when a client wanted to take a photo at a certain place on a certain day at a certain time and I wanted to know where the sun would be.
I have it bookmarked and I use it all the time when planning exterior shoots or simply when I want to know when and where the sun or moon will set.
It is a great tool for anyone, whether you are a photographer or not. Check it out and donate to keep it going!
If you’ve ever been part of a corporate headshot shoot (either as a photographer or a “head”) then this probably looks familiar. Instant studio in a vacant meeting room.
When people come by for their headshot, a lot of them tell me they hate having their picture taken. That’s entirely reasonable and understandable but it don’t bother me none. It’s actually a lot more fun that they expect. Plus I’m pretty efficient so it doesn’t hurt too long.
Meetings and conferences are a great time to get corporate headshots. It is when everyone is together and a maybe little more relaxed than when at the office.
The Crown Plaza in Princeton is a favorite conference center for corporations so I am there pretty often. It is a big place. So big that it even has water stations so you don’t get dehydrated walking from one part of the center to another. I think they should have golf carts.
…
Dr. Jody Serra, owner of the Center for Natural Wellness offers a range of chiropractic services from adjustments for children and adults to special concierge treatment for NFL athletes. Jody and his team provide different approaches to their various patients based on their individual needs.
Like most business owners, Jody recognizes the need to frequently update and refresh his web presence and so scheduled an afternoon to get some new business portraits.
We discussed standard, studio-based headshots (which are always a great standby) but Jody wanted to push the envelope a little to create some different looks that he and his team can use for reaching different audiences and offering some of their different services.
Many of us in the small business community can relate to this. We are often quite diverse with a variety of skill sets that appeal to different clientele. Keep this in mind when thinking about your marketing plan. You can have more than one look.
…
Every year I enjoy photographing the newest class of the Leadership Hunterdon program. Leadership Hunterdon was launched back in 2011 with the vision to “transform people to become trustees of our communities, to become leadership resources and work for the betterment of Hunterdon County.”
These people, already leaders, will spend the next nine months not only working in their full time jobs but also attending classes and workshops, visiting companies and organizations throughout the County and crafting a white paper offering their guidance and insight on continuing how to improve life and business here in Hunterdon County. I am always totally impressed!
…
Happy Equinox.
About equal day and night today as we continue to spiral and dance with the sun through the cosmos.
(Maybe I’ll build a circle of stones to mark these events. I wonder if anyone ever thought of doing that.)
…
Newark, NJ continues to grow and expand with the help of Dranoff Properties (dranoffproperties.com) which is building a 22 story luxury apartment complex just across the street from the NJ Performing Arts Center (NJPAC).
Dranoff and its PR firm, Evergreen Partners (evergreenpr.com), brought me on to photograph its Topping Off Event held to celebrate reaching the height of 22 stories with the men and women who did the construction and the VIPs who helped make it happen, including Newark Mayor Ras Baraka and NJPAC CEO John Schreiber, shown here with Carl Dranoff.
Everyone got a chance to sign the ceremonial beam that will be a permanent part of the building (I thought about sneaking up and signing my name, too, but I didn’t help buid it so that would just be graffiti)
It is good to see Newark grow and expand in a positive way. These kinds of projects benefit everyone. My next assignment with Dranoff will be showing off the views.…
What’s for sale here?
On the surface, it’s a funky looking squash. Taken just a little deeper, it’s a decoration, a feeling of fall, a memory of Thanksgiving dinners, leaves blowing across the lawn, crisp cool air … A pretty good bargain for a few bits.
What are you selling?
…
Google Earth is a powerful program. It provides a 3 dimensional view of the earth’s surface and is designed to allow users to embed their own data and share it with others on the Google Earth platform. And it’s free. You just need to know how to take advantage if it.
I find it invaluable for enhancing my photography when there is a spatial component (i.e., when the location of the photos is important). By incorporating my images in Google Earth or in it’s companion program Google Map, I can add the geographic dimension to enhance the viewer’s experience and better communicate my client’s message. I’ve made use of this many times from preparing proposals for multi-site assignments to coordinating a large regional project with other photographers.
Most recently, Google Earth was the perfect application for a environmental photography study. The assignment was to photograph a certain type of geology in various locations of NJ in order to illustrate the orientation of the fractures. The conventional way to do this is to simply take the photos and then mark the locations on a map. This is effective but the viewers have to jump back and forth between map and the photos and cannot virtually travel around the region like they can with Google Earth.
Using Google Earth is fun and introduces the “WOW” factor. If you’ve ever used Google Earth you know how it flies in and around the globe to various areas and can not only see not only the locations but can give you a 3 dimensional rendering that showing the hills and valleys of an area along with a seamless aerial photo that shows all the features on the ground.
This is an example from my recent project showing the location of three photos that were taken in a stream valley. …