So just finished a pretty awesome photo shoot. (Up in American Fork Canyon)

I skimmed some of the pictures real fast (there were a Ton)

I thought to myself I could put up a quick teaser.
That would either be very nice to do so they could have something ASAP long before their expectations.

Or on the other hand it could be very mean to give them just a small bite and leave them hanging for a while til the rest of them are done.

So is it mean or nice?

I’m not really sure, I kind of just want to put these up so people can ohhh and ahhh and make me feel good about the pics.

P.s. Marco (one of the student-interns) came and assisted with lighting and took some pictures for himself. He learned lots about fun lighting and learned it’s all about setting stuff up fast in shoots like this. I made him work hard, but in the end I hope that helped him really know his stuff.

A couple color versions

Which brings up the question… Who’s more into the B&W these days?

SEE FULL GALLERY

I edit and upload in batches (First batch will have 61 – look for more later)

Am I starting to like B&W more or is it just because the feel and the lighting and the mood of the day seemed to be better stated in B&W??

Lots of pleased individuals when I left… I heard a lot of positive responses to what SmugMug has to offer.
My way of saying thanks to SmugMug for being great and dealing with me and all my massive amounts of pictures.

There was a suggestion by a couple people at the end of the evening that perhaps we could all write a comment if you were there. Everyone was passing around business cards and perhaps felt this was a good way.
I of course wouldn’t mind at all the comments… and feedback would be great, as well to show SmugMug how good a time we all had. haha

I have written posts in the past.

One on my yr (1TB) anniversary with the company. A review
http://jarviestudios.com/blog/2009/10/smugmug-1000gbs-later/

Another to do a review and a wish list for their new coupons system
http://jarviestudios.com/blog/2009/12/coupons-and-questions-smugmug/

In continuation some Notes

“I’m going back to school next week”

In fact about a week or two ago I wasn’t planning on it.
But now I’m a school bound fool.

Learning from past roads

Good news though… It won’t be the typical schooling experience.
It will be heavy emphasis on the learning this time around.
Taking from the 16yrs of schooling experience in my life I believe this experience will go about things in a much improved system.

My personal belief is they shouldn’t just pump more money into a bad system… but change the system. Or perhaps take the old horse out back behind the shed carrying the trusty gun and a shovel.

If you can’t find the perfect solution … Create it!

Where When What Why How Who?

Happy that this time around I won’t be paying absorbent fees
It’ll be a system that focuses on application of knowledge in addition to acquisition.
It’ll be much faster. (4yrs?!? Why do we accept the standard that it should take 1200+ days to learn something well. Maybe for slow people… but what about us? )

This time around I’m not really the student per-se.
Well in a way I am since I’ll be learning lots.
But I guess I’ll be learning while in the roll of Teacher.
Ok more of a Director or President of the school, perhaps we can even say Founder.

It Begins

“Orientation” is friday night at 7:30pm
525 W Bullriver Rd Lehi

Staring next week: Classes, Office Interning, Field Trips, Photo Excursions and all the coolness

Response has exceeded my initial expectations.
I figured it would eventually get popular…
It seems people have really caught onto the vision quite quickly.

New challenges to solve

In the future present students will be involved in selecting the next students, but dang I wish I had a board of directors to select this first batch.
I face challenges I just don’t know the answer to.
Like how many student-interns there should be.
I thought at least 5 and I got that…
Now I need to figure out a maximum. 10? 15?

Good news is we’ll do a second round of student-interns probably  late march early April.
So even if we can’t take everyone now we’ll have more spots then.

JarvieU – Explained

I will explain JarvieU (or jDigital U) the funnest way I know…
Through a list of benefits

• The core is an internship of Photo-Editing and Workflow. (Hands on / real life)
• And the hope is a focused fast and efficient approach to becoming really good at this stuff.
• You’re joining a community of a dozen+ other people who think constantly about and who are passionate about photography.
• Classes on EVERYTHING
• Field trips (to meet people and industries involved in photography)
• Photo Excursions (like mini-workshops and phototrips, chance to use new knowledge and tricks)
• Assisting opportunities (Not just with me)
• Guest speakers (Other photographers volunteering to teach or people related to the industry)
• Use of studio
• Group/School projects
• Backup from a great community
• Business discussions and presentations
• Learn to Edit, Take better pictures, blog, use smugmug, wordpress.
• Learn and work on a photography related emphasis (blogging, printing, audio-visual, business marketing etc)
• Access to Photo-Books & online training.
• Promotion of services
• Job placement
• Critique sessions
• Photoshoot opportunities (stack your portfolio)
• Pay-It-Forward student to student training
• Essentially learn EVERYTHING to become a successful photographer

Fun Times Ahead

It should be a wild and fun few months ahead of me.
I’m sure I’ll be making lots of adjustments and figuring out how to go about and sharpen things up for round two in a couple of months.

I’m really excited not to help others and have lots of interns to help work on projects.
But because I feel like I’ll be learning tons from all the classes and events.

Invited

You’re invited to come to the orientation and learn more… whether you’re interested to be a student-intern now or next time.
You’re also invited to come if you’re a photographer who might want to present to the school or be involved with the assisting program where you always have an interested and trained assistant willing.

My blog posts hope to reach the following people in the following ways. (No particular order)

1. The client

By showing them their pictures in a short succinct recap, and giving them a quick method to show their pictures to their friends and family.

2. The clients friends and family.

By offering them a short recap of their friend or family member.
And also provide a link to the full gallery so they can see more if desired

3. Potential clients

By showing them what kind of work I’ve been doing recently.
After 4-5 years I keep on getting better every shoot.
It’s great to see many pictures from one shoot and know that I don’t just take a small handful of good pictures at each shoot.
Thus the longer posts

4. Friends and Family

Because they say they like to see what I’m up to.
They like to look at pictures. Or so they say

5. Other photographers

-I think that’s a huge bulk of my audience.

I write many posts of photographers interest only.
Posts with tips and tricks directly mainly to photographers, specially the aspiring and learning types.

I also try to include teaching moments through almost all of my posts.
Like for instance, this post.

That being said.

Here’s the link to the FULL GALLERY

This couple has yet to be married.

I’ll be in Hawaii when they get married.

They opted to do their wedding pictures on a previous day.

Why do people do their pictures on a previous day?

• They’ll thus have these pictures in time for their wedding reception or dinner.
• They’ll also have lots more time on their wedding day.
• They won’t freeze as much on their wedding day. (popular for winter weddings)
• We can pick any location.
• We can shoot at any time.
• It’s tons cheaper.
• They can even get another photographer to do group shots if I’m not available.

Why do I like formals?

• For many of the same reasons:
• We can shoot at any time. (not just smack dab in the middle of the harshest light)
• We can take our time and focus on better quality. (Wedding days are often very rushed)
• We have more fun.
• I can do more weddings this way.
• They can show off the prints at the reception.

This one is the product of Spencer … he decided he wanted to pick her up.
I welcome ideas, I don’t know what all a couple is wanting or willing to do.

Any when it comes from the couple themselves, it’s bound to be the favorite… because it was their own idea, their own moment.

You might be noticing a theme and ask yourself this question.

“Where are all the other people at the temple? It looks soo quite!”

Well there was no one else…
the temple was closed for cleaning.

These spots are usually so full of people that I’ve rarely shot these.

I rarely shoot the south side of this temple because I’m usually shooting middle of the day when the light works better on the other side.

I mentioned how with pre-wedding formals I can take more time.

Well I don’t often set up a light stand on the wedding day, but I did with these.
(There are many reasons why I’ve preferred a light stand over a person holding a flash, but usually opt for a person, I’ll explain more some day)

I can’t usually do a light stand for time constraints or bulkiness of my equipment.

It was fun trying out the other south side arches… I think this might be the first time I’ve shot only the south side and not the north side.

But it was a cold and windy day… so I only got a couple before we had to pack it up and get her back in her warm car.

Thanks ashley and spencer for choosing to stick with me even if I wasn’t around for your wedding day.

I hope you enjoy them half as much as me.

I do seem to fill up all my free days don’t I?

Well I’ve done it all over again… to your benefit.

2 Lightroom Classes next week. (Beginner and Intermediate)

A weekend photography workshop (Friday and Saturday – 2 day event for about 5-7 people)

>>>>>>>>>>>>

“Editing at the Speed of LIGHT(room)”

Beginning lightroom class

Time 7pm on tuesday – Lehi Utah
Meal and socialization time provided. (Probably a smaller group than in the past)
Cost is to cover making it happen. $20 (I’m getting chairs and food – I’ll be able to use the chairs from here on out)

From the beginning at a fast pace exploring every aspect.

What’s different? – There are plenty of short 1hr free classes out there so I’m gonna be a little more intense and at the same time talk faster and go over more. I’ll also set up a great presentation and good examples for lightroom features.
Included – all my old presets, food, jokes and a simply swell time.

Signup: Sign up on Facebook and please let your friends know so I can spend time making the presentation better and not letting people know about it.

Intermediate Lightroom Class

For Who? Anyone that’s been using lightroom and knows the majority of functions. Or who’s been to a beginner class.
Meal and socialization time provided. (Probably a smaller group than in the past)
Cost is to cover making it happen. $20 (I’m getting chairs and food – I’ll be able to use the chairs from here on out)

Assuming a good knowledge we’ll go back over main aspects and go more in depth and give more examples. We’ll also deal a lot with fast workflows and playing with presets.

What’s Different? – I’ll be doing a lot of visual examples. I’ll do lots of tips and go through my standard workflow. I will also be using a good calibrated large screen 55″ instead of projector, for better quality.
Included – all my old presets, food, jokes and a simply swell time.

Signup: Sign up on Facebook and please let your friends know so I can spend time making the presentation better and not letting people know about it.

Weekend Workshop

I’m trying hard to make my workshop unique and different from all the many other workshops out there. (But still make it a low comparitive price)

I wanted to make one happen before it gets too cold. (personally i don’t mind if it’s cold)

Yes I understand it’s halloween weekend. But I’m only doing 5-7 spots… soo…. plus we’ll be done saturday in time to get you back to your kids and get them dressed.

We’re a small group if we need to adjust times by up to an hour I’m down (this is about helping you guys anyway)

Friday Evening 5:30-9:30 – Lehi Utah (525 w Bullriver Rd)

Meet and a quick shoot before sunset.
In depth presentation.

Saturday - 8-2 in the field in different cool spots.

Shooting and learning and applying all the info from friday presentation.

Learning how to See and Use a location and interact with the subjects.

Foundational Photography Learning – “Less smoke more fire”

Plenty of people sharing tips and tricks out there (which is cool)

But I want to help people really understand photography (and location people shooting)

Best thing is you’ll be able to learn every single trick from here on out with better understanding and speed in the future.

Plus you’ll be able to come up with your own tricks and not be dependent on others. Because you really understand.

Keep or form your Own style and not simply mimic the tricks of others.

What I want you to learn

• How to SEE a picture and know what you’re seeing AND communicate what you’re seeing.
• How to SEE and USE any Location to it’s fullest
• Letting go of insatiable desire for tricks and becoming a more complete and resourceful photogher.
• Knowing the buttons on YOUR camera.
• How editing can improve your picture taking and vice-versa.
• Pick your battles – Letting go

Extras – to increase value in the workshop

• • Smaller Group : 5-7 people
  • Lots of Models
  • Food
  • Time to chat and network
  • An in depth visual presentation I’ve been forming for years
  • Lower comparative cost than what I’ve seen out there.
  • Come prepared to ask tons of questions.

COST: After much research I think $500 for a 2 day class limited to 5-7 people is a crazy price… and I’m all about being crazy and way too nice.
I know times are tight even at that cost. Let me know if your interested in the future if I can’t find a way to do a lower price workshop in a different format and I’ll keep you on the list.

To sign up: Let me know by email or call – To reserve a spot I think $100 retainer is fair.

Signup: Sign up on Facebook and please let your friends know so I can spend time making the presentation better and not letting people know about it.

RECAP:

Lightroom classes are tuesday OR wednesday and are only $20 to cover my costs

Weekend workshop is Friday AND Saturday combined and is $500

EVENTS on FB: Please sign up for the events on Facebook so I know who’s coming.

Full Gallery Here

They picked out this cool spot and had me come out… it fits them well and we all had a ton of fun.

See the FULL GALLERY

A note about the location:

I know some will be asking where this is:
Some random antique store in Orem.
It’s not a place that is used to photographers.
The girl in these pictures talked directly to the owners and asked for permission.

If someone is serious enough about gaining access to the store let me know.
If you can sweet talk the owners into allowing more photographers come and not getting thrown out.
Maybe tell them we’ll give them $10-20 each time we come.
That could be cool. But until then let’s not over-run the small little store and make them mad.

I’m busy and stuff… so I’ve just decided if you haven’t signed up for thursday yet… JUST COME.
Leave the nice tables for those who’ve already signed up. But there will be chairs and stuff.

Also please send an email to lightroom@jarviedigital.com to list things you want me to cover in intermediate class.
I’ll try to cover them all. 

Intro/Beginning Class

(Those wanting the intro and the basic rundown of Lightroom)

Tuesday 14th April
7pm-9:30pm 

Intermediate Class

(Those who have used it for projects &/or gone to a previous long workshops.
We’ll be learning some tips and tricks, guest presentations and a more extensive Q&A for me and other Advanced Lightroom users) 

Thursday 16th April
7pm-9:30pm 

Advanced Class

There is no workshop or class
But we will be a monthly meetup.
Lightroom Advanced User Group Meetups – “Jarvie’s fellow Lightroom Geeks”

You must have a good deal of lightroom experience
If you want to be involved or help organize these meetups email lightroom@jarviedigital.com and specify your interest 

There is a cool special format for these meetups.

Location:
East Bay Studios
85 Eastbay Blvd
Provo, UT 84606 

How to register – Follow directions exactly

Send email to lightroom@jarviedigital.com – Or leave a comment on this blog post
Write out the following items 1,2,3,4

Email Title: “April Workshop” 

1. Name
2. Which class you’ll be attending (1 class only, you pick)
3. If you want to be on the waiting list for the other class. (The one you didn’t pick.)
4. Whether you expect to want to go in for Pizza &/or Rootbeer Floats
   5. Notes/Comments – Anything you want me to cover, thoughts, inspirations, resources, ideas! Everything else I can skim through for kicks. Or questions.

Extra: If you’ll be bringing anyone else please supply their information as well – including email 

Example:
Title: “April Workshop”
1. Scott Jarvie
2. Tuesday Class (beginning)
3. Yes (for waiting list on thursday/intermediate class)
4. Yes, Pizza (Yum Yum)
5. My question and ideas: Are you going to give away all your presets?  Have people there to talk about their experiences, share their workflow.

80 person Limit

… so RSVP soon. (Specially since it’s only 1 week away)

Questions?

If there are further questions please try to use lightroom@jarviedigital.com – or twitter @jarvie
I will try to refrain from doing much chatting on facebook or gmail chat about the subject to help save me some time to get pictures edited to free up time to do these workshops. 

FAQ

What can we do to show our appreciation?

Advertise this event for me… so I can get to my editing and be prepared for this workshop.

Also you can become fans of JarvieDigital on Facbebook 

Why only one week notice?

Because I’ve been busy and now I have a brake.
These are the dates that worked best for me and the location.
From the 18th of april until the 2nd of may I’ll have 7 weddings… so I need to do it before then.

Will there be other opportunities?

Pete at East Bay studios is kind enough to let me use the facility and suggested that doing more in the months to come could be an opportunity.
I can see doing a month one either beginning or intermediate (rotating) could be an option.
We’ll see what the demand is and I’ll go from there.
Personally I’m not opposed… I like teaching and I only get better each time.
I’m considering strongly throwing in a twist the next time… adding a little photography teaching to go with that editing teaching. haha
 

How many people can attend?

Each time I’ve doubled the capacity. 
I’ve done so again… we will now allow 80 people.
This time I believe it will fill up fast.
Please RSVP soon. 

Will there be food?

Remember this is all casual.
But Yes! We will accept money at the very beginning of the class
We will then send a runner out to get the food.
Dinner &/or desert.
You can put minimum $4 down on pizza
And minimum $2 down on RootBeer floats

Anything left over in the funds will go to say thanks to EastBay/VIP studios for hosting us.

Is there a cost?

NO, I will not be charging a fee if that’s what you mean.
We will take donations for Food and donations in general, to say thanks to EastBay/VIP Studios. 
If we have left overs I might grab some stuff to bring to the next class to give away. 

I might be pimping the opportunity to do one on one personal lightroom training sessions. (Lightroom Personal Trainer)
But really it’s not even in my long term life plans nor a part of how I make a living… I’ll do it mainly because I know there’s a desire, and I’m cool like that.

Are their giveaways?

Yes a couple hour of my time that night. haha
But other than that… I’ll look into it.

You guys can come up with ideas for giveaways.
I need to edit and not spend all my time looking for giveaways… haha 

What are you teaching?

I would say it’s oriented to teaching how to be both Fast/Efficient while raising the  quality of work.
I focus on workflow and how to deal with large quantities of images.
After all I have 5,000 images waiting for me to edit at this very moment.

What is your teaching style?

Fast and furious!
This isn’t a dumb class where I wait until everyone understands everything.
We’ll cover tons and tons of information in a relatively short period of time.

Basically think of long 5 hour intensive classes you’ve been to…
Take that amount of information add a little more and we’ll try to cover that in less than half the time.

Will you answer my individual concerns and questions?

Probably not. My assistant might.
But in most cases I’ll take your question and just extend this FAQ and give you a link to it haha 

Do you have any more answers?

Not unless you supply the questions

Feeding Each other STRESS

Parents get stressed because they want things to go perfectly.
When kids get grumpy or distracted… the parents start to freak.
Which in turn makes the kids freak out more… which in turn…
I’m sure you get the picture.

Not “Good” Money

Besides family pictures aren’t really good money (comparatively)

It’s my opinion that the price structure for family pictures was based on buying prints.
This mindset of wanting mainly prints is largely disappearing for most families.

Prints aren’t as “big” as photographers would like

Heck I personally would rather have the disc than a print on my wall… specially since I move more often and I use blogs, websites and facebook mostly and I can print stuff up myself just fine.

So people don’t want as many prints but the sitting fee for portraits has largely stayed the same.
Then there’s the people who think that because a CD costs $1 (which it doesn’t more like .15 cents) that charging them $100 for a CD is next to highway robbery.

Personally I don’t like being in charge of printing… I want to be paid for what I do (photograph) I don’t want to push products (like prints, albums etc)

I understand that the market and the abundance of new photographers will push prices down for photographers as some raise their prices (like I do all the time)

Not For me

All I’m saying is Traditional Family Picture sessions are not worth it for me.

I put up with boring weddings because they’re a lot of money and they’re very important.

Go to a studio for the traditional Shots

But i think if people are looking for good prices for family pictures they should go to studios, that’s their thing.

The Exception

That being said I have actually had a couple of families that were all right and enjoyable experiences
And in down times I’m sure I’d say yes because the money is nice… I’m just saying I don’t like it much.
But I like a “real” job…. way way less!

My database so far for Utah is 300+ Photographers, 100 Californian Photographers, 75 Colorado 50NY

A Mega-Database
I am storing lots of information for each photographer, most importantly a link to their site.
Eventually I will share this information on a massive informational website… kinda like a price/product comparison site.

Price Comparisons
I have also done price comparisons for weddings
I have documented about 80 sites
25 of which don’t have prices listed or don’t do weddings.
Every single photographer has a different system for wedding prices and it is very hard to document.

4 price options to rate (Keep in mind there are different Print Options in every package)

• Minimum Price
• Maximum Price
• 2 Event / 5hr At least
• Full Day / 8hr At Least

Utah Averages:

• Min: $822 (57Sites Viewed)
• 2Event/ 5Plus $1502 (41Sites)
• Full Day $2031 (42Sites)
• MAX: $2716 (46Sites)

Utah Phenomenons

• Low Minimum
  
• High Full Day

Of the abt 50 sites with prices listed I noticed that there was a big separation … some photographers offered 1-2 hour packages and many didn’t. This seems to be a Utah Phenomenon and throws off the Minimum average in comparison to other states.
Having done quite a few weddings myself I have never done one that short nor do I ever entend to, I suppose I’ll leave it to the others.
In my personal opinion the 5hr/2event and the full day prices are the best things to look at.

The second Utah Phenomenon is that many of the photographers don’t even seem to consider that people need a photographer for the day.
While this might be true for many I have done many more (full day) weddings where I go from morning until late night than anything else.
And if the trend of the rest of the country tells us anything full day is much more common than not.

All in all we have a lot of entry level and part timers in the field in Utah
but even with the good photographers the prices are super low on average and much fewer high priced photographers.

*I will continue to complete my database however don’t expect these numbers to fluctuate for Utah much at all.

OTHER STATES
I’ve done some small samplings in Colorado and California

California (The devide between cheap photographers is very small so far in California, Expect these prices to change with more info)

• Min – $1946
• 5 – $2095
• Full – $2443
• Max- $2966

Colorado

• Min – $1770 (14Sites) Remember many sites only list Minimum
• 5 – $1633 (12 Sites)
• Full – $2074 (10Sites)
• Max – $3879 (8Sites)

If you would like to help with this project, have helpful input or would like more detailed findings. Please Email me.
It could specially be of help to photographers who would help with other states.

IF YOU WANT TO BE UPDATED LEAVE A COMMENT SO I KNOW PEOPLE CARE
I will continue to do research and update you about other states.