Lightroom for Wedding, Event and Portrait Photographers

Here's a great opportunity for anyone interested in getting the most out of Lightroom. Hope to see you there!

Click Here to sign up.

Peter Krogh, Lightroom alpha tester, presents a day-long course on getting the most from Lightroom for the wedding, event, and portrait photographer. The program will focus on safe and efficient workflow, including getting the most from the Develop tools, and streamlining your output and integration with services like Pictage. Make your images look great, faster than you ever thought possible.

The course will cover:
• Shooting for Lightroom - how Lightroom should affect the way you shoot
• Catalog set-up and management
• Efficient Download - we'll look at ways to automate the download process using either Lightroom or ImageIngester Pro

Library Workflow
• Tagging and Grouping Images
• Using Smart Collections to control workflow
• Ratings Workflow - how the built-in keyboard shortcuts were designed to be used

Develop Workflow
• Getting Autoblacks during import
• Work -order for the develop tools
• Finding, Installing and Using Presets
• Use HSL controls to control skin tones
• Use of Negative Clarity for skin smoothing
• Use of Sync and Auto-sync to do batch adjustments
• Use of Snapshots
• Use Virtual Copies to get Color and B&W versions of your images
• Local Adjustments

Batch Output
• Export Controls
• Installing and using Export Plug-ins

Archiving
• What to do with the catalogs and images when you're done

Details
Location:
The seminar will be held in Peter Krogh Studio,
3301 Oberon St.
Kensington, MD

Date:
June 16th - 9am through 5pm

Cost:
Individuals $200
Photographer with assistant $350
Lunch (Baja Fresh) provided

Click Here to sign up.

May PUG Update

I will now be disseminating info in three ways - so I am sure to get everyone's attention. I will be sending out this email following each month's PUG as well as posting the update on our blog: dcpug.blogspot.com, and on our new facebook group page. As soon as dates are announced for upcoming meetings, I will notify everyone, but we've got an exciting summer planned our June meeting featuring Jim Collins, new CEO of Pictage, a summer outing in July, and a visit from Joe Buissink in August.

Thanks to everyone who came out to the May PUG to hear about some of the new product updates from Pictage and the great direction that the company is heading under direction of the new CEO Jim Collins. We also got a chance to hear from our friends at Critical Exposure that some of our photographers have already been volunteering with. From this month's meeting we have decided that Critical Exposure will be our official philanthropic partner.

This means a few things: First, we will be starting our own fundrasing drive to help with the wonderful work that this group does (make a donation here: http://www.criticalexposure.org/support.php).

Second, we will be starting a used digital SLR drive (thank you Nicole Wolf for this great idea) so that the students, who are currently using digital point and shoots, can improve their technique and can better capture images and tell their stories.

Third, we will make announcements about upcoming opportunities for our PUG members to serve as mentors to the young students, training them on the digital SLRs and helping them learn more about photography.

Fourth, this will also provide opportunities for promising students to tag along as assistants to learn more about possible careers in photography.

Here are some links to view some of the work that Critical Exposure has been doing:
From Books to Bottles (focusing on teen pregnancy in Alexandria):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQJJAp8wo2s

Eyes on Education (our Pennsylvania project):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcRWnQZDP8g

In addition, you can search for Critical Exposure on Facebook or go to: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Critical-Exposure/79944774450?ref=mf to see what is going on currently.

Hope to see all of you in June - date to be announced shortly.

Best,
Geoff

I'm back!!.......Again!!

Ok.....go ahead and say it, I'm a slacker. Its OK...I can take it. Yes, I said that I would be blogging about something every day and NO, I haven't blogged about something every day. But the truth is, I have been really, really busy over the past month. Probably the biggest thing going on is that I have moved myself and my business to Ashburn, VA. Getting settled has taken a while and I've been fighting an awful flu. Also, I quietly rebuilt my website and am getting good feedback on the new design. Feel free to stop by and send me feedback. Anyhow, I'm back and busier than I have been in a while. My calendar is filling up with weddings and engagement sessions and I couldn't be more pleased. OK....I could handle a little more business, but I'm not complaining. With all of the stuff thats happening in my life, I'm feeling truly blessed these days.

February PUG - Dinner Before?

Hello Folks,
I hope to see you all on Monday at the PUG meeting in the new MBK studio!
I wanted to see who would be up for dinner before hand?
If you are interested, please send me an email - sarah@blinkdc.com

Tentative plans for Monday night are dinner at Red Tomato Cafe 4910 Saint Elmo Ave in Bethesda
at 5:30.
If we get a large number of folks wanting to come to dinner we may need to change locations, but I will keep you all posted.

Thanks so much and hope to see you Monday!

Sarah

January PUG tonight CANCELLED!

OK, so I just returned from shooting a wedding in Palm Beach, Florida and am greeted with the biggest winter storm of the year! Since it will get worse before it gets better, I have decided to cancel tonight's PUG. I hope this does not inconvenience everyone - I was looking forward to seeing you all and to show off our new studio. We will now have a pre-WPPI PUG on Monday February 9th. Hope you're all staying safe and warm.

Best,

Geoff

January PUG Rescheduled for Tuesday the 27th

Hello all - 

I hope everyone had a great holidays. Ours was busy at Michael Bennett Kress & Associates as we moved to our new location - 7906 Woodmont Avenue - still in Bethesda. While we hoped to be ready today, we're still getting unpacked and settled into our new space. So we have rescheduled for Tuesday, January 27th. I hope this does not inconvenience anyone and hope to see you at the end of the month!

Best,

Geoff

Winter Get Together - Update

I hope everyone had a fantastic NYE, and celebrated 2008 going out and 2009 coming in with a bang!

I just wanted to give a quick update for those of you who are interested.
Myself Jess and Shawn will be at the Corcoran Gallery at 10am. The Corcoran opens at 10 and since Shawn is still operating on west coast time, he will be raring to go since he is quite the early riser! :D

We will view the Richard Avedon exhibit and then head to lunch.
I have two places that I love to recommend to "out of towners", Teaism and Ollies Trolly.
We can take a vote as to where we would all like to eat after the exhibit.
I believe we went to Ollie's last time and it was a big hit.

We hope that you can all join us.
If you come late, don't worry, I am sure we will be in the exhibit for at least an hour and a half, maybe more.

Please email me at sarah@blinkdc.com to let us know if you will be joining us.
And on Saturday if you need to reach one of us, you can call my cell 703 851 8463.

Can't wait to see you all!
Sarah, Jess and Shawn