I won! I won!

Recently, Joerg Colberg posted about Carl Wilson's Let's Talk About Love, a book about Celine Dion's music. He then challenged his readers to email him a story or a good reason why they should be the lucky recipient of the book. Just hearing Madame Dion's name evoked some long-forgotten childhood trauma of having her music inflicted upon my young ears.

Today Mr. Colberg deemed my tale of woe sufficiently sympathetic/pathetic enough to win the book. There's nothing like flogging your childhood trauma for free stuff.

Pause, to Begin call for entry

Pause, to Begin is a unique, new photography competition currently accepting applications now until April 1, 2008, and the selected finalists will be announced online April 15, 2008. Ethan and David, the founders of Pause, to Begin, will hit the road in May 2008 with a documentary filmmaker to visit the selected finalists and record the time they experience together.

By traveling to meet the selected finalists in-person, Pause, to Begin becomes a publication that reflects not only the visited photographers and their process for creating, but also the journey of making Pause, to Begin.

The first year of Pause, to Begin culminates in November, 2008 with the release of a limited edition, hard-bound fine art book that is distributed to important creatives in the photographic industry and available online for purchase. The selected photographers will also be exhibited at a to-be-announced gallery that will coincide with the book release celebration.

Outside/Inside exhibit

Tonight is the opening reception for the Outside/Inside photography exhibit at Gensler New York featuring International Center of Photography alumni, including Noemi Nin Pfluger and Ryan Thatcher.

Date: Monday, March 31st, 6-8pm
Location: 1230 Avenue of the Americas, Suite 1500

Photography business blog

Found a link tonight to Dan Heller's Photography Business blog. Some gems in there, including information on model releases.

Retail renting

From Jezebel there's a post on retail renting, "A former camera store manager came forward to defend retail renting as a common tactic that helps drive sales. Retail renting is when a customer buys a pricey item like a prom dress with the intention of returning it later.

'In fact, last week I "rented" a $1900 lens from [the store.] Now, normally I actually "rent" lenses from a company that's equipped to do so. However, I needed the lens the next day and [the store] was my only option. As far as I'm concerned, its a victimless crime.

I guess what I'm trying to argue is that if its done correctly, its a victimless crime. The insiders do it in much worse fashion anyways. I would argue that if your willing to rent something, you might be willing to buy it (eventually). Allowing you to rent with me increases my chances of a sale. And that's what I really want.'"

Working on new website

I needed to find a way to distinguish between my commercial photography and art photography so I finally decided, for convenience sake, to place the work on different websites. The look of each website is a work in progress but this is the preliminary home page of my personal work/projects website.

You need insurance

Photoshelter has posted a cautionary tale of why photographers need insurance. Watch the YouTube video. I wonder if that model sued everyone involed.

Andrew comments

Andrew Hetherington has an interesting comment on Rob's recent promo opportunity.

I'm curious as to what Rob's choices will be.

Art Fairs galore this weekend

New York is host to a plethora of art fairs this weekend, including The Armory, Pulse and Scope.

Free Promotion APE-style

Rob Haggart has posted an interesting offer for all of us:

"I’ve wanted to do this for awhile and my thinking on the future of photography and photo contests and other things I’m cooking up has gotten me inspired to offer everyone the chance to promote your best work for free by submitting a couple images for a slide show. There’s plenty of photo editors and art buyers who are readers and I know they will find it extremely beneficial to view a quick slide show with hundreds of different photographers featuring their best work and I can’t think of any other examples where this exists, so here we go.

There will be a bar for entry and I will edit out any photographs that are a waste of time for potential buyers to look at. I know there are a lot of top shooters who may be wary of submitting their photographs so I’m going to make sure all the work displayed is top notch. You can also remove your images at any time if you don’t think I’ve done a good enough job.

The purpose of this is to connect photographers with buyers for FREE. That’s it. No bullshit. If that doesn’t happen to anyone then the project has failed."

The (edited) images will be posted on flickr. The deadline is March 31st.