m_p7

One more thing you might consider: use only one b&w film stock for the wedding. You mentioned TMY and TriX. If you shoot both, I think you'll find you can tell the prints apart. From a consistency point of view, I would only use one film. For instance, I shot some Delta 400 and HP5 at the same time, and I could definitely tell the difference.

Not using a film for the first time is the best advice. And it also depends on how they'll be printed. For instance, I tested out some Neopan 1600, rated at 1250, processed in Xtol. I obviously need to adjust my dev. time, because the highlights were basically unscannable. If you want 1) b&w and color, 2) reliable results without a lot of testing, 3) fast film 4) enlargements no bigger than 8x10, I say 800 speed color film (Portra 800 or NPZ) is your best bet. Based on the fact the wedding is in 2 weeks, I would not want to experiment now.

Ask whoever does your taxes. I'm guessing if you use an accountant and don't do them yourself, that the answer is "yes". I'll bet you won't find a CPA that will like getting info from PhotoByte or FotoBiz, but I could be wrong. And based on some of the uses I see people putting spreadsheets to, I can't discourage you strongly enough about NOT using a spreadsheet for accounting. You will definitely regret it. No matter what people say, spreadsheets are not for for accounting or databases. That's like saying MS Word is a good HTML editor or Powerpoint is a good page layout program.

Does she really want silver prints? If not, why not just shoot color film and print desaturated (by whatever method you desire) to color paper? If she really wants silver prints, then you definitely need a lab experienced at processing and printing b&w. While I don't have a tremendous amount of experience, I would recommend Tri-X and/or Ilford P3200. I don't care for TMZ. As others have mentioned, grain size, etc. are going to be very subjective.

I would do what I did. Call a few CPAs and ask for a consult. Most will do it for free. I talked to 3 before I found the right guy. His daughter has a photography business, and does her taxes. He knows his stuff, he's a partner in his own firm. He isn't cheap, but as he said: "it will be done right in the first place". You also might call some local photographers and ask who they use. That's how I found my lawyer.

You can't go wrong with a Sekonic L558, L608, or you can get the older model some places (L508 - which I have). The new 558R has built in radio triggering. <a href="http://www.sekonic.com/Products/prodinfo.html">Sekonic Meters</a> Pricey, but worth it.

If he had a studio, you might be able to find his new address from the owner who I assume leased the space. Or, you could send a letter to his PO Box, his studio street location, and his home address marked Address Correction Requested. Check with the post office about all this, but I think if the post office has his new address, they'll send you a card, and I think you pay a little (a buck or two) to go pick it up.

 

If you can get him served with small claims papers, that might motivate him.

 

Also, was he a member of any professional organizations? They might help. And talk to other photographers in the area. They might know him.

 

Sorry about this. Guys like this ruin the business for the rest of us.

I'm pretty new, too, so I'm still figuring this all out. But I shoot film and I proof online.

 

I either get low-res scans made at time of processing if I have a lot of rolls, or I make my own scans on my Minolta 5400 if I only have a couple of rolls.

 

Then I run actions on my scans to very basic color correction, rotate, etc. I modified a web gallery template in Photoshop to use CSS. I made a supporting website that I stick the PS gallery into. Then I upload the whole thing.

 

I've been leaving it up until I need to reclaim the space (I'm transitioning to my own domain soon, but for now I have limited space). When I deliver their order, I burn a copy of it on CD so they can refer to it later in case they want to order more stuff.

 

You can see an example here: http://www.xmission.com/~mpyne/clientproofs/feldman/

 

The main advantages I see: 1) no client scanning, 2) all images have copyright info (as does the CD I burn), 3) images are too small to get a decent print 4) clients (and guests) can access from anywhere anytime instead of passing proofs around.

 

I'm not sure how effective it is for encouraging timely orders or more orders. Although, the pic on the front page is ordered almost every time. I'll be interested to hear what others have said.

 

-Mike

This may be a stupid question, but if this was commissioned, wouldn't you already have worked out the price with the customer before you made the print, (or at least have an estimate)?

Mark, I should mention that bluehost is hosting only. You'll have to design (or pay someone) to design your site. It sounds like you planned on that anyway, but sorry if I misled you. P.S. If you do decide to host through bluehost, please use the link in this discussion - I get a referral fee.

I'd recommend learning HTML and CSS and building your own. I'm taking the week off to build mine. For hosting, I use <a href="http://www.bluehost.com/track/pynephot/photonet20040103wed">

bluehost.com

</a>. HTML isn't that hard to learn, and you'll have control. I don't like flash websites. They look cool, but how are you going to make changes later? Some people don't have flash installed, or don't like it either. IMHO, XHTML and CSS is the way to go. For an example of what can be done with CSS, look at <a href="http://www.csszengarden.com">csszengarden.com</a>. Same HTML, different CSS gives you endless design possibilities.

If you want control and don't want ads, just host it yourself. Hosting is ridiculously cheap these days. I use <a href="http://www.bluehost.com/track/pynephot/photonet20040103">

bluehost.com

</a> - It's only $6.95/mo. Check it out.

Thanks. I think I've got it figured out now.

Ok, I had a logo designed using two Pantone spot colors. I want to

use the same colors (as close as can be rendered) on my website for

consistency. I've been messing around in photoshop, but I know just

enough about color management to be dangerous. I'm getting different

answers depending on how I do things.

 

Can somebody that actually knows what they are doing, please tell me

the RGB and/or Hexidecimal equivalents of these:

 

Pantone 7470, Pantone 601, Pantone 601 at 30% opacity

 

Thanks very much. - Mike

I couldn't make it all the way through your contract, but here's a couple thoughts (aside from the good advice you've already been given):

 

1) You need to revise the language. Being concise and orderly counts for lots of points.

2) I am not a lawyer, but I don't think #3 is even legal. I don't think you can have someone else agree to be responsible for someone else's orders.

3) Start with other people's contracts (I recommend getting Tad Crawford's book, "Business and Legal Forms for Photographers".

4) Go see a lawyer.

5) Do what the lawyer says, and always use a contract.

Just to clarify Gerald's comment: "If you have a sales tax number from your state, you may be able to purchase some items (film, for one) without sales tax as the finished product has sales tax collected on it."

 

You should check with the state taxing agency. I live in Utah, and I've been told that I cannot buy film tax free, because I don't give the client my negatives. It makes no sense to me, since "no film, no pics", but I do as I'm told because I don't want to get reamed someday.

 

In general, I have found my sales tax authority fairly helpful (free seminars, email response to questions, etc.). But I also find the tax law very arbitrary - eg. there is not a document that lists what I can and cannot buy tax free; it seems sort of open to interpretation. The bottom line for me is: if you sell it to the client and actually give it to them, then you can buy it tax free and charge tax to the client. Otherwise, you can't, and it's a business expense. I would just make a phone call and save yourself the hassle later on.

There's an artist's co-op that opened a couple months ago that my

wife and I are thinking of joining (we're both moon-lighting

photographers). They are currently looking for additional artists

to join them. The space is in one of the local malls in the Salt

Lake City area (Dillards, JCPenney, Meier and Frank, Mervyn's are

anchor stores).

 

The deal is: $100/month, two six-hour shifts per month, you get 85%

of anything of yours that is sold, you get 5% commission on anything

you sell during your shift.

 

We talked to the woman (a painter) that runs it today and had a look

around. She seems nice, apparently has a lot of marketing

experience, very determined, etc. The art was mostly paintings, but

had a fair amount of photography (b+w and color), some sculpture,

drawings, etc. The vast majority was very high quality.

 

She has people bring in some representative work, sort of

an "interview" before letting people join.

 

Questions: 1) does this sound like a good deal, 2) have any of you

done this before or do you currently do this, 3) what has been your

experience, 4) any advice or things to watch out for?

 

Thanks for any feedback.

<a href="http://www.lightimpressionsdirect.com/">Light Impressions</a>

For mats, I say white or black. Personally, I think color mats usually look amateurish. How many color mats have you seen in galleries? I suspect not very many. Also, if I understand correctly, not many colored mats are archival, but I could be wrong.

<p>You can modify or make your own gallery templates fairly easily. Look in the help or on the web for "tokens". They are basically variables like "%THUMBNAILROWS%" that photoshop uses to build things. You'll need to know some html, though.</p><p>I use PS7 web gallery creator to make the thumnail and large pages, and then put a sort of "site" around it. It wasn't too hard to add the navigation. I've done minor customization to make galleries before, and I recently did an overhaul of the templates to make them XHTML 1.0 Transitional compliant and to use CSS. I like it much better. Here's <a href="http://www.xmission.com/~mpyne/clientproofs/feldman/">an example.</a><p>I taught myself HTML and CSS, and I recommend you do it too, or hire somebody. The HTML that PS7 writes is pretty terrible. Maybe PSCS is better. If you want more info, email me and I'll be happy to help.</p><p>Personally, I don't like Flash sites</p>

Laura, see this thread with my response about <a href="http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00A7Hm">renaming files</a>.

Pentax, film.

To avoid this in the future, you might consider something like the following:<p>

Put a clause in your contract. Here's mine: "Editorial Discretion." Photographer may edit out images determined by Photographer to be substandard. Such determination is to be made by Photographer alone and in Photographer?s absolute discretion.<p>I proof online with Photoshop web galleries. I edit out all the bad shots, and I rename the proofs sequentially after I get them in the order I want. Then I keep a log of old and new file names and what negative they correspond to. That way, nobody knows how many frames I shot and how many are missing.

I don't shoot digital, but I'm almost positive that ACDSee will read and sort based on EXIF data. And you can custom sort, too. My wife and I both shoot film at weddings, and we use it to edit, sort, and rename files for online proofing. We just drag thumbnails around the way we like the proofs to be in order, then batch rename. You can also output a list of the files to a text file. Try the demo. I'm going to look at the links posted here, also.

I use ACDSee for this; works great. It's about $50. There is usually a 30-day free demo. I also like it for quickly viewing and editing (ie. discarding) photos.