My recent email suggested that if you can't name five things that differentiate you there is probably only one - price! Not a good look. Among the responses was this one: I'm so sick of working harder and not smarter with the middle to lower end. I want to start all over again and aim at the high end of the market with the best products and service. I have never done an album before. I made the decision to specialise in babies, children and family portraiture. I can visualise beautiful portrait albums sitting on my coffee table in the studio, but I don’t know where to start. Albums are not the To View More >>

Hey, you guys are album designers. Check out Johannes van Kan's recent post on the Queensberry Connects, Judging albums for awards. As a judge for the Australian Professional Photography Awards at PMA in Melbourne a week or so ago, he shares some insightful observations and advice about album design... And shares a few pointers for anyone entering albums for awards. Cheers, Nigel To View More >>

Imagine taking this to a wedding. Here's a clever advertising campaign by Samsung promoting the NX11... Get noticed. Cheers, Nigel To View More >>

I've gathered enough gongs now to qualify for an opinion on album design. Last week I was a judge for the Australian Professional Photography Awards at PMA in Melbourne. This was an honour I shared with the lovely Jo Grams, Jerry Ghionis, Jackie Chan, Yervant and other luminaries. Several things became apparent: 1) Some authors treated the album as a set of individual prints, mixing black and whites with colours, verticals with horizontals, with blatant disregard for the influence of those images on each other. 2) Some authors were hypnotised by the ability to apply a filter to create a look ... To View More >>

Turns out there's a certain stigma attached to the word 'free'. Take a conversation I overheard this morning. A photographer was talking about how they really like the look of Photojunction but was avoiding downloading because, quote, "Although it says free, nothing is ever free." This conversation reminded me of a post Ian wrote about this time last year titled, "F.r.e.e".  In light of this morning's conversation, I thought I'd resurrect part of it which explains why we give Photojunction away free, and why there's no catch... So… why? What’s the catch? Well, we’re building a community To View More >>

I had the privilege of being the photographer when Queensberry's pinup boy/metrosexual, Nigel, tied the knot with Kayla a few months ago, and I learnt a lesson. Pretty much at the beginning of the day I unintentionally upset the bride's parents. They had organised that I would shoot photographs outside their neighbour's property. I took half a dozen images and ticked the box for family pics at home. But I also wanted to do a quick family photograph in their own garden, in a spot that from my point of view, between rain showers, would do the job well. The bride's mother was able to conceal, through To View More >>

"The brides love seeing themselves": In our final installment Jerry explains how blogging generates bookings and sales, the benefits from clients look forward to seeing themselves online – and the serendipity by which he ended up shooting his first wedding in India. Click here for the audio (8:21 mins). Thanks for listening and sorry once again for the audio quality. Cheers, Ian To View More >>

Photojunction's integration with albumexposure just keeps getting better. albumexposure now offers you the ability add music to accompany a client's album design, from within Photojunction. Just select the 'Proof with albumexposure' option from the Album menu in Photojunction, then on the AE start screen, choose the 'Upload Music file' option from the 'Select Song' drop down list. Cheers, Nigel PS music files need to be in MP3 format. To View More >>

More wisdom from the over-30s... ;) In this segment Jerry Tomko tells Heather and me why he won't take a wedding booking without an album, why the lady in his bagel shop doesn't like digital and what's wrong with shoot-and-burn. And Heather talks about the only question many photographers know to ask about albums ... and what's wrong with the question. Click here to listen (9:52 mins). More soon. Cheers, Ian PS Apologies again for the audio quality. To View More >>

You can now choose in the Photojunction Preferences to have the Problem Reporter report on any problems in your album design when you create a slideshow or proof sheets from it. Why's that useful? Well you'll need any problems fixed before you order the album, so if you're going to create a slideshow or proof sheets of it, you can be sure they're perfect too, and exactly as per the album. This option is set on as a default but you can turn it off by heading to the Preferences and unchecking 'Report problems on exporting proof layouts and slideshows'. Easy. Cheers, Nigel To View More >>