Professional Photo Books.com

As digital photography has usurped a position of power from traditional analog film, so have computers taken the place of the darkroom. Most photographers, professional or amateur, have anywhere from the basic skills to a mastery of the Adobe photo editing software, Photoshop. Now running its fifth updated version, Photoshop gives photographers the ability to edit their photos in more ways than ever before, combining traditional darkroom techniques with modern technology.

Silver Efex Pro is a plug-in for Adobe Photoshop (and Apple’s Aperture) that is strictly used for editing black and white photos. While Photoshop already offers various conversion filters to change a color image to black and white, Silver Efex Pro is a much more sophisticated tool for converting photos to grayscale.

Upon opening the program, it runs a general black and white conversion of your photo. If you wanted the initial conversion to be more focused, you can always edit the colored version first. It doesn’t need to be perfect, just in the ball park of what you want. That way the black and white version will start off a little more fine tuned.

The best thing is that Silver Efex Pro offers a variety of pre-set “styles,” much like the Photoshop filters. If you aren’t looking to do too much work, sometimes these styles are all you really need. These styles can create a high- or low-contrast look; they add the effects of different color filters so the images looks like you had been shooting with them all along and more.

What really makes Silver Efex Pro stand out (and worth the price if you are serious about black and white photography) is its ability to make localized edits. The software’s intelligent Control Points allow you to make tonal adjustments to very specific areas of the image. It uses the original color under where you put your initial Control Point and adjusts only for that color. For instance, if you were shooting a landscape image and the grass and the sky came out very similar looking in grayscale, a Control Point in the sky would know that it was only supposed to adjust the sky, regardless of how close a match the grass was.

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The do-it-yourself photo book was a radical concept when first introduced. Suddenly, amateur photographers, even those who could barely manage a point-and-shoot camera, could turn their pictures into something much more professional looking for a much lower cost. Photo books gave the everyman the chance to enhance their family photo album, bringing it to a level usually reserved for only the most avid photo-bugs.

While there is nothing wrong with everyone being able to turn their honeymoon photos into a coffee table book, professional photographers understand that the printing of images is almost as important as the image itself.

Many commercial photo book printing services keep their costs down by using less expensive paper, inks and printing methods. While this may not matter for the average user, a professional photographer should have their images printed by a company that understands the expectations of a serious photographer. The weight, finish and type of paper can greatly affect the colors and shadows of a photograph. This means that while the printed image may be close, it is not quite what the photographer was expecting to get. The same can be said for the quality of ink and printing machines used.

Average printing procedures produce average prints, and clients do not come to a professional for average. They come to you because you have the skills to do something they can’t. They want the shots that only someone with your talent and knowledge can produce. A professional photo book demonstrates to your clients that you take every aspect of photography into account. You wouldn’t show up to a wedding with a disposable camera, so why print your images in a less-than-perfect photo book.

Companies that produce professionally printed photo books often use stitched binding, as opposed to glued. Stitched binding is much more durable and holds up to heavy use, so pages are less likely to fall out over time. These companies don’t sacrifice quality for cost, so while they are more expensive than a commercial printing service, you can be guaranteed of the outcome. Professional printing companies produce photo books that are deserving displays for your work.

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One of the bonuses of using a professional photographer is that, after the shoot is over, a professional photographer is going to be the one selecting the best photos and editing the film. Clients want to get the most for their money, and they expect the finalized images to be perfect. They also want to look perfect in them. You might say clients are expecting a little bit of magic from the photographer and his studio, turning their photos into something extra special.

Professionally printed photo books are a great way to show off your post-production retouching skills, making your services as a photographer that much more valuable to a prospective client.

Perhaps a client will have a favorite frame, but something is awry. Maybe they moved their head at the last moment, creating an unexpected glare from their glasses. Maybe they are really sensitive about the way their skin looks in the shot. Or perhaps they want color accents added to a black and white photo.

Brides can be especially picky when it comes to editing photos. They spent so much time on the ceremony, reception, dress, etc, they want to make sure the last piece of the puzzle, the photos, comes out looking exactly like they imagined. Families that create elaborate holiday cards each year using family portraits want everyone looking their best. New moms want the perfect first photo to send out.

You can have a professionally printed photo book created that showcases your ability to address any concerns or editing choices they may have.

Using before-and-after shoots in the photo book is a good idea to demonstrate your ability. That way, the clients can see where the photo started and what the finished product looked like. This will boost their confidence in your ability to deliver exactly what they want. Being a “full-service” photographer makes your services that much more valuable, which can increase your bottom line. Professionally printed photo books are an excellent way to showcase your editing skills, in addition to your skills as a photographer.

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No one can argue that the best way to learn photography is to grab a camera and shoot as much as possible. But without some frame of reference, learning the ins and outs of the technical side of photography can be extremely difficult to master. The difference between an amateur and professional photographer is established in the technical mastery.

A professionally printed photo book is a great way for a professional photographer to create their own how-to guide for assistants to learn from and reference.

It’s hard to explain what you see through a lens, even harder to understand what someone else is seeing. While digital cameras have made it so we can see the shot instantly after taking it, there is no substitution for seeing it printed, where even small differences produce strong results.

When training someone, having visual samples on hand is the easiest way to get the point across. A photo book created as your hands-on training guide lets you do just that. You’ll find that it’s easier to:

• Show the difference between ISO settings
• Demonstrate how different flash position can change the lighting the same shot
• Show the numerous outcomes when combining various F-stops and shutter speeds

Photo guide books provide a strong base for young photographers to lean on. If the circumstances of the shot are A, B and C, then they must do X to get the best result. Photography may not be that formulaic, but for someone just starting out it helps to have an idea of where to begin when composing the frame. Over time, they may start recognizing similar lighting situations, for example, and remember how to cope with them without the need to reference your guide.

A professionally printed photo book lets you add text to your images, so the information is always readily available even when you might not be. You can fit multiple images on a single page, making it easier for side-by-side comparison. And because it is your photo guide, you decide what tips and tricks your assistant needs to learn to become a successful professional photographer.

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There are plenty of photo sharing websites available to photographers, both professional and amateur, where you can post your portfolios, show off current or recent photo projects or even just store your snapshots. With so many fish in the sea, as the proverb goes, here are a few of the best to start with should you be looking into creating an online collection of your work, but aren’t looking to spend the time or money developing a registered website.

While these may not be the most professional method of showcasing your work, a photo sharing site is a great way to back up your files. Just keep your albums private and it’s like having unlimited hard drive memory.

Shutterfly
Shutterfly is unique in that it allows an unlimited number of photos to be uploaded and stored on their servers. The site keeps posted photos at their full resolution, rather than scaling them down for easier storage and altering the original file.

Photobucket
Photobucket allows 500MB free storage and is usually used to store photos (often organized into albums), online avatars and short videos. Users can share their photos/videos by email, IM or MMS phone messaging. The site also offers a user-friendly slide-show builder.

Flickr
Flickr, in addition to storing member photos and videos, is commonly used to host images embedded in blogs and other social media forums. As one of the largest photo sharing sites around, the site reported hosting more than five billion images as of September 2010.

Snapfish
Snapfish, owned by Hewlett-Packard, allows members to upload files for free and gives them unlimited storage space. The only catch is that members must submit at least one paid order to Snapfish a year, or their files can be deleted.

If none of these photo hosting sites seem right for you, take the time to do a little research until you find the one that best meets your needs. These sites may not be the most professional way to showcase your work, but they can also be a fantastic addition to your website, allowing interested visitors to view more of your work.

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As a professional photographer, you may speak in a jargon that your clients don’t always understand. While most of the time this doesn’t matter—because it really doesn’t affect your work if they understand ISO or aperture settings—sometimes you need to make sure they understand exactly what you mean, so there is no confusion further down the road. This is especially important for when it comes to pricing. A professionally printed photo book is an easy and effective way to create a pricing guide for your services.

If you do a lot of portrait sessions, a professionally printed photo book is a great way to show your clients what type of backgrounds your studio has in stock, the different poses you typically have clients strike, information about print package options and, of course, the price associated with each one. The photo book price guide is an excellent way to make certain there is no misunderstanding between what your client expects to get and the price they expect to pay. If they want an intricate setup with different backdrops, a number of outfit changes and props, you need to make it very clear to them that a session like that will cost much more than a simple photo shoot.

Similarly, if you do a lot of weddings, a photo book pricing guide can show prospective clients the range of your work and services. Maybe you are available to shoot everything from the engagement photos through the reception. Perhaps you specialize in black and white, or bring assistants along to the ceremony. Each service that you provide comes with a price attached to it. For instance, do you charge extra for the editing? Can you also provide a videographer? This is something you need to make your clients aware of upfront, so there is no confusion or frustration later.

Your professionally printed photo book price guide can also double as a mini-portfolio. Should prospective clients want to check out your work, they can do so and see the cost at the same time. If your work impresses them, the cost of your services will seem appropriate.

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While every photographer has their own set of “must have” items that they can’t imagine going to a shoot without, there are a few items that form the basis of a photographer’s tool kit that both professional photographers and serious amateurs should never leave home without.

Here are 4 things that every photographer should have with them:

Filters
Filters are basically glass rings that can be screwed on to the front of a camera’s lens. While there are various filters available, UV filters and polarizing filters are the most common.

UV filters reduce the haziness created by UV light. Since they are transparent to other wave lengths of light, many photographers simply leave them on all the time and use them mainly to protect the actual lens. (And since a good lens can run you thousands of dollars, the $25 dollar filter is definitely worth the investment!)

Polarizing filters can adjust the blues in the sky or water, making it an excellent tool for creating more dynamic landscape shots. They also help reduce any glare created by glass or water in the frame.

Extra Batteries
There can’t be a more nightmarish situation than working an event and having your battery die. If you are hired to work at a wedding, outdoor event or anyplace other than your studio, make sure you have an extra (fully charged!) battery with you. If you are shooting indoors, considering bringing your charger to recharge the first battery in case the backup also dies.

Extra Memory Cards
This goes along the same lines of always carrying extra batteries. Running out of card space at an event, or even just when you are on a creative roll, is always a terrible situation to find yourself in. Having one or two extra memory cards around means that even if one gets full or even worse, corrupted, you’ll be able to keep shooting.

Cable Shutter Release and Tripod
If you find yourself shooting at night, indoors or any other low light situation, a cable shutter release and tripod are great at reducing camera shake and allowing you to lengthen your exposure time. They also come in hand if you are running a photo shoot by yourself and need to handle a flash, reflector or other tool.

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Once you’ve managed to secure a show in a gallery, a much coveted position by photographers everywhere, you might find you have more options than you have space. Depending on the size of the gallery and duration of your show, you might have to trim back on your already carefully crafted showcase. A professionally printed photo book can help enhance the show when you come across a situation like this. Photo books allow you to showoff you talents and vision as a photographer, even if you are limited by the gallery.

Let’s suppose you wanted to show your Cape Cod landscape series, which consists of a carefully edited and selected 34 pictures—it started with several hundred images, so this is already a much trimmed selection—but the gallery, regardless of its reason, is only offering you 17 spots do to so. Suddenly, you have to go through the entire show with a fine tooth comb, cutting out an additional 50% of your images. This can be a frustrating effort and might hinder the success of your show, should you not be able to reconstruct your finest gallery presentation.

Why not create a professionally printed photo book to serve as a companion guide to your gallery show? Not only will the images displayed in the gallery make it in, but so will the images that you had to cut out. This way the story you had originally intended to tell can be seen in its unabridged version. You can even add text to the images, describing both the technical and artistic aspects of each shot. You can include a forward about the show and contact information, further promoting your work. A photo book adds a voice to your gallery show, speaking on your behalf.

If the gallery permits it, you might also be allowed to promote the sale of your photo book in addition to the prints being displayed.
Should your exhibit be sharing gallery space with another photographer’s work, a professionally printed photo book might be that extra special piece that gets the attention of the public, earning you more recognition and, perhaps, future clients.

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It’s impossible to deny that the world has gone digital, or that photography has gone along with it. Amateur and professional photographers alike have switched from film to digital cameras, be they the point-and-shoot pocket cameras or top-of-the-line digital SLRs. As digital photography has become more commonplace, so have the editing and printing methods. Computer editing software has taken over, negating the use for traditional darkrooms.

However, just because the means of taking photos have changed, that doesn’t mean the traditional method of displaying and sharing of them needs to be left behind. While some photographers may lament the demise of the darkroom, there is no need to mourn the loss of what is created there; namely, the print.

Professionally printed photo books are a great way to pay homage to the classic printing techniques used by photographers for centuries. While the shooting and editing may be done digitally, nothing can quite compare with seeing an image printed on a glossy (or matte, whichever you prefer) sheet of paper.

There is a great sense of pride associated with producing a finished print, where hours of time and concentration have created the correct color balance, enhanced the right shadows and perfected the frame. Why leave that image on a computer screen, only to be used as a desktop display. Even worse for that perfect photo to be buried away among the hundreds of unedited images stored on your hard drive.

A professionally printed photo book lets you experience your digital images just like you used to handle your film prints. Using only the best quality paper, ink and printing equipment, a printed photo book matches the professionalism of your images. You take a lot of pride in your work as a photographer. Often times much time, effort and dedication has gone into crafting an excellent image. Why not have a photo book developed that both matches and enhances the quality of your prints? They deserve to be showcased and you deserve to see (and touch) the fruits of your labor.

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As a professional photographer, your commercial career is based on capturing the happy moments of other people. Weddings, birthday parties, family portraits and the like serve as the bread and butter of your career. But rarely, if ever, is it your wedding, your birthday or your family being showcased. Professionally printed photo books are the perfect place to celebrate your most important client…you!

Chances are you spend the majority of every day viewing life through a lens— sometimes metaphorically and sometimes physically—because photography is your passion. You take a photographic perspective towards everything you look at; that face your dog makes when barking at the back door, the way your son built his Lego castles, how your mother’s hands look while kneading bread. Every instant is carefully composed and snapped off, either in your mind or with a finger. All these little moments in your life deserve to be recognized and celebrated. A photo book is a step up from the traditional family photo album and is something your neighbors will be happy to let you show them! Since photo books are so customizable you’ll never again be forced to put your anniversary photos in a boring frame.

Too often our personal photos spend their lives on a memory card, only to be forgotten, erased or lost over time. The favorite shots that make it to the rotating, electronic photo frame aren’t much better off. Our personal photos deserve a place of honor in our homes. They are, after all, the best record of our lives. Professionally printed photo books are an elegant way to showcase your talent and celebrate your home and family at the same time. They are of such high quality that you won’t want to store them on the bottom of your office bookshelf.

You spend hours working on the memories and special moments of other people. You’d do everything in your power as a photographer to get the perfect shot for a client, why not save a little time for yourself and show what you can do when the subject is something you really care about. It’s your life and it’s time to show it off.

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