Part 2 of our trip: Leave San Diego, head to Vegas for a week of intense learning with 16,000 other photographers from around the world. The Wedding and Portrait Photographers International (WPPI) conference is not to be missed!
Special thank you to our clients, who helped send us to WPPI by participating in the WPPI Special!
Jeff and I learned SO much this week! Our first two days were spent volunteering as Print Handlers… we’re the staff that makes the International Print Competition run like clockwork! For those unfamiliar with print competition, here’s how it works: Prints are submitted to the competition in different categories and subcategories. For example, in the Wedding category, there are Bride Alone, Groom Alone, Wedding Party, Wedding Details, Engagement, and other subcategories. And Weddings is only 1 category! Within each category, prints are judged by a panel of 5 judges – internationally renowned photographers who are specially trained to judge the prints on a scale of 60-100. Print handlers put a single print on display and announce the title of the print as it is judged. As print handlers, we get an up-close view of every print, and we’re the only ones who know the artist of the print. It’s an incredible learning experience to hear the judges’ commentary on each print, as well as a cool networking opportunity to rub elbows with the big-wigs. 🙂
The rest of the conference was spent learning hard and playing hard. As a newer studio, Jeff and I felt it would benefit us to focus on the business of photography – marketing, sales, pricing, etc. rather than on the creative aspects like posing and lighting, which we feel pretty adept at. So we didn’t take as many pictures as usual… in fact the only ones we took were camera-phone pics during the playing hard part – “networking” after hours with fellow photographers and new friends. Check out our mobile uploads on facebook.
We returned to Wilmington exhausted but with brains full of new ideas… stay tuned for some announcements throughout the year and new directions in our business!
