SickShots Blog

I know a lot of photographers (whether aspiring or full time pros) read my blog and I try to mix in some things that have helped me along the way. One of them is Photoshelter.  I am a big fan.  In fact the sickshots site is built with the Photoshelter Archive.  

There is also a great way to market your images with another product they have called the ‘Photoshelter Collection’.  I have started to send my images in for review to be marketed to people outside my industry/contacts that I could not attract on my own.   

It takes some work to prepare images and they edit them to keep the collection professional (which is a good thing), but I think they have a great concept and I see a future in their idea.  I have a personal page of my images (see the little viral slideshow in the accordian above where it says ’stock image slideshow’) you can see the Photoshelter website here.  

I have never really had anyone go through my photos and review them before.  I always kind of do it myself and determine what I think is most ’saleable’ and submit to my usual contacts.  It is interesting to see what their editors determine are accepted, rejected and ‘editor’s choice’.  Ideally, you want the least amount of rejections and the most amount of Editor’s choice which determines a rank for the photo (and a behind the scenes ‘Photographer rating’  - currently mine is 3 of 4 stars, which is good).  One gets a ‘gold star’ for an Editor’s choice kind of like in Kindergarten, but more fun.  

An outstanding photo makes it on the website ‘front cover’.  I was surprised to find this photo of mine in just that place!  This is a shot of my wife and our son in a pool in Bali.  I was testing out my housing and shot a bunch of photos and this one was in the batch and I thought it looked cool.  Did I think it was epic? No.  Did I think it was ‘gold star worthy’?  Not really, but again what do I know.  I am glad they selected it and I am learning what their editors like (which isn’t always an exact science).  I sent in some photos I thought were great and some got rejected.  It is humbling and a good exercise. If you are not involved.  Check it out.  

Hey, by the way, the last I checked this was a surf website and I want to mix in a little about surfing.  My buddy Chris got a few in Newport yesterday and claimed ’shoulder high fun ones’ and there may still be some leftovers…so get out there and go!

I promised another shot of the last job I was on and here it is.  A huge stage to say the least.  The set was quite an achievement as were the props, lighting and camerawork that went into the shoot.  Coming to a TV near you…

Once I finish these things I am so spent from the long hours I just want to move on with my life and do stuff like watch the Olympics!  The TV coverage is OK, but the time delay sort of sucks.  I have really enjoyed some of the images and one of my favorite photo blogs from over in China is Vincent LaForets.  If you are into photography at all or just enjoy some epic moments caught on digi… Check out Vincent Laforet’s Blog.

Finally, I use a program called Lightroom to process all the photos you see here on SickShots and they just released the new version.  I have downloaded it and am testing to make sure it works on another computer before I fully commit.  Seems there are still a few bugs as usual with a new piece of software, but I really like what I see so far.  Anway, today’s blog short and sweet.  Have a good week.

This is a pulled back view of the stage I am working on at the Studio.  I find a lot of times I get really obsessed with the close up and need to get further back and away from all the action to really capture what is going on.  This goes for everything from surf photography to Still Life photography (and real life).  It is sometimes good to change your perspective.

How cool does this look?  I snapped it with my iPhone between takes.  It is actually a series of stages used to shoot continuous action with the camera rolling by each set on a dolly. While the quality is not that great you can get a sense of all the activity going on that is a normal part of the production process.  Lots of lights, flags, reflectors, and people! It almost looks like a night market…Pretty cool.  I can’t talk about the client or even which studio this is in, but I will say a lot of famous movies have been filmed here and this particular stage is massive.  Tomorrow I will try to give you a different view…

Meanwhile…In their infinite wisdom the marine police in Indonesia torched the boat that was on the reef at Padang Padang.  Are you joking?  I just read the Padang update here on Surfline.  That is shocking to me.  Maybe I am wrong, but I thought the point was an environmentally friendly ‘cleanup’?  Yea right, Nothing says ‘green’ like black smoke and melted plastic!  Yikes.  This story just gets worse.  I know there are a lot of people that offered assistance on this thing, but I would think there was a better solution.  I just wish the Marine police would have been more helpful on the front end and pulled the boat off the reef when they had the opportunity during the first week when the tides were right.  Yea, I know I am not helping much sitting on my arse here on the computer, but I am not there…Someone tell me I am wrong and that this was a good solution.