Directory — Photoblog — Blog Details for "Dana Hursey Photography Blog"

Dana Hursey Photography Blog

Dana Hursey Photography Blog
Los Angeles Photographer Dana Hursey shares what litlle he knows on his blog

RSS Feed Homepage

Articles: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

Articles

Pocket Wizards
2007-12-06 20:28:00
Everyone knows about Pocket Wizards ..Right? Well evidently not. I ran into another photographer a few days ago who was still using sync cords to trigger his strobe units. So I thought I would do a quick post on them to to share the joy with anyone out there who is not yet aware of these little guys. Pocket Wizards are Radio Slaves/Syncs. They trigger your strobe units via radio signals rather than hard wiring your camera to the strobe packs via a sync cord. They allow for virtually infinite mobility and a lot less tripping over cords in the studio or on location. The transmitter will fit in any hot shoe or connect via pc cable. The receivers sit on the pack and connect via whatever proprietary cable your pack uses. Or as in the case of our Profoto D4 Strobe Packs, the receiver is built into the pack! Also if you use Sekonic Light Meters they also have the capability of transmitting signals and can fire your strobes wirelessly as well! As far as our strobe system is concerned we ...

Wedding Photographers
2007-12-05 20:40:00
I have to say I really have to hand it to Wedding Photographers . I have done a hand-full of weddings (many years ago) and vowed never to do one again. So far so good! My brother got married back in September and although I was not the wedding photographer, I did bring my Lieca to take a few casual shots. It was much easier and much more enjoyable to do, knowing that I was not the one responsible for getting "the shot"! I was only recently able to sit down and go through what I shot and forward them off to my brother & sister-in-law. Although I must admit that I had immediately downloaded them right after the wedding and with a quick glance was not very thrilled with what I saw so.. going through them was not a high priority as I really didn't think there was much there to be had. I was pleasantly surprised once I did sit down with them, not because there was anything spectacular, but once I started to play with the raw images in Lightroom a bit there were a few that weren'...

Help With Your Photography Career
2007-12-04 19:39:00
In visiting the Adbase web site yesterday, I noticed that they were featuring a "success story" about a friend / colleague / mentor of mine - Rhoni Epstein. Consequently I thought it would be a great idea to pass her info along. Rhoni and her business partner Susan Baraz have a consulting business for Photographers called PhotoTherapy. I have worked with them in the past and sent both assistant and colleague their way. Whatever level you are at, they work with you to take your career to the next level. If you are looking for inspiration or a much needed kick in the butt... these are the ladies that can give it to you! We're adding them to out link list! >>>
More About: Photography , Career , With You

Finding Cold Call Contacts
2007-12-03 20:39:00
The most common question I get when talking about doing cold calls is; "Where does one find the people to call?" This is actually an easy question to answer. There are a variety of sources out there to find this information. Most of them require some sort of investment in the form of a subscription, but most are well worth it! Here are a few that I have used: The Workbook Phone Book Although the basic services are free, you really need to pay the $75 annual subscription in order to get the full benefit of this directory. They list all of the Ad Agencies, Design Firms, Magazines, ect. with names, phone #'s, e mails and addresses and you can search by a variety of criteria. This is the source we currently use. Although I must say their server is painfully slow. Another good one is AdBase They have a tiered pricing structure but this is an extremely good resource! If I were doing my own cold calling, this would be the one I would use. Some others to consider are: Agency Access Fr...
More About: Cold , Call , Contacts

Portfolio Content
2007-11-30 19:21:00
To wrap up the last two posts I am going to re-iterate a previous post. When it comes to what is inside your portfolio, put in the the work you love, not what you think people want to see. Again I will refer back to my previous post about shooting what you love. And at the same time have others you respect edit your book. We all get too close to some of our images and they may not always be our best. We may get a bit attached to a memory or emotion surrounding a shot, or we may have put a ton of effort into an image and therefore insist that it stays in the portfolio. You need to have objective parties look at your work and if consensus indicates that a particular shot should go... it should. But also have those same people look through some of your work that is not in your portfolio. Because quite often there are these little jewels that you never thought twice about but really touch others, and these shots need to go into your portfolio. Ultimately you need to be passionate...
More About: Portfolio , Content

Cold Calling
2007-11-29 19:44:00
So to continue on yesterday's train of thought... Before I had my motivation adjustment, I had long had a mechanism in place for making the cold calls and scheduling appointments. This too had it's own unique mind set. Again when I first started out, the thought of making cold calls was paralyzing. I would literally sit and stare at the phone. As if staring at it would make a client call me out of the blue, so that I would not have to make the call. Every day it was the same. I struggled to pick up the phone and make the first call... or the second! My shift in this area came in the form of two things; organization and a game. I'll start with the game.. I don't remember where it came from, but it started out very easily and built up to amazing productivity. I made cold calling a game. And here were my rules: Cold Calls were to schedule appointments to show the portfolio. You either have to talk to the person you are trying to meet or leave a voice mail. Cold Ca...
More About: Calling , Cold calling

Showing Your Portfolio
2007-11-28 20:13:00
When I first started out, a budding young Los Angeles Photographer, I did not have a rep. I had to get out there and pound the pavement on my own and get my portfolio in front people. It was a daunting task. I have learned a lot of lessons over the years and have realized that I was approaching this task in some ways from the wrong perspective. But I was also doing a lot of things right (at least for me). Over time I realized the biggest mistake I made was the motivation with which I went out to show my portfolio. I was going out to "Get Jobs". You might say "Well, duh! Isn't that the whole point?!" The answer is yes. But if that is your driving motivation, you won't get very far. You see, I had a very strong attachment to "getting a job", and who wouldn't, being a "just starting out" creative type. The problem is that despite how hard you try, that underlying motivation ultimately shows through. And people sense it. They may not be able to verbalize or identify it, but it's th...
More About: Portfolio

Jamuse
2007-11-27 21:43:00
There is a new web site out there for creatives to be able to post and share their work. It's called jamuse. Although not open quite yet, it looks to be a great place to host a portfolio, share large files with clients, allow others to mark-up and comment on imagery and all done in a secure fashion so as not to allow hi-res images into the hands of others (unless you want them to have access) The site has a clean easy to understand interface and has a "cover-flow" type browser (much like Mac OS X) to view images as well as a proof sheet style interface. You can upload a bio, your contact info and a full portfolio. Museworx is their interface to send and share files. You can set up multiple projects and share them with one or multiple clients. There is the option for real time chatting and clients can comment, approve, and even draw and mark-up an image. It is all quite easy to use and the mark-up option worked surprisingly well! When I was asked to join as an advisory member,...

Welcome to B&H Photo and Google Ads
2007-11-26 19:54:00
Over the weekend we welcomed some advertising to the blog. B&H Photo has been a major supplier and low price leader for professional camera, lighting, and studio equipment for ages. They are one of three major suppliers for Dana Hursey Photography. We have over the years spent some major bucks with them. So despite the fact that we are here in Los Angeles and they are all they way out there in New York, it is without hesitation that we welcome them as a featured advertiser on the DHP BLOG. (Just because we are Los Angeles Photographers doesn't mean they don't appreciate our business!) And Google Ads also joined the DHP BLOG. We have and do advertise through Google Ads ourselves so it seemed a natural fit. So make sure to click on the links over on that right sidebar and check out those sponsors! Especially B&H for your equipment needs!!

Michael Hurd
2007-11-21 21:22:00
Back in August we were in Alamogordo shooting a campaign for the 2008 White Sands International Film Festival. On the first day of shooting we were invited to do a portrait of Michael Hurd, a noted artist form a long line of noted artists. As he walked us around the family property looking for a setting to shoot our portrait he (obviously saving the best for last) finally led us into his studio, which was his fathers studio before. We of course had tons of equipment with us; needing to be prepared for anything. Well, we walked into this studio and the light was gorgeous. I have been in other artists studios before and the good ones always have amazing light. So there we were with very few decisions to be made. Michael clearly felt at home in this space, it was after all his environment, so we had to photograph him there. And despite our ability to light the hell out of almost any scene, the soft filtered directional light coming through the large windows was really the only choi...

Great Model!
2007-11-20 20:42:00
So to augment yesterdays post we'll also tell you about the opposite... a really great model. And we'll gladly share his name right off the bat; Todd Nasca. He came on set got into character and stayed in character until he walked off set. He was amazing and gave us way more than we ever expected! We were laughing our asses off with how great he was. We needed someone to look very dejected and overwhelmed and he was spectacular. His agent (Coast to Coast Talent) on the other hand was nowhere near professional. AFTER we had already booked Todd they tried to pull him from the job because we would not pay them more $! We won't ever be dealing with them in the future! But if we ever have the need for someone like Todd again, we will book him in a second (directly of course!)
More About: Great , Model

Unprofessional Models
2007-11-19 20:32:00
On a recent shoot we had a rare experience, twice. We have dealt with literally thousands of models over the years and 99.999% of models are GREAT too work with! They are fun, easy going and usually up for the team effort of getting the client what they need. Well on the shoot in question we not only had one, but two models that were mind bogglingly unprofessional. They were both male models and truly no one you would ever know. Not a name, not a personality or celebrity - quite frankly we have work with plenty of celebrities and they would never behave as these two did! The first walked onto the set as if he was the most famous person on the planet. He actually worked for us two days. The first day he was completely put out by the fact that he needed to try on different wardrobe to see what looked best, when we asked him to try on something different he said "I'll just wait till you guys decide which one you want" clearly not understanding the concept that we needed to see what...
More About: Models , Fess

A Book Plug
2007-11-16 19:23:00
We went to a book release party last night. Back in the Spring we were asked if our house could be included in a book celebrating homes of all types in the San Gabriel Valley. We have a 1948 Mid-Century Modern Home in Altadena designed by noted architect Gregory Ain. The book, entitled "At Home Pasadena" is published by Prospect Park Book s. The imagery was shot by two Art Center colleagues Jennifer Cheung & Steven Nilsson. And the Foreword written by David Brown who was the President of Art Center and is now the director of Descanso Gardens. You can see a few spreads of the book at their web site: http://www.athomepasadena.com/ Our house is featured on six or seven pages. One image of my favorite piece of art that resides on our hallway is on the web site if you go to "View Inside" and click on the third thumbnail. It is an illustration of Andy Warhol by a good friend of ours, Kamran Moojedi (also from Art Center - we're everywhere!) We have three other pieces by Kamran that gra...
More About: Plug

Go To France!
2007-11-16 02:55:00
Last month we had a great evening with some dear friends who, a year ago, sold it all and moved to Franc e . They were in town for a month visiting Family and Friends and we are lucky to be counted as the latter. Lisa, Tanya, and Cole have started a new life in France and own a gite (kind of a French version of a B&B). Lisa assisted me for all too brief of a time. She was unequivocally the best assistant I have ever had. But alas she quickly moved onward and upward and now does high-end digital retouching and compositing (and now does it from France!). She worked on a couple of images for our recent UHC shoot. At any rate the point of my post today is to send you to their web site as not only do they live in an amazingly beautiful region, they are amazingly beautiful people. So should you ever find yourself going to France, have I got a place for you to stay!!! La Maillerie Check out their web site! And make a reservation while you are there. We hope to be heading over in early 20...

Another Casting Resource
2007-11-13 20:09:00
A while ago we shared one of our resources for casting. There is actually a second one that we use equally as often. LA Casting Networks (http://www.lacasting.com). This too is free to casting directors, photographers etc. It has a different user interface (UI) but accomplishes basically the same thing. Both LA Casting and Breakdown Services have their strengths and weakness, but overall they are great resources. I must say that I do quite often get duplicate submissions of the same talent when using both services. But that's okay, I would rather have duplicate than potentially miss a perfect match for a role. We have added LA Casting to our Photo Resource s as well! --->

Epson Print Drivers & Leopard
2007-11-12 23:16:00
So upgrades on all of the computers have gone, for the most part smoothly. But as with any new operating system, software will always be playing "catch-up". And so much of the time you never know what will and won't work until it does or doesn't! Today we found out that Epson Print drivers are only minimally functional on OS X Leopard . On their web site they indicate that they should have fully functional drivers available for many of the printers in December. Although we are able to print, all of the customizing functionality in the Print Dialog boxes are not available. Ooops. So any high end printing that we might have done over the next few weeks has been put on hold.
More About: Drivers

More articles from this author:
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7