WPPI 2012 Were you there?

This year’s WPPI was great… Time to start planning for 2013… OK, I exaggerate, but that’s only because we look forward to it all year, and it goes by so fast. More so, for the last two years, since we’ve been privileged to present a Master Class and help our sponsors, so we don’t have much time to look around the Trade Show floor or see many speakers. That’s the best part! Seeing what everyone else is doing with their art AND their business is inspiring. This year Mirta and I decided to split up for most of the presentations we were able to attend, and then tell each other what we learned. This is a good idea if you’re attending with your partner. See different speakers and visit different vendors when possible, then compare notes. This year our friend Henry Ventura, from R&V Photography in Santa Barbara, came out to give us a hand with our Master Class. It was his first time there, and it was fun to see him take it all in.  Thanks Henry!

The MGM Grand has been home for WPPI for the last few years. The first time we attended, 11 years ago, the convention was held at the Tropicana. Of course, every year it grows larger, and it had to find a bigger home in Vegas. This year 17000 photographers from all over the world came out to Las Vegas for WPPI.  I can’t think of another week of the year where we pretty much stay in the same building the whole time and time flies by so fast.

This is our newly remodeled room in the main tower, and Mirta hard at work answering emails and putting the finishing touches to our presentation.  Out Master Class this year was titled “The Capture, Care and Feeding of the High End Bride”. It was held on Sunday and we were honored to have a capacity crowd plus a few extra attendees that “added” the class at the last minute. We were really humbled by the great response.

Henry was nice enough to get a few shots of our class. We had a great group of photographers at different stages of their business, but all with the same goal, to improve their business and reach the type of client they want to work with.

Mirta did “Dashboard” demonstrations at the Kubota Imaging Tools booth. I think she did a little Flamenco dance before her presentation to attract a good crowd. She told me next year she’s bringing her castanets 🙂

Here’s Mirta with Kevin Kubota, our digital guru after her second presentation. Kevin’s products have saved us countless production hours and help us deliver a much higher quality of images to our clients.

I don’t know how Kevin and his wife Clare do it! Every year they work so hard for so many long days and are always having fun. I’m pretty sure they really love what they do.

I had the opportunity to help out at the West Coast Albums booth. They make a great product, and we’re proud to feature their albums in our wedding collections. Here I’m showing our good friend Joe Photo some of the albums. I think this one is from the Huntington Collection. Leave it to Joe to make a T-shirt look dressy. Joe’s platform presentation was on how to work with wedding planners. I had the opportunity to sit in for that. It was very informative, Joe did a survey among many wedding planners all over the country and shared the findings, great stuff!  Anyone interested can find out about his survey at Joe’s website.

This is Jack and his wife Carol with Mirta and myself. Jack is the person you want to talk to if you’re interested in checking out West Coast albums. Carol is also part of the company. Really, really helpful people, they take great care of us!

This is the man at Bay Photo, the best lab in the industry as far as we’re concerned! Larry Abitol and his team do amazing work, they have an incredible line of products and the customer service is amazing. If you’re a client of Bay Photo, you’re family!

I think Larry’s smiling a little more in this one… I can’t blame him 🙂

How does she keep all that stuff in her head?! When it comes to helping you in every way possible, the team at SmugMug has no rival. SmugMug Pro is a very powerful solution to many different aspects of our business, from on-line reprint sales to automatic offsite back up of files.  As such, it takes people like Ann McRay to help SmugMug clients get the most out of it. SmugMug is a very, very important part of our business!

Here’s Mirta with our friend Melissa Ghionis. She and her husband Jerry were all over the place as usual. The ICE society is a really great learning tool, and lots of fun too!

OK, I really want one of these… I’m glad this one was chained to the table, otherwise I don’t know if I would have been able to resist the temptation. This is the new Ice Light. Jerry Ghionis’ new product, made by Westcott. A little pricey, but worth every penny. I can’t wait to get one! Check Jerry’s or Westcott ‘s site for more information…

Here is our dear friend Dina Douglass of Andrena Photography and now of Colorpop. Her booth was next to West Coast Albums, so we had a chance to hang together. The response to her brand new product was incredible. And so is what it can do for your images…

If I only knew what our friend Art Suwansang has forgotten about Lightroom I’d be considered an expert by most photographers. This guy is a genius! Here he is at the Bay Photo booth helping photographers improve their images.  If you have the chance, try to see one of Art’s presentations. He often speaks at SmugMug meetings as we do.

This is Hanssie, the reining Queen of UNDFIND, next are Chris, Justin and Mirta of course, with our (actually I can’t get it away from her) ONE bag, my favorite camera bag. The UNDFIND team was nice enough to put our logo on the bag cover. It’s so comfortable to carry!

Here’s the whole UNDFIND team minutes after the Trade Show closed. They sold so many bags during WPPI, the guy in the front was frozen in the order taking position!

Of course, all work, learning, inspiration and no play is just not right! Especially in Vegas!

This new IPhone 4S does a pretty good job! Especially when I was balancing myself on the backrest of a couch after 3, or maybe 4, Captain Morgan Cuba libres… With extra limes of course… This is the gang… The guy doing the Austin Powers imitation is Jay Gough, all the way from Canada.  Check out the new site he’s involved with.  It’s a repository of information and it’s 100% FREE.  We recommend visiting this site daily!!  Shuttercliq.

Jay and Hanssie

Mirta with Brynn and Mike of D’avello Photography and the Christy Shipp of Studio Moirae.  We had a GREAT time hanging out with new and old friends and letting off a little steam.  Now that we’re back, wedding season has already begun and we are excited about all the fabulous weddings we have for 2012.