OC SMUG Meeting

Last night, I attended the OC SMUG Meeting. It's a monthly meeting sponsored by SmugMug that encourages photographers to get together and learn about various topics. There are SMUGs in various locations across the country. You can find one near you here. They employ various guest speakers every month to talk about a certain topic. Last night was regarding how to market to your target audience. The speaker was Lawrence Chan which is a photographer as well as a marketing consultant for Grace Ormonde Wedding Style Magazine (Spring Summer 2010). It was a very enlightening talk and really gave us an idea of how to better market ourselves to our customers through transparency and leveraging social media. Afterward, as usual, some photographers and I went to grab some food and talk about various topics. I really enjoy these meetings since you get to meet  people with similar interests and get more insight into the photography industry. We also found out that the OC SMUG now has a new leader. Congrats to Hanssie Trainor will be taking over from Jasmine Star. You can also join the Facebook group for the OC SMUG here. As usual, all SMUG meetings are free and open to all so if you're interested, find out one thats happening near you and stop on by. There will be one next week in Riverside and it will be featuring Rob Nicholson. For more information about that go to this website. The leader of the Riverside SMUG is David Wolf. He's a great guy and works in SmugMug customization so if you have a SmugMug site and want to make it look awesome, he's the guy to contact.

Talkshop with Gavin and Erin Wade

Last Sunday, I attended an incredible workshop by Gavin and Erin Wade. I learned so much from all different aspects of photography, from technical to marketing and everything in between. Gavin and Erin were very helpful in answering all our questions regardless of how simple or complicated it may be. There was also a quick photo shoot with Priscilla and Drew at a great location setup by Gianna SanFilippo. She was also gave us a short talk regarding vendor relationships and a little insight into what Wedding coordinators do. In addition, Paul Von Rieter gave us a brief look into SEO and how to make our blogs more efficient. Here are a couple of images from the photoshoot. Some of the other vendors were:

Rentals: Classic Party Rentals

Decor and Accessories: Chic Celebrations and Tuvalu Home

Floral Arrangements: Desdemonia Gilbert

Menswear: Mission Viejo Tux

Bridal Gown: Vera Wang via One Night Affair

Location: Maison des Oliviers

Cypress College Photo Expo

Yesterday, I attended the Cypress College Photo Expo. It was a small expo that had only a few tables. I believe the main draw for the Expo were the speakers. Starting a noon, there were various speakers and workshops going on.

I had a good time listening to the speakers. Also had a great learning experience talking with Doug and Henry from Tiltnshift.com regarding lighting. They're workshop was so packed there was a line outside.

Since this was the first expo that the college has held, I'm sure future ones will be just as good or even better.

Tonight at USC

They had Grant Imahara from Mythbusters as a guest speaker. It was great. He talked about his background in special effects as well as what he did on Mythbusters. I stayed around at the end and was able to get a picture with him... actually I was the ONLY person who stayed around to get a picture with him.... lol