Mary Kay Photoshoot - LATISM Retreat in Washington D.C.

Who said photography wasn't fun? Driving an entire day throughout DC in a limousine with a bunch of beautiful models proves you wrong. Here is a quick snapshot that Ana Flores of LatinaBloggersConnect took:

In the picture is Carmen Ordonez from Viva Fashion. 

For this event, Mary Kay invited six of the world's top Latina bloggers to attend a retreat in D.C. with a full make-over by celebrity make-up artist Luis Casco, celebrity stylist Angie Escamilla, and yours truly as the photographer.

LATISM (Latinos in Social Media) is a pioneering organization of Latinos social media influencers of over 140,000 members. This event was a This by-invitation only unique opportunity will bringing together top Latina executives with a hand-picked group of influential Latina bloggers. The event was organized by Mary Kay, LV Communications and Latina Bloggers Connect.

The girls were getting ready at the splendid Hotel Helix before a limousine took us to four DC landmarks: Pennsylvania Avenue with the Capitol in the background, the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial and finally Georgetown. We had three hours to cover four locations with six models in DC traffic, but everyone pulled together and we made it! This was the first event of its kind and while none of the girls are professional models and we had to work quickly, their attitude and spirit was simply stunning, particularly when considering the heat and the constantly changing weather conditions. But see for yourself...

Mercedes Sanchez of Be Chic Mag (Facebook, Twitter):

Jeanette Kaplun, Co-Founder of Todo Bebe and Co-Host of Viva La Familia:

Carmen Ordonez of Viva Fashion Blog (Facebook):

Monique Frausto of Blogs by Latinas (Facebook, Twitter)

Flor de Maria Rivera of Flor de Maria Fashion:

Viviana Hurtado of The Wise Latina Club (Facebook):

And here is a shot of stylist Angie Escamilla:

Beauty Shoot: Beth C.

Here are some pictures from my recent shoot with the fabulous Beth C. Make-Up was done by Michelle Heffner, who is also a professional body- and face painter.

Model: Beth C.

MUA: Michelle Heffner

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Upgrading your Camera - What you should know

All the time, people come up to me and ask which camera they should buy. Usually they try to choose between the latest and flashiest model they can afford, but mostly that's the wrong question to ask, so I ask a counter question: "In what ways does your current camera limit you?"

Barely anyone can give an answer to that simply because very few people will ever reach the limiting factors of their cameras. I still use 10 Megapixel cameras simply because I had 30x40 inch (75x100 cm) prints made with those hanging in galleries and no one ever told me that my camera had too few megapixels. Since I rarely shoot high speed sports, I also don't need more than 3 fps and the few times I do, I deal with it. Now if my main source of income would become high speed sports, I would consider getting a camera that shoots at least 5 fps. The current limiting factors I see in my cameras are ISO, AF points, and image sharpness. I already use high end lenses, so at this point in time, my image quality is not limited by my lenses but by my camera bodies. So far I haven't seen a camera that does all of these to make an upgrade worth it for me. However, that may change in the future and will be a major buying point for me. Since I travel a lot and use gear in all kinds of conditions, of course the body has to be weather sealed and be made of magnesium alloy. Unless all of these things come into place, I won't upgrade my cameras. As you can see, I have evaluated exactly where I have a need and will only ever upgrade once that need is met.

If you are just unhappy with the image quality, you may want to consider buying better glass than a better camera, since that's the limiting factor for most people.

Another question to ask yourself when buying a new camera is: "What kind of photography are you trying to do?"

If you are doing sports photography, you will have different expectations from a camera than if you would do portraiture or if you would do landscapes. I know many sports photographers who use only one AF point during the entire lifetime of their cameras, while I know portrait photographers who even think that 61 AF points are too few. At the same time, most portrait photographers would be perfectly happy with a burst rate of 1 fps, while many sports photographers think that 8 fps is still too slow. If you only shoot indoors, you will also not need a weather sealed body. How much you shoot also impacts what kind of camera you should get. If you shoot a lot you may be better off getting a camera with a higher life expectancy and upgrade to the new model whenever your old camera gives out instead of having to buy the same model again at the end of its life cycle.

Also consider that if you mainly shoot one thing but once in a while you get jobs for other types of photography, it may be cheaper for you to just rent the camera body required for that type of assignment (or borrow it from a friend).

The Microstock Challenge - Which sites make you money and which ones don't

I have been doing a little bit of Microstock here and there for a few years but never really applied any analytics to it. Four months ago, I set out with the goal of tracking my progress and quadrupling my Microstock income purely by spending four hours a week in the first month, two hours a week in the second month, and one hour per week in the third and fourth month on it. My first four hours were spent on researching various Microstock sites, creating new accounts and developing a spreadsheet to track my progress. The second four hours were spent tagging all the images with Metadata and uploading them. There is a nifty tool called ProStockMaster that allows you to submit to all the major Microstock sites at once. During the four months, I almost doubled my portfolio purely out of pictures I already had but never used ranging from objects to lifestyle (a rough average of what's out there). I did not reach my goal of quadrupling my income, but I increased it by a factor of 3.5, which is pretty good.

On the way there, I found out which sites actually make you good money and which ones don't. I also made several accounts to track different factors that aren't part of this write-up, so here goes the summary ranked by awesomeness (which is how much money they made me). Just so you know, I have a degree in economics and finance, so I actually know about this stuff.

1) Shutterstock (link) Acceptance Rate: 60% % of Total Monthly Income: 38% Average Earnings per Download: $0.42

2) Dreamstime (link) Acceptance Rate: 65% % of Total Monthly Income: 31% Average Earnings per Download: $1.70

3) iStockphoto (link) Acceptance Rate: 38% % of Total Monthly Income: 12% Average Earnings per Download: $0.74

4) 123rf (link) Acceptance Rate: 98% % of Total Monthly Income: 9% Average Earnings per Download: $0.59

5) DepositPhotos (link) Acceptance Rate: 74% % of Total Monthly Income: 4% Average Earnings per Download: $0.37

6) Fotolia (link) Acceptance Rate: 63% (I found the approval process to be a hassle, so I didn't bother to upload all images.) % of Total Monthly Income: 3% Average Earnings per Download: $0.38

These are the six Microstock sites I would go with. The other ones had no or only very minimal payouts below 1% of my monthly income. They were: CanStockPhoto, BigStockPhoto, PantherMedia, YayMicro, CutCaster, and StockFresh.

Meet Author Ken Ballen

Portrait of Author Ken Ballen in his Study

When Ken Ballen called me, he said that he needed a portrait for a book that he wrote on Terrorism. He told me a little about the background and I was glad that he invited me into his house to take the pictures, since that's where he unwinds from dealing with terrorism and organized crime. The title of the book is Terrorists in Love and can be pre-ordered from Amazon (click here) (Launch Date: October 07, 2011). The book itself is an interesting read because it shows radicals and terrorists from a more personal side and nothing is as black and white as the media portrays it.

This is my favorite picture of Ken, but the publisher chose a different one that you can see here.