What a month February has been! I started the month with 4 days of PhotoPro Expo in Covington, KY. The first day was a juried photo print contest. That was such a learning experience. It was fascinating to hear the judges’ thoughts on some of the prints. They did not discuss them all, only those where there was a substantial disagreement in how to score a given print. For those who have never been to a print competition (this was my first), here’s how it works. A panel of several judges – I think there were 6 – gives each print a score of up to 100. A score of 80 is required to earn a merit rating. The scores are averaged and then that averaged score is announced. If a judge feels that the announced score is considerably different than the score they awarded, they may challenge the score. At a challenge, each judge discusses how they scored the print and why. Then the judges score again. It was fun to mentally give each print a score of my own and see how close I was to the judges. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was often within a point or 2.
Friday through Sunday of the Expo were filled with lots of seminars and 2 days of trade show. I admit to being exhausted at the end of each day. It didn’t help that I was fighting a cold that decided to hit me on Wednesday before I left home. Despite the long days, I came away energized and inspired. I got some great lighting ideas as well as some marketing ideas. At the trade show, I got the nicest prop. It’s a wrought iron garden bench with a small cushion and the perfect size for small to medium dogs. I’m pretty sure that I can also use it for larger dogs if they only put their front paws on it. To compliment that, I also purchased a nice variegated green backdrop that is washable.
I’m really looking forward to setting the studio back up and getting some new photos of my boys as well as some photos of some new pups in town. But before I do that, I want new lighting……