First of all, I want to thank all the people who bought my ebook tutorial over the past few days and thank you everyone who spread the word about it. While I am not ready to head off on a cruise to the Caribbean just yet :) the great response has certainly made the time I put into this little project worthwhile, heck I may even make another one on a different topic in the future. For those who haven’t yet got it, it will always be available through my WEBSITE and this blog (side-bar on the right).
I want to thank one person in particular – David duChemin / Pixelated Image. I met David a few years back on the ‘Travel Photographers Network’, since then we’ve corresponded over the internet and while I have never met him in person, I feel like I can really call him a friend.
If you’ve never heard of this duChemin fellow, well then I really can’t imagine where you’ve been. Over the past few months David duChemin has become one of the hottest names in photography. It seems as if on any given day he could be giving an interview on a popular photography podcast, meeting up with top photographers like Chase Jarvis or Joe McNally, or launching his BOOK at B&H, New York (probably the largest photography store in the world). The fact that amidst this busy schedule David managed to find the time to spread the word about that little ebook of mine just shows what sort of person he is. The dude is about as genuine, friendly and helpful as they get. Add those qualities to his success and you have one of the most inspirational photographers out there. So, thanks a lot David mate :) – for helping out and for being a continuous source of inspiration for God knows how many photographers now.
Now to the social media business, well it was also David duChemin who gave me the final kick up the butt to start ‘twittering’, ‘tweeting’ whatever the heck you call it. It’s not like I wasn’t aware of Twitter, I was, just as I’m also aware that it’s become much less cool, since all the ‘stars’ started using it.
I couldn’t care less about the ‘coolness’ factor. What I do see is that Twitter has turned into a really valuable tool for businesses and I can certainly see the incredible potential in it from a photographer’s perspective. David wrote a great blog post about social media stuff and photographers a while ago - “You 2.0 - Photographers and Twitter” and if you want to delve deeper into what the whole Web 2.0 thing can do for photographers it’s worth checking out Jack Holligsworth’s Site. From what Jack is promising, it will be a valuable source of information.
As far as my opinion – in short, I think Twitter is very useful for photographers marketing their work and services. It can also be an important tool, along with a blog when it comes to building your brand. But even if you aren’t into brand-building or marketing your photography, you can get a lot out of Twitter. If you ‘follow’ the right people, Twitter can be a tremendous source for learning things you never even knew were extremely useful for you – latest tech news, industry trends, free resources on the internet. If something has value, there’s a good chance that you’ll come across it on Twitter.
So yeah, I’m on it now, as some may have noticed from the ‘My Twitter’ update thingy on the side bar. You can all FOLLOW me if you like, I’m ‘mitchellkphotos’. I promise that I won’t tweet whenever I take a crap or eat something, only useful information for photographers, travelers or simply like minded folks.
Now to a somewhat different topic. As if I didn’t lust for the 5D Mk II enough already, not long ago I discovered this blog – Planet 5D.
Look around for 5 minutes and you’ll come across some amazing videos created with the camera. Some of you may be photography purists and don’t want to even touch that video button, but me, well I started off making films, so this bloody camera is making me drool. The price-tag, which is still a little ridiculous in Australia and the fact that for the same amount of money I can probably live and travel in Asia for half a year have prevented me from getting one, but man, could I do some great things with that video function :).
If anyone important from Canon ever reads this – please send me a free 5D Mk II, the stuff I’ll shoot with it will be a very worthy return for your ‘investment’. :)
