New Pentax K10D reviews at last

And it's out and available in a shop near you. I probably will not get one for Christmas but maybe shortly thereafter. Meanwhile here are some very favourable Pentax K10D reviews. ...

luminous-landscape.com pentax K10D review

ephotozine.com review

User at DP review - "Handle this camera, and the Nikon D80 and the Sony feel like toys ;-)"

PopPhoto.com - "The features of the Pentax K10D are sure to amaze Pentax lovers, and the photo world in general"

Running Adwords on Photoconnect

So it seems to be quite public now that the lay offs at Acclaim Images were not that amicable - unfortunate since it appears 'family' were involved.

One of the issues raised was that Fred Voetsch's decision to run Google Adwords on his site exploited the photographers - by effectively making money by advertising competitors.

Since it is easy for many to see some truth in this, I have to consider the situation here at Photoconnect where I do the same.

Photographers originally paid to be on photoconnect - but that was in different market conditions to those that exist now. Each photographer has paid for a year's exposure for their images, an alternative to their own website costing rather more. After the year matured I have not asked for more money, or for photographers to leave but recently I have started running Adwords on the pages on this site.

I am in a slightly different position to Acclaim. My only marketing is the search engines. Acclaim uses them but has also been raising its profile by other means, although that may change now.

Now say a photographer puts on this site images of the New York Financial District. That page will get found in a great number of Google searches. Some people will want to buy a photo of the New York Financial District. Others are looking for something else to do with New York or to consider their Financial affairs.

Those looking for a photo will either see what they want on the page in front of them or not. If yes, they will look to buy. If not then one in a hundred will click on a advert earning a few pennies to help keep Photoconnect running, subscription free. The ads MAY be for other stock agencies but are as likely to be selling Mutual Funds or travel to New York. So those looking for something else will find what they are looking for.

One thing I do is try and keep control of 'free photo' adverts or adverts for microstock sites. I can do this through a filter Google provide but inevitably some sites get through until they are spotted and I employ the filter.

So all in all I don't think the adverts affect sales. What they do is keep the site running with no subscription. The modern internet runs on the basis of advertising keeping many sites alive, and photoconnect is not an exception.

Christmas party event photography....

A prosperous City firm in London hired me to do a full scale shoot at their Christmas Party on Friday night at the Sheraton Park Lane Hotel, a swanky 5 star venue in the West End of London.

Now I've not done anything on this scale before. This is EVENT PHOTOGRAPHY - 340 people to handle - and with Son, my regular assistant, in Korea, I had to pull in alternative help. I chose to go with my daughter and her boyfriend, not an obvious choice, but they know how to deal with computers, both work Saturday's in coffee bars so know how to handle people and cash, and they could be trusted with the latter.

How did it go?

In the bar, with a low ceiling, I was able to get some really pleasing shots using bounce flash off the ceiling and often the soft glow of the lights behind the bar as a background. I got some good shots of performers in action using no flash and pretty good ones of the company's CEO delivering his speech (the length of which was of great benefit to me but I suspect everyone else in the hall wished it was a lot shorter!).

Unfortunately, over dinner, in the high ceilinged main hall, I had no option but to use direct flash. I also had no option but to use .jpg to record the images because they speedily had to be processed by my two assistants onto proof sheets so that the guests could purchase the images. These images I almost universally hate. And it would be no surprise if the subjects feel that way too! The variable ambient lighting (floodlights sweeping the hall) played havoc with the colour balance on many of the images and this really could not be fixed after the event because each one would have to be individually adjusted.

Also the Pentax P-TTL flash seemed to give quite variable results. I was carefully checking the screen as I toured the hall snapping away but what looks good on a preview screen does not necessarily look good on a computer screen.

And then there was the hazard of the waiters! They seemed to follow me wherever I went in their hordes and it's a wonder that a soup course did not finish up splatter over me or my gear. Often it was a case of nipping in and out of this ceaseless traffic to quickly grab shots from the narrow spaces between the tables. Near the entrance to the kitchen it became almost impossible....

The light was no good, making focusing a nightmare. I used my large f2.8 Sigma 24-70mm zoom to make it as easy as possible but it was still not bright enough. I used autofocus for a while but this took a while to register correct focus to the irritation of the guests. So then I switched to manual focus for the rest of the night but still quite a few images had to be binned. I read of other photographers having the same problems with their Canons and Nikons so I know I'm not alone in the frustration of getting focus right in these conditions but I'm also beginning to wonder if my eye is up to it!

And financially?

Well I'm not going to make any money doing this! My nature is to not interrupt people's conversations until the moment appears right. I felt like a predator in search of prey, while myself avoiding my own predators (those waiters!). So I finished up taking rather fewer photos than I might have expected (although I must have sailed past 500). Deleting all those that were a bit out of focus, or the expressions were wrong / embarrassing must have got rid of half of the images.

And people did not really start buying until after 11pm. We had originally planned to pack up at 12pm but went on until 12.45pm, leaving the hotel half an hour later. So sales on the might paid for my assistants' help but not much more. Fortunately I have received a separate fee for doing the job, but not remotely enough reward for all the effort. Will Internet sales rescue the situation? Very unlikely!

Still it was fun.

Shock Horror! Yell works! Sort of....

Well it's not a new client but I did actually have someone contact me as a result of my Yell listing. And it was one of the UK's biggest advertising agencies to take pics ay their Xmas party.

I did not get the job (apparently they changed their mind on the actual coverage they wanted) but my name was passed to the Production Director re possible photography for their clients.....

The theory that I have heard is that if Yell do work then they get you important clients. We shall see, there's a long way to go yet.

Lifestyle - more than one style....

One of the little issues that I face in pulling together images on photoconnect is how to categorise lifestyle.

Well, I've finally found a place (a tip from Chris Elsdale on the AlamyPro group):

http://www.imagesource.com/

A way forward for photoconnect?

I've thought long and hard about how to include other photographers on Photoconnect. The crux of the issue is whether Photoconnect is going to get in visitors to click on ads (and sell a few photos) or whether it's going to sell lots of photos AND have visitors clicking on ads.

It's the latter I'd prefer and I've reached the conclusion that this means that, yes, I've got to be a little choosy about which photographers feature on photoconnect but more choosy about which of their photos feature.

Photoconnect is built on using keywords that correspond to those that people searching for images are using. Those people get their first impression directly from the images that they see that feature those keywords. If they are potential buyers then I and other photographers need them to hang around or even better return again. Nothing will happen on the site if it is padded out with lots of images concentrated in a few vague areas eg landscapes. It needs to have a great breadth of specific subject matter, travel images covering individual cities, countries, states, sports images covering specific sports, lifestyle images covering specific feelings.

So when a photographer declares an interest in Photoconnect then I'd look at their portfolios on Alamy and see whether their images are concentrated in subject matter areas that are going to work on photoconnect. Are the image titles good? Then I'd ask them to load up the images and take it from there.

While this is happening, I will have to do a purge of existing images to bring them up to scratch. Mine, other photographers. What I do not have great confidence in is the ability of all photographers on the site to deal directly with buyers. At least if there are links to Alamy the buyer will be able to purchase from there and the site will not gain a poor reputation because of an inability to deliver.

Yell update

Well let's face it, nothing much is going to happen. Except of course I got called yesterday to try and sell me even more advertising.

The reason organisations like Yell have to charge what they do is that they have to employ so many people to spend such a long time chasing new custom. They would not have to do this if they provided something that was value for money because individuals like me would sign up again after our first year's 'service'.

Anyway, stats for November are 15 clicks with a 20% conversion rate, a conversion being someone looking at my contact page. The chap on the line yesterday said that Yell conversions would be much, much higher than Google Adwords.

For the record Google brought in 151 visitors costing £140 - conversion rate 19%. That's 90p per visitor.
And of course Yell brought in 15 visitors costing £60 - conversion rate 20%. £4 per visitor.

I gained one client from Google.