Robert Seale lighting workshop webinar posted

A video of the lighting workshop webinar presentation Photoshelter founder Allen Murabayashi and I recently took part in is now available.  The video features our live webinar from March 31st in which we discussed my lighting demo shoot with Michael Scott Creature from the SXSW festival in Austin last month.  Taylor Jones, the owner of Texas Grip, provided us with a fabulous grip truck stocked with Profoto gear for our demo shoot.

The video has made the rounds among many of my favorite photography websites, including, David Hobby’s Strobist site, Rob Galbraith.com, and even the Profoto blog.

Photoshelter Webinar: Lighting it up in Austin

Recently, I had the opportunity to speak at SXSW in Austin at an event sponsored by Photoshelter.  At the end of the seminar, we did a quick lighting demo with a local Austin musician, and we’ll share those photos, the planning, and the thought process that went into the demo this Wednesday night, March 31 from 6-7pm Central Time during a live webinar at Photoshelter.com.  I hope you can join us.

Taylor Jones, a fabulous Austin digital tech (and owner of Texas Grip) provided support with live capture during the event, and provided most of the lighting equipment from his magically awesome grip truck.  We were assisted by good friends Nathan Lindstrom, Todd Spoth, Will Rutledge, and Andrew Loehman.  Profoto also helped out by loaning us some additional equipment for the event.

We thought it would be interesting to show a scenario that happens all too often in our business:  How to deal with a subject with limited time in a single location.  Planning and choreographing your shoot ahead of time and utilizing different lighting tools can make all the difference and can give your art director more setups to choose from.

We really lucked out by landing a great musician and artist to be our muse for the shoot:  Michael Scott Parker, of Creature Rock.  Michael used to live in San Francisco, and has been photographed numerous times by the trinity of rock and roll photographers: Michael Zagaris, Baron Wolman, and the late, great, Jim Marshall.  She was great to work with, and I hope to shoot with her again soon.

Lighting Talk/Demo at SXSW in Austin

I’ve been asked to participate in an exciting event coming up on Saturday, March 13 in Austin, Texas.  Photoshelter, the premier company helping photographers with websites, sales and marketing tools, file delivery and secure image archiving is putting together an exciting photo workshop  in conjunction with the South by Southwest (SXSW) conference.

Allen Murabayashi, the CEO of Photoshelter will be presenting a program on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for photography websites.  Allen and his colleague Grover Sanschagrin  have studied photo websites and SEO more than anyone on the planet.  (They are also two of the smartest people I know).  If you haven’t checked out their FREE pdf reports on SEO, social media, and photography websites, then you’re just plain nuts.  This will be a great presentation.

I’ll deliver a talk/slideshow showing a wide-ranging body of work, and talk about transitioning through different phases of a photography career.  I started in newspapers, migrated to a magazine staff job, and then went out on my own as a commercial photographer.  I’ll talk about each phase, the challenges of a changing marketplace, and (of course) show lots of photographs.

After a quick lunch break, there will be a panel discussion with my two of my good friends:  stellar photographer, and BBQ buddy  Darren Carroll (probably the best golf photographer in the world, and a helluva portrait shooter, too), and Taylor Jones (a fellow photographer who has made a name for himself as a super high-end digital tech, who works all over the country for some of the biggest names in the advertising world).  Local photogs (who I don’t know personally – but am looking forward to meeting) Eric Hegwer, and Jack Hollingsworth will also be on hand to complete the panel.  Together we’ll discuss both the art and business of photography.

At the end of the day, we’ll have a live photo shoot/lighting workshop.  I’ll answer some lighting questions, talk about portrait concepts, research and planning.  I’ll show you how to pull off a quick portrait shoot with a variety of looks in one location.  Taylor will be on hand to demonstrate how a great digital tech operates.  It should be a lot of fun, and I’m excited that they’ve asked me to participate.

The event will be from 11-4, at The Long Center for the Performing Arts, 701 West Riverside, Austin, Texas on Saturday, March 13, 2010.

Looking forward to seeing lots of folks there!

Sports Photography Presentation at ASMP Boston

I’m excited to announce that I’ll be giving a sports photography slide show presentation Tuesday, February 9th for the New England chapter of the American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP).  My good friend and colleague, Damian Strohmeyer, a longtime Sports Illustrated staff photographer, will also be presenting that night, and I’m very proud to be on the same bill with him.

Damian will focus more on his sports action work, and I’ll be showing sports portrait work.

Here’s a link to the event on the official ASMP New England website.

The event will be held at E.P. Levine, 23 Drydock Ave., Boston, Massachusetts, on Tuesday, Feb. 9 at 7:00PM.

Hope to see you there!