We haven’t featured an album in a while, and I just wanted to show off a couple of pages from Angie and Brandon’s wedding at the Westcliff. Its super clean, quite graphic and features a lot of moments and expressions, not just a fashion shoot using the bride and groom as props. The cover was made from the pattern that they designed for their wedding stationary. Its a killer bee Westcliff Album that is classical, emotional and whimsical. I love it, and I think it fits two very hip parents who also happen to be killer graphic designers.

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It’s been a long couple of weeks, I’ve been (figuratively) chained to the desk in the basement working on albums and doing the post on what seems like millions of photos. Two of my cameras broke while shooting a wedding – the two batteries on the big black camera’s battery grip literally shot out, snapping the hooks and the housing – fortunately I had backup cameras, but that would account for my dry wit at Avianto. After many phone call and trips to Kayalami, the local Nikon repair center and I are finally seeing eye to eye as to who should be paying for the repairs. Anyway, it’s been a while so I figured a bit of an update on what is going on in the studio is in order.

Nicola and John’s album, they’re the baobab guys, was nominated for an album award. After speaking to Nicola we decided not to submit it, I’m not really big on photography competitions, but it was nice to get recognition for a really cool album. I don’t think I posted anything from that album so a quick couple.

I also finished Swathi and Andrei’s killer bee album from their Indian wedding in Mauritius.

I even finished Shelley and Marc’s Shepstone Gardens album (some from that one later this week, after they get a chance to see it). I did find this cool birdcage pic amongst the images – I’ve been having a Eugenio Recuenco week, so it may just be me that loves this pic.

We also opened a couple of dates in Jan, March and May due to cancellations for those that are still looking. I did send out mails to everyone who asked to let them know if anything changed. I’m also in the process of investigating switching back to the traditional albums from the storybook, coffee table books, and am in talks with a local bookbinder to make me a custom sample album.

Also really getting into Hendrik Kerstens’ portraits.

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Way too many fantastic spreads from this one. A typical Dullstroom winter’s day, all grey, misty, roaring fires inside, chandeliers. Just altogether amazing.

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I’ve been reliably informed that I haven’t posted on the blog in over a week, thanks for that email we know who you are. Oh, the same person also informed me that I didn’t post a portrait of myself this year for my birthday. Gotcha there, I posted it on my facebook profile.

Anyway, this is a quick update on what’s been going on in the month of June at the studio. We are literally swamped with work at the moment and have been busy as beans putting together albums, photos, working on new joint ventures and trying to reply to the literally hundreds of emails that have come through. Due to this overload, and lets just say that I didn’t expect this many inquiries this year, we are in the process of trying to find an admin person to handle this for us. The good news is that you can expect to see a lot more pics and albums and … other things I’ll mention a bit later … on the blog in the next couple of days as I take a short breather and surface to do some blogging.

We’ve put together a joint venture between ourselves, a canvas printer and a framing company and will be offering really good quality mounted canvas prints. I’m putting together our pricing at the moment, but you’re looking at about R1600 for a 1.5m by 1m canvas, printed, stretched, mounted, delivered – that’s an A0 and A1 next to each other.

Before we get to the fun stuff, I’m really trying to cut down on the amount of email I’m getting. It seems that every week we get an email from someone putting together an online wedding portal, magazine, community or some other form of electronic business which is set to revolutionize the industry offering a one-stop portal for all a bride’s wedding needs and would like us to contribute, advertise or to use our photos. If your site can beat the following stats, or comes up higher in the SERPS for any of the keywords that we compete on, feel free to send me an email (include stats), please don’t call. Otherwise, I drink your milkshake!

We’re changing hosting providers this month, our current hosting doesn’t seem to be able to cope with the amount of traffic we generate, and we’ve decided to switch, so there may be a slight hiccup during the middle of the month while we make the necessary changes. We are also going to change our URL, but more on that later.

If you’re a photographer and have read this far. Hi!, we are in the process of putting together two seminars on marketing for wedding photographers, they’ll be held in Joburg and are full day events full of practical ideas and advice. There will be an advanced version for those who are already full time and a entry level version for those wanting to go full time. Keep an eye out here for more info.

Lastly, we learned a lot this month. Firstly, we need an admin assistant badly. Secondly, don’t try to fit a 1.5m canvas into the green mamba, you need the big black car to transport that kind of monster. Thirdly, wedding photography doesn’t scale, you can have too many inquiries, and lastly, did you know that L. Ron Hubbard lived in Linksfield? I didn’t, oh, and it gets pretty damn cold out in Cape Town, pretty damn cold.

Dylsky, it’s on its way.

Just finished uploading Celia and Hugh’s album – a two volume Asuka set, 80 pages in total. Just thought I’d show off some pages before we head out for the long weekend. We’ll be back on Saturday.

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For those that don’t know we use Asuka book as our album manufacturers of choice. Been with them for about three years now and our clients have always been very happy with their product. Their head office is in the US but the albums get printed in Japan. Anyway, I was very happy recently to have had our studio selected as their studio spotlight for March 2008. They say really nice things about us, and there’s even a little picture of me flashing the armsleeve.

sample quote – Dror believes “all brides should be photographed like a rockstar – if possible, backstage.” As V would say, yeah, whatever, rock ‘n roll.

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I recently loaned my album to Andrea and haven’t had a chance to get it back yet. So I was recently a bit lost when I was doing a consultation and couldn’t show an album. To remedy that until I get the album back, here are some images of that sample album.

Our exclusive range of hard cover books have a high-end feel that is reminiscent of fine art coffee table books. Presented in an exclusive red or black book case. Each page has a laminate protective coating in either a Matte or a Glossy finish to preserve its appearance and has a lifetime guarantee. The pages are book bound which means that the the signature pages are stacked together, cut down the center and adhered to the spine of the book using perfect binding.

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