Well, Dreamstime gave me my first chance at doing stock photography. I have done so much reading about photography that when I look back on it, I wonder where I find the time to shoot! Between reading on the subjects of technique, technical information (how my camera or lights work), photography history (my favorite photographer being Lewis Hine and Edward Steichen is a close second), camera industry, and the business of photography, I have always found time to read the info here on DT.

Why? Where does it fit in? Well, if you will indulge me for just one moment, I will get to that.

But, first, let me say thank you. Thank you to all of you who indulged me as I fumbled around in the dark and encouraged me to keep working ...

Generally speaking, I have never enjoyed participating in contests or Prom or anything that allowed someone to be singled out based on their popularity. I mean, who am I kidding, I was never the cool kid in High School and, as a bald guy in my mid-30's, my popularity ain't getting any better.

But, in order to understand why this blogging is such a great marketing tool, I have to put my teenage nightmares aside because this is the easiest way to explain it.

I am sure there are plenty of you out there who are, like me, still wondering where the proverbial rabbit gets pulled from when I do a google search. How do those pages get ranked? It can't be strictly on the "best" match because when I put in "Art Linkletter" and number three in the list ends up being a link ...

I am going to go out on a limb here.

For those of you who know me, I pity you. But, seriously, you know that my life is about balance. Balance is very important to me. I drink alcohol, I just don't get drunk (anymore... there was this one night in Waikiki....but I digress). I jog, but I don't run. I have four kids because that is about all one SUV will hold.

Anyway...balance. It makes life more enjoyable, but every once in a while you have to do something crazy like jump out of airplanes or rappel out of a helicopter that is hovering 30 meters above the ground (thats about 90 feet for

the American readers...wink, wink~when are we EVER going to give up those feet and inches and switch to metric? It's soooo much easier)...

Some people think that it is impossible to make a living at stock photography unless you have a studio. Images of people seem to be the big sellers, but, from what I have seen and in my very lacking experience, I don't think the images shot in a studio are necessarily the BEST sellers.

I saw a blog about the best selling image the other day and I am fairly sure that it wasn't shot in a studio, but I could be wrong. Most of the shots of people that sell great are situational, not on a white background. (Man, did it take me a while to break that mold!) Images of people on a white background have their place, but we are talking about expanding your horizons. For some of you, it may be time to leap into the category of shooting people. If you are tired of shooting ...

As a 'self proclaimed' student of photography, I have made it a point to mentally critique every image I can reasonably take time to do so. One of the things I notice time and again that I think separates a good photograph from a great one is perspective. Sometimes it is as simple as using the proper focal length, like a wide angle shot to accentuate things that are close the camera. Sometimes it is making sure that your camera is level when you have obvious horizontal lines in a picture to make it aesthetically pleasing.

Most of the time it is a matter of NOT shooting while standing erect. If there is one thing I tell my fellow fledgling photographers, its: Don't just STAND there.

Get down on a knee (this also creates a more stable platform)...

I have tried, on several occasions, to put together some very well thought out and intuitive blogs about photographic technique. Problem is that I am more suited to tell astronauts how to put their space suit on than I am to tell photographers here at DT how to shoot great images.

Besides, how long can I go on pretending to be this learned (pronounce the E and the D at the end) photographer when I have only been doing this for about 2 years now? Some of you have gone on photographic trips through Yosemite with Ansel Adams you have been doing this so long. Some of you were spending hours in dark rooms while I was doodling "I love Nancy" in my Biology notebook. So, who am I to tell YOU what makes a great image?

I think some of you would laugh out ...

I just have a second to get some quick thoughts out there, so I don't have time to add the images to support this message (sorry to all of you who only read my blog because you get a little notice telling you that I included your image in my blog). Here is my ONE image:

I was helping a friend learn PS CS2 today and 2 hours of 'instruction', we realize its time for lunch. So, we go and eat lunch and come back and now were getting serious about the thing. We are talking about layers and masks and histograms and tonal adjustments and sheep. OK, not sheep, just making sure you weren't reading too fast.

It was fun to share some of the things I have learned over the last two years working with the program on my own, but there were a few buttons and functions that ...