ellipsis…

a thank-you video to all of the people who made Help-Portrait Vancouver a huge success.

Help-Portrait Vancouver was an overwhelming success! the Grace Mansion was full of joy and laughter. the makeup artist and hair stylist were buzzing making women and girls look beautiful. Mark Hildebrand and Kathi Reid filled the room with music. photographers were making people smile and laugh and giggle with excitement. and when the printers starting rolling off prints, it was priceless to see people’s reactions to their portraits. it was such an amazing experience to watch it all unfold before me.

the day went off without a hitch. all of my worries disappears as the first family walked through our doors. that was one of my favourite moments. we all had been waiting for our first family and a photographer suggested we take a group photo of the morning crew. just as we were about to take the picture the first family walked in and we all turned and cheered and clapped, we almost scared them away. lol! my heart jumped and the day had officially begun. everyone seemed to get into a good rhythm, a relaxed joyous rhythm. the day honestly flew by so quickly. i’ve watching the videos that Steve Tan has produced over and over again. they capture the day so well.

by the end of the day we took approximately 175 portraits of families & individuals, which translates to having about 430 people walk through our studios. pretty amazing that we were able to touch that many people. this is just the beginning. there is much more Help-Portrait to come!

the morning crew

the afternoon crew

mr. leigh culpin taking a portrait

bernard ng firing away

michael moore’s larger than life personality

Steve Tan, the resident Help-Portrait Vancouver videographer, has produced two videos of our event. watching these videos almost make me cry. they capture the day so well. i’ll let the videos do the rest of the talking.

Help-Portrait Vancouver

Help-Portrait Vancouver “Let It Shine”

i was one of lucky 25 who had the chance to hang out with Chase Jarvis on Monday. it was a bit crazy trying to get down to Seattle; jump off the plane from a wedding, get home, get my passport, pick up Wayne, and try to boot it down to Seattle in under 4 hours. the craziness paid off and we got there with 15 minutes to spare.

Chase has cultivated such a great community of photographers. virtually an open forum of photographers sharing ideas, techniques and styles with each other, Chase being the biggest open book. the saying “the secret is, there is no secret” was very evident amongst everyone. i love that kind of  community. there doesn’t seem to be a yearning for that in Canada. photographers seems to want to hold onto their “secrets”, as if their entire world would come crumbling down if others found out. wake up Canada, there is no secret! if there was one pseudo secret it would be, share your secrets, all of them. and by sharing them you will gain so many more in return. if you don’t believe me, i’d beg you to take a good look at what Mr. Chase Jarvis has accomplished by opening himself and his wealth of knowledge to who ever asks. and if you still down believe me, read Tim Sanders’ book Love is the Killer App. ok… enough of my ranting.

the secret location Chase had was a local Seattle skateboard park near his studio. his crew setup a wealth of crazy-ass Broncolor lights, and all 25 of us went hard shooting some amazing athletes. the entire park erupted with the noise of skateboards, shutters and the rapid fire of beeps from the strobes. i have never been amongst so many people shooting all at once. it’s a pretty amazing sight.

the crew of athletes we had just ripped it up non-stop for 3 hours straight. doing the same trick over and over again, each time asking us if we got the shot we wanted.

Josh ended up in Seattle via Ontario via New York. he was in New York on vacation when he found out that he was one of the 25, peaced-out early and flew into Seattle the morning of. didn’t have a have any gear, just knew he had to be there. he is a laid back, chill guy, with a ton of character and a sweet hat. i found him taking a break under an alley light and decided to take a couple of shots of him smoking. then grabbed a beauty dish and snapped a couple of portraits too. (if you’re reading this Josh, hook me up with your contact info so that we can keep in touch)

all the craziness to get down to Seattle was worth every minute. i’m sure everyone there would agree. a huge thank-you goes out to Chase and his team for putting on such a great event. now let’s see if we can start cultivating this kind of community in Vancouver. i’ll be the first, ask me anything you want about photography (mine, yours or otherwise) and i’ll answer it as best as i can.