I’ll let you know who they all are next week, but here’s a hint - only four of them missed WPPI a few months back!

If you want to stay on top of the trends and challenges then you need to have each one of these icons in your network.  So, if you can join us at Summer School in August terrific, but if you can’t, then make it a point to keep in touch with each of these photographers.  Read their blogs, look at their teaching schedules, keep track of what they’re doing.  They’re teaching because they love education and they believe in the growth of professional photography…so get to know them.   And today I get to introduce you to Kay Eskridge!

Kay Eskridge:  This year’s Summer School theme is about diversity and few photographers are more diverse than Kay!  She’s a marketing and branding machine, looking for new ways to support the community around Phoenix.   Over the past year her studio work has branched out into the pet market, boudoir and Seniors, not high school seniors, but the Golden Age senior crowd.  

Think about that for just a second.  It takes a monumental effort to get on the radar of the Golden Age crowd, but there isn’t a grandmother on the planet who doesn’t complain about not having pictures of her family and virtually none of them have images of themselves that are up to date.    It’s a unique opportunity, well worth working to develop.

When it comes to developing new concepts and testing out new ideas, Kay’s secret weapon is her enthusiasm!  She’s a family photographer with incredible energy and creativity.  Best of all Kay walks the talk and is constantly looking for new ways to expand her business.   She loves to teach, is a terrific instructor and proof that hyper-active kids grow up and have great careers!

The only sad thing about Kay is that she has my Arnold Palmer signed putter hanging over her fireplace when it belongs in my house…it’s been over ten years since she outbid me at a PPA Charity Auction and after years of therapy I’m almost over it! LOL

Want to learn more about Kay?  Visit her website, Images by Kay.  You’ll find her on Facebook too.  And if you’re on Twitter, you’ll find her there too!  She’s also got a great blog, well worth reading on a regular basis.

Monday, I’ll hook you up with Kevin Kubota!

I’m convinced, as are thousands of professional photographers, part of the answer is in diversity in your business model.  It’s tough to be a one trick pony in this economy, but a little diversity brings in new clients, new applications and challenges your skill set.

Have you thought about the high school senior market?  You don’t need the entire school system, just a handful of enthusiastic seniors.   But you need to do it right – and nobody does it better than Larry Peters , Ralph Romaguera and Fuzzy Duenkel , just to name a few.   Check out the look and feel of their images – all different, but each with his own style.  You can catch all three of them on the speaking circuit and it will be well worth your time to pick up ideas on how to get started with seniors.

Years back I spent some time on the road with Larry through a Hasselblad University program.  One of the techniques Larry was using at the time was to photograph a half dozen or so seniors free of charge and then send them out as his ambassadors.  It’s marketing brilliance at its best.  These kids had a blast – they worked with one of the finest photographers and they wrapped up their high school years with a portfolio that captured their personalities.

It was a LONG LONG (notice the use of double “longs”) time ago that I had my senior shot done.  And, I want extra points for having the nerve to share the image here!

Notice how the glasses hid the unibrow.    My left ear used to stick out even farther than the one you can see, but that’s the way it was.  The photographer came into the school and sat us down one at time, knocking off the entire senior class in half a day.  Photographs came in an envelope with the usual combo of 8×10’s, 5×7’s and wallets.  Everybody’s images looked exactly the same.

Today, it’s all about personality and capturing who the subject is as an individual.  You still have to know how to do a more traditional head shot, but for the most part it’s about the interests of the senior.  It’s about capturing who they are more than how they look.  It’s about their hobbies, friends, achievements and their aspirations.

Most important of all, think about the impact you might have on a future client.  In most cases a full portrait session for a high school senior will probably represent the subject’s first truly professional photographic experience.  If you do it right, it might just open the door for future business from Mom and Dad or the student themselves, when they get married or have other needs for a professional photographer.

Check out the story of one of Don Blair’s seniors 20 years later!  I wrote about it in an earlier post last year.  He absolutely remembered Don and was actually excited to see him again.

Photographing seniors and doing it well expands your skill set, forces you to learn and understand lighting/posing, even photojournalism and best of all gives you an opportunity to fine tune your creative skills!  It’s a new year with lots of the same challenges, but it’s not about survival of the fittest any longer.  It’s about survival of the most diverse and most creative.