New Stock Photo Series: Black Businessman Downtown Montreal

Been busy this week with finally getting around to doing post-production on this excellent shoot I did last Summer with Roody Renelus, a great model I’ve had the chance to work with a few times already. We went around downtown Montreal, shooting in cafes, Old Port, Old Montreal, Place des Spectacles, in the metro, at a food court and a clothing store. I managed to get a lot of great material from this day and I’ve added 40 new images to my portfolio this week. You can view them all in this lightbox on Istockphoto or at Roody’s gallery on my photoshelter site. Here is a sample of what you’ll see:

Stock Photo: Handsome Black Businessman with lunch outdoors

Stock photo: Businessman with tablet and smart phone looking away

Stock Photo: Successful Businessman jumps with joy Downtown Montreal

Stock Photo: Businessman shopping for shirts

Stock Photo: Businessman preparing report by himself outdoors

Featured Stock Photo – Yellow Erythrone Trout Lily with Claytonia Virginica

Stock Photo – Yellow Erythrone Trout Lily with Claytonia Virginica

So what have I been up to lately?

Well apart from publishing dozens of new photographs on Istock and Getty Images, I’ve been getting acquainted with Spring in my new backyard and shopping for plants and trying to make them grow in the rather sandy soil the construction has left us with.

These flowers are indigenous and amongst the first to pop up after the snow disappeared. They are everywhere in the woods and have spread also in the cleared areas, providing us with a nice show of yellow and white early flowers.

I’m working on a Spring lightbox today and will update this post with the proper link later.

Watch out Pinterest, I’m joining!

That’s the spirit! Click here to see my Pinterest boards.

Jokes aside, Istock sent us a memo a few weeks back that images on Pinterest now link back to the image pages so that people could easily share them and then license them. Always on the look out for more ways to promote my work, I’m thinking: “why not?” So today I did it and opened an account. The work I will post there will be personal favorites and I will write comments about how the photos came together underneath, so it will read a bit like a diary. This blog will go on, but will keep more of its focus on the images that are landmarks business-wise or stories about my distributors. So if you like my work and crave for more personal stories and making-of anecdotes, head to Pinterest, follow, share, tweet or FB about it, repin if you’re a Pinterest user and always remember that to download or license the work, just click on the image and then again in the pop-up window and then once on Istock, you know the drill…

Featured Stock Photograph – Senior Black Woman Thankful For Beautiful Florida Nature

Stock Photograph – Senior Black Woman Thankful For Beautiful Florida Nature

Still working on my Orlando Minilypse photos. I’m now passed 60 on my way to 100 after which I’ll move back to shots from last Summer, Berlin and the recent studio work I’ve neglected. I’m quite happy with a lot of the work and I’m hoping for the best sales-wise. This one was my first photograph of the Lypse to be selected for the Agency Collection, which is always a nice surprise, as it now can grab a few good sales at Getty Images. Jeanette, the model here, was quite a devout Christian and we started talking philosophy for a while, and finding happiness in little things, such as being there at that moment, in that light and environment. This concept just ensued naturally. I placed her so her arms would mimic the tree shapes in the background and did a number of exposures to get it right, as it is a tricky light to work with. Love the result!

Featured Stock Photo : Beautiful Young Ethnic Couple Having Fun Isolated

Stock Photo : Beautiful Young Ethnic Couple Having Fun Isolated

Here’s the shot that got the most views in its first week online. I really love the work of the models here. The female one, Melissa, was a real pro and gave me lots of great expressions, always true and carefree. I loved working with her in Orlando if only for a few minutes. William, the featured male in this shot, was able to to deliver a solid performance as well as I asked Melissa to fall repeatedly in his arms until he genuinely started to laugh. Good times.

Don’t forget to look at my Orlando lightbox on Istock or Photoshelter: it’s growing every day!

Welcome back Istockphoto

After enduring 6 months of turmoil, drama, confusion and disappointment, some of it passionately expressed on forums, surveys and blogs, it’s only fair that I write this positive note given what I’ve witnessed this month. Many of the technical glitches have disappeared, communication has greatly improved, important steps have been taken to correct corporate mistakes, the best match search engine is healing nicely from the heavy battering it took last Fall, inspection times are fast and the results fair, indexation of new images happens overnight, the connectors to Getty Images and the other partner sites are working at an amazing speed, the royalties from these sites are now reported automatically in a timely manner, and, best of all, sales have started increasing, at least in my case. There are still quite a few things for them to work on, but it is great to see things getting back to normal and even improving. I’m glad I toughed out the rough months and stayed exclusive.

Welcome back IStock. My motivation is now renewed.

Featured Stock Photograph – Insensitive coworker can’t help laughing at embarrassing colleague

Stock Photograph – Insensitive coworker can’t help laughing at embarrassing colleague

Since it has become a tradition, here is my first sale from the 2013 Orlando Minilypse. I was hoping for a different shot, since to my eyes this one is flawed, but it became my first sale overnight, with an extended license no less, less than 6 hours after being published on Istock. The models were great and the concept sound, but I felt so limited during the shoot by space and lighting that I couldn’t quite give it my usual esthetics. I normally would have framed wider, but there were distractions, lighting gear and nasty reflections all around this scene and so this is what I could do under the circumstances. AT the end of the day though, it worked enough for me to push it through. Good thing I did.