March 28th, 2010
In recent months my photography has centered more and more around birds, I am fascinated by birds especially big birds. The first year of doing that, I was satisfied figuring out where I had seen some interesting birds and pursuing them at these sights. Soon, I and I believe my limited audience, grew tired of the same animals in the same settings. In order to appease them I would need to learn where I could find similar birds and in order to find them in new spots I would need to learn about them, in detail. I was at a loss, how does one learn such things? Then I found iBird Explorer, this iPhone app answered needs I wouldn’t have anticipated.
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Tags: bird identification, birding apps, iphone, photography tools
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March 27th, 2010
Recently I started focusing on my blog again, I started writing some posts and found that writing about the process was a useful place to start. I did this for a couple of reasons. First, I am planning on some serious photography this spring. Yes, I am planning on finding and capturing a bunch of cute baby animals etc… to herald in the best time to be outdoors. Additionally, I felt that by documenting some process I could better formalize a process for myself and any strategy is better than no strategy. I offer these posts in the hopes that you may find them helpful, see what I do, watch as I post results later. Pick up things that work for me, avoid things that don’t.
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Tags: photography, seo
Posted in SEO and Social Media | 4 Comments »
December 21st, 2009
I work as an IT Director, I help make complex technical choices for a largish company. I do that because not so long ago someone told me I needed to grow up, I was after all almost 30 years old. At the time, I was working at a zoo in Utica NY and surviving on peanuts (actually on Ramen, but I digress). In my mind I had already grown up and made a decision, I was going to do what I was passionate about and damn the consequences. A grown up would have considered the consequences of his choices and mapped out a path that included his passions in his life. Sigh…. I so mapped. No longer would I toil away caring for animals at minimal wages just so I could get the best photo opportunities.
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October 14th, 2009
When working on the basic skills, I used to tend to get a book, read the rules and get to work. This led to gradual incorporation of the rules at best. The reason that is slow is that you get no opportunity to “do over” or fix your mistakes. I think that most of us (who are not already pros) tend to pick up our cameras and go out to “shoot” with a vague idea of what we are going to shoot. Maybe, that is an exaggeration and we know what we are shooting that day but have no idea about next week. When we shoot like this, most shots are unique which is good in a way. However, when we are practicing the rule of thirds and we get a picture of a slam dunk dead center we may not get to try that shot again (unless we go to a basketball game on day 2).
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October 4th, 2009
You read that right, work for free. Photography, as with all other professions these days needs professional experience before anyone will hire you. I have a very good friend (Tony) who runs several charitable events in support of Rileys Childrens Hospital. Tony approached me a couple of months back to ask if I would participate in his charitable golf outing, I informed him that I have never played golf and that I would love to help in some way. Somewhere between him, myself and his girlfriend someone suggested that I do the photography and I agreed. I believe this may be one of the best things I have done in terms of starting my side career. I intend on approaching this project as though they are paying me thousands of dollars, as this will allow many people to see my photography and potentially help me with the exposure. Additionally, who could turn down a nice afternoon full of people and sun in exchange for helping a worthwhile cause. The Hackers Classic Golf Outing for Rileys Childrens Hospital is Sept 26, I will put more information about it up here soon.
Tags: charity, golf, photography, riley children's hospital
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October 4th, 2009
This is the first post in my blog, as such I should introduce myself and set the expectations for this ongoing project. My name is Karl Tatgenhorst and I am a semi professional wildlife photographer hailing from NW Indiana. The intent of my blog is to document my attempt to integrate a small side photography business into my rather dull and uneventful life as an IT professional, father of three children, home owner and keeper of three dogs and three cats plus being a husband. So, in my spare time I will be photographing wildlife, in more of my spare time I will blog, in the remainder of my spare time I will market my photos. I hope this proves interesting at least for me.
Photography has been a passion of mine for the last 12 years, specifically wildlife photography. Recently, I have decided to work on taking my photography to the next level in the hopes of subsidizing this expensive passion of mine. This blog will document all aspects of this pursuit and hopefully it will help some other people in similar circumstances as well as generate helpful comments from other readers.
Thank you for your time,
Karl
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