Photography articles

Copyright (c) 2010 Red Apple Auctions LLC

Three of my auction fundraisers this past year have had professional portraits offered on-site. The photo offers guests a remembrance of your benefit auction.

Portrait photography works especially well for charity auctions which tend to have co-workers attending, such as corporate and hospital foundations. Guests look spiffy, so the photos show employees in their best light (all the better, considering those photos may show up on the company intranet).

This auction idea works for four reasons:

- The activity allows company departments and smaller teams of co-workers to have their photo taken together, which is a nice touch.

- A photo with a traditional background seems more professional with your co-workers than, for instance, a backdrop of Las Vegas.

- The photos allow for more flexibility later, such as if the company’s foundation wanted to include a photo of the work team in an issue of the company newsletter, or even in a proposal for a prospective client.

- When individuals have a portrait taken, the finished headshot can be used for business cards or on the external company website.

Near the entrance to the silent auction is usually the best location for the photography station. The photographer will show guests where to stand and offer basic instructions to capture the best angle and shot. For group photos, the photographer often takes a hands-on approach to ensuring everyone is in the photograph. Guests are given a 4″x6″ photo, often housed in a cardstock black frame.

The developed photos are displayed on a table near the check-out area so guests can take their photo as they leave. Photos with groups of people are developed multiple times so each person in the photo can take a copy home.

In short, this is a good activity for fundraising auctions. The big perk is that you can use those photos in a multi-purpose way long after the event is finished.

A second photo option for charity auctions

I read an article from BizBash’s newsletter entitled “The Photo Booth That Can Capture the Whole Party.” http://www.bizbash.com/newyork/content/editorial/16574_a_photo_booth_that_can_capture_the_whole_party.php It talks about a new portable photo-booth — AKA, the Boothomatic — which rolls around the party, enabling guests to take photos wherever they might be.

After reading the short article and checking out the photo, here are my immediate thoughts as to whether the Boothomatic would work in a benefit auction environment.

My first thought is that this is something for a younger crowd. I can see as where Generation Y or Generation Z would totally get into this! But I don’t envision most of the guests at my benefit auction (age 40+) comfortably jumping in front of the booth without encouragement from an outgoing photographer.

I’m still unclear after reading the article as to whether a photographer supervises the booth. If he does — and if that photographer is a gregarious type who can comfortably corral guests for photos — this would work. But if the booth is not supervised, my crowds would ignore it.

In many hotels, the Boothmatic would work fine. But if the auction is to be held in an unusual facility — such as a historic home or even an outdoor garden — I’d consider alternative forms of entertainment. You’ll want a venue (and a floor!) that allows the booth to roll unencumbered.

I love that photographs of the event are available for download from a website! They also offer customized packages. My only concern is that — once again — some of my less savvy older guests won’t understand how to download photos from a site. Those same guests *would* take home a photo of themselves if it’s printed onsite, but they would be less likely to check a website in the days following the gala.

The price in New York is apparently $2500 for a 4-hour rental. I don’t know NYC rates well enough to gauge if this is in-line with other forms of photo entertainment or not. But given that there are no printed photographs available to guests onsite, I would hope that the Boothomatic would be less in price than something, say, like portrait photography.

You can gather in plenty of inspirations for your calendar printing. With this ripe season where you can send out your very own calendars as gifts and even turn them into a promotional material for clients in the coming New Year, there really isn’t anything stopping you.

Acquiring design ideas for themes and images can be quite hard, especially if you don’t have a concept to begin with. Planning your calendars can be just as simple or hard. Remember to always assess how you want to use your calendars, the response you can gather from them and so on.

If you want calendars to gratify your personal hobbies and interests, all you need to come up with is a concept or theme. If you need a calendar that would do well to build up your image, augment your sales or other, then it may do well for you to sit down and think it over.

Nevertheless, here are some ideas you can use for your calendars that are more or less popularized by noted artists, the pop culture and more.

Themes for Your Calendars

1. Get inspiration from the noted photographer Anne Geddes. If you are into baby portraits or your business and interests are aligned to it, then create or shoot portraits that presents babies in cute dresses.

For personal family affairs, why not shoot your very own babies and toddlers. This would make as a great replacement for Christmas cards you send out.

2. Spoof. If you have a big family or are involved with different organizations, you can very well create group pictures or images that are injected with a bit of humor. You can spoof other notable television series. Make families pose as the Simpsons of the Family Guy among others.

This is not only a memorable calendar you can look back to, but an overall activity that would be great for the holidays.

3. More than including photos or portraits of groups of people, it is better to picture people in actions. Groups or organizations can create a documentary of past accomplishments within the year. Highlight important events. Make sure to use photos that take you or your group out from the usual environment. Let your audiences know that you are actually out there and doing something.

4. If you want a trip down memory lane, this idea may be most useful for high school reunions. You can use images on the most memorable television series of your time. Put up images of actors that were the rave back in the day. Include your own high school pictures or those events that were highlighted in your year book.

5. If you are into cooking or culinary arts, a calendar with its generous space would also serve to be a great cookbook in one. Highlight a special dish and use it as your portrait. Leave enough room to give out the recipe and instruction.

6. With the previous idea, use the same concepts for other interests, hobbies or activities. Show your audience with an end product they can come up with. This can be applicable from arts and crafts, gardening, beading, and more.

Use these calendar printing ideas for your own use and create more inventive ways for a calendar that will last all year long.

Color poster printing is not all about delivering its message. A good poster print not only gives that special message to people. It also delivers them in a way that really sticks to the memory of people. If people can remember your color posters vividly even after a few months of looking at them, then you will have a powerful poster that stuck to people along with its crucial poster marketing message.

If you have yet to achieve this in your own color poster printing, then you might be interested to know a few great tips that should definitely make your custom posters more memorable. With all of these special poster printing tips combined, there should be no doubt that people will remember your posters without exception, “sticking” into their minds so to speak. So read on and digest all the information that you can.

Beyond picture portraits. When it comes to making your color posters stick to people, you must always remember to go beyond picture portraits. You might think that a beautiful picture of a product, or a portrait picture of people is enough for poster printing, but the truth is, this is not as memorable to most.

What really sells though are pictures that go beyond just a display of the image. Images and photographs that have a story or have some sort of action going on is a lot more memorable since people understand and empathize with events and situations more than just plain portraits. So make sure that you go beyond portraits and use images that have more story and action to make your color posters more memorable.

Words that stick. Words are also a vital part in getting a poster to be remembered. You of course will not want to just “state” your poster message. You want it to be creative enough and powerful enough so that people will want to repeat it or tell it to people. So try to use rhyming slogans, creative word puns, or just something that really has great inner meaning for people. The more the text relates and rings to people, the better these words will stick, and by effect your color posters will stick with them as well.

Beyond common inks. On the more visual side of things, you can make your custom posters more memorable by going beyond common inks. Using other kinds or special inks like glossy inks, metallic inks and even glow in the dark inks will contribute to the identity and originality of your poster designs. With glinting, gleaming and glowing color posters, people will surely remember your concept for a time. So if possible, try to have your posters printed with special inks.

More than just printing paper. You can also go beyond the usual poster printing paper to make your posters more memorable. Besides using thicker poster paper, you might want to invest in paper materials with special glossy coatings. You can even go beyond actual paper itself and print plastic color posters if you want. All of these elements should improve the overall look of the poster, making it look more expensive, impressive and of course memorable.

Repeated exposure. Lastly, your posters can get more easily remembered if you just expose them all the time to people. So do not just do a quick one week promotion with posters in a limited area. Always go for the long view and expose your color posters one month or more in the widest areas that you can. With people constantly seeing your color posters for a time, they will slowly remember as they pass them by day after day.

Now you know how to make your color posters stick to people all the time. This should be a great help to your poster marketing campaign.

For comments and inquiries about the article visit: Color Poster Printing