Kate Hopewell-Smith believes that the more confident you are, the better photographer you'll become. But she worries about the lack of confidence in our industry, and wonders how many photographers are considering whether to carry on or not… From my experience meeting and communicating with lots of photographers there is a serious problem out there with lack of confidence, which for some can become quite debilitating. In fact I describe it as an “epidemic” –extremely prevalent, widespread. I read a lot of photography magazines but I can’t recall ever To View More >>

As told to Cate Scaglione - Life As Fine Art “There is a space between imagination… and attainment…that may only be traversed by… longing.” ― Khalil Gibran, Sand and Foam The story of Cindy Harter Sims is about more than going from part-time hobbyist to full time award-winning photographer. Cindy’s is a tale about longing for all that life has to offer. Photography just happened to be her way of finding it. There is something about an image by Cindy Harter Sims. It’s an inexplicable surge of emotions that make you feel as if you’re To View More >>

I'm a little embarrassed to admit this but I've never read a business book. Not really. I've skirted around them … flicked through them … put them back on the shelf. Stephen on the other hand has shelves of them. He reads them and fills me in on the concepts. It's worked for many years :-) So a friend comes for the weekend and hands me this book … tells me I MUST read it: The Freaks Shall Inherit the Earth by Chris Brogan, one of Stephen’s favourites. I think it's the title that grabbed me. I’ve always felt we've bordered on the right side of being freaks. To View More >>

I have a friend going back to work full time after working part time for six years to raise his kids. Some weeks ago he phoned me, incredibly disheartened after many job applications and many knock backs. No one wanted him. I encouraged him to stop treating each job interview as make or break, and to start playing. To apply for jobs he thought he couldn't get. At salary ranges he thought he couldn't justify. To mix it up, try something different each time and see what worked. The trick, I said, was to remember that his next interviewer would know nothing about his past interviews, and it wouldn't To View More >>

A little over 6 years ago I returned to my office after a meeting with staff to introduce a design audit and branding project. My phone rang and a man introduced himself and said he was from Apple. At first I thought I was being punked - all through the presentation the consultants had compared us to, and suggested we benchmark ourselves against, not our competitors, but great companies like Apple. This gentleman proceeded to tell me he was from Cupertino and that his boss was Steve Jobs. I tried to act as if I took calls like this everyday. He said they wanted to develop a premium book, and would To View More >>

We're constantly reinventing Queensberry to make things better, simpler, faster and more creative. In the mid-1990s we threw away the rule book and started making our albums to order. Computer-driven mat-cutters meant our clients could design books to suit their photography, rather than making their photographs fit the books. It had never been done before. In 2000 we cut out the middle-man and began developing the world’s only worldwide door-to-door service to professional photographers. In 2001 we released Photojunction. In 2003 we were pioneers in the album printing business. (We’re still To View More >>

Good design is a big part of the Queensberry way, so may we introduce Anna Matsuoka, one of our product designers. Anna M grew up in the beautiful historic city of Kamakura in Tokyo, which maybe explains her very strong focus on materials and the preservation of history. She studied curatorial and fine arts at the Tama Art University in Japan. Issey Miyake studied at the same university, which has a strong emphasis on the art of choosing and working with materials. While at TAU Anna also did an Internship at the Tokyo National Museum where she studied how to present artifacts. After moving to New To View More >>

Click here to watch the video on Vimeo. My father's family came from Westhoughton, only twenty miles or so from where Brett and Kristie Harkness have their studio in the North of England, so we're practically neighbours. Brett's a northerner born and bred (Newcastle), but Kristie's from Saskatchewan, where the population density is only slightly more than that of New Zealand supporters at an English rugby match. In the first of a two-part interview Kristie and Brett tell Ian how they got from working on a cruise ship to their high end studio, and: learning the business side of photography; letting To View More >>

I daren't start this blog with 'In my day ... things were different!' In my day 'We' were the difference ... we were the new generation biting at the heals of 'the old guard'. There was always going to be a new generation coming in to replace what we did. Several things happened in the wedding industry when I was starting up. People started looking for images that were less formal and more photojournalistic, and people started asking for their negatives. Enter Generation 2.0, invigorated and empowered by the digital revolution. Camera makers have made it easier for our audience to be better aligned To View More >>

We don't know many people who know their way around Photojunction better than Chip Gillespie. Especially when it comes to shortcuts. We call him a Power User. (He's also the founder of Blogstomp, which is well worth checking out.) 1) You're a PJ power user – how long have you been using Photojunction and what attracted you to it in the first place? I have been using PhotoJunction for a little over a year. To be truthful, I was skeptical at first as I had what I believed to be a near-perfect album design process using Photoshop. On the recommendation of a friend and fellow photographer/designer, To View More >>