Striking Balance / Pro Gig: Renaissance Hotel

This will be my last blog for awhile, I am slammed. I’m fighting off getting sick which I really can’t afford right now. Sleeping odd hours to not sleeping at all. There are several things I’m striving to balance over the next 60 days and beyond.

STRIKING BALANCE

…between my professional and personal life.

My personal life has been completely zapped by my professional life but I recognize if I am to make this commitment, that’s the way it has to be as I begin this endeavor. It’s starting to blur into one and the same. But I’m going to need to take a day off somewhere.

…between my professional photography and fine art.

So. As many of you already know, I’m gearing up for my art show on March 26th. However, I’m also in preparation to turn my business LLC next month, developing and honing a new business plan, services, and marketing strategies. I’m currently broadening my network, working with my existing clients, attracting new ones, and increasing exposure for both my professional and fine art photography. In between, I’m attempting to maintain my presence in regional juried art exhibits. I perform my own website and marketing design and will be tweaking all of these in conjunction with my goals.

However, it is almost four months into 2010 and I’ve ventured to take photographs for fun…three times. That must change.

…between supply and demand.

Its seems my limited experience with photography is paralleling those with architecture. With buildings, thanks to HGTV and the like, clients thought architects could pull out a complete design in 30 minutes with commercials. Thanks to the advent of digital technology and its accessibility, many think because of fancy equipment, necessary quality photos somehow magically pop right out of the camera like a Kodak Instamatic. Running any creative business you’re always going to run into “Oh well this must be easy, you just click the button, right?”

The public at large doesn’t understand what creative professionals do, the education and experience necessary to do it, or the time required to perform such services. We’ve spent many decades futilely crying about it, for that’s the way it is and to much extent will remain. It is imperative that as creative professionals we not just merely manage clients and their expectations, but to efficiently provide high-quality services to keep our clients happy in a way that does not drive us penniless, insane, or both. If the general public completely understood what we did, then everyone would be doing it, right? That’s why they’re hiring us.

It’s the Achilles’ heel of any creative person. Why don’t they love meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee? We waste SO much time trying to impress on the general public to understand and love what we do, when it’s REALLY a matter of garnering respect. Respect cannot be gained by directly tinkering with public perception to adjust to who we are, but instead altering the way we manage our businesses and quantitatively illustrate the quality of what we provide. For we do not merely rely on our talent it takes a ton of hard work and dedication. The meager state of our economy is forcing this recognition and until we stop doing the same thing, it’s simply unrealistic to expect a different result.

Oh…hey.

I was going to show some photographs.

Last week I completed photography for Troy CSL Lighting at the Renaissance Hotel in North Hills in Raleigh, North Carolina. Their lighting was installed in the ballroom and the immediately adjacent exiting corridor.

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