I want to give a SHOUT OUT to the anonymous person who nominated me for the BEST OF INDY, A-LIST local business list on WRTV.COM. I really appreciate the nomination!!

In order to win, I have to get VOTES, so if you think i’m decent, then PLEASE CLICK HERE and VOTE FOR ME!! Be sure to leave a COMMENT, too!

Anyway, THANKS AGAIN to the person who nominated me!! CLICK HERE TO VOTE FOR ME! (i feel like i’m running for high school class president!!) ha!!

I will be out of the office from Saturday, August 25th through Monday, September 3rd! I’m going to be in Canada being a part of the wedding of my two dearest and best friends, Melissa & Gary, at the stunning location pictured!! I cannot tell you how excited I am, there just aren’t enough words!!

I am lucky enough to be in the wedding, getting to partially photograph the event (they have about 50 photographers in attendance, along with an actual hired photographer, so we’re pretty well covered and I’m pleased to say that my job is small!!) and also enjoy some VERY much needed time of R&R!!! It’s been a a SUPER fun but crazy, insanely busy summer…so I’m very much looking forward to a little down time!! If possible, please contact me by EMAIL instead of phone (the whole phone thing in the mountains of Canada isn’t soo trustworthy!!)!! EMAIL: jess@jessicastrickland.com

I’ll be in touch SOON with LOTS of fun pictures!! In the meantime, happy end of summer!!

Wow, what a GREAT experience! I had a fantastic time in the twin cities and was SOOOO warmly welcomed by EVERYONE!! (pictured to the left is the group of nice people who took me out after for drinks!) The process of getting there was a bit of a challenge! I endured a major computer mess while attempting to transfer all of my presentation info over to my two laptops! It ZAPPED alot of info and resulted in me having to pull an all NIGHTER the night before the presentation!! THAT was LOTS of fun!! (THANKS to my brother, BEN who came to my rescue and helped me out!) I showed up bright eyed and bushy tailed (ha!) to the airport at 6am and was on my way! After some delays and typical airline frustration, I arrived in Minneapolis! It was SUCH a pleasant experience! Everyone was just soo kind and SOO complimentary!! I couldn’t believe the feedback I got…it was soo nice!!! I WARNED them that it was my first time AND that I was going off of almost NO sleep ANDDD to make matters even MORE fun, the AIR CONDITIONING was OUT in the AUDITORIUM where I gave my presentation and people were SOOOO HOT!! I felt AWFUL making them sit and listen to me and be MISERABLE!! I was afraid that the heat would put ME to sleep and they would be sitting there wondering WHAT they signed UP FOR!!! Much to my surprise, they ALL stayed through the heat and listened to me talk for 6 hours, stayed TOTALLY in tune the whole time, asked GREAT questions, had GREAT feedback and it was JUST GREAT!!!!

(we took alot of breaks, had some snacks, had dinner, etc!) It was SOO kind of them and I heard later that people don’t usually stay the whole time, so the fact that they DID stay and through the HEAT…was just SUCH an honor to me!!

I have some MAJOR thank you’s to pass out for some people who REALLY made this WHOLE experience soo wonderful!!

First, thank you to Amy Zellmer of Custom Creations Photography to asking me to come, helping make it a smooth process, driving around the airport a million times waiting for my majorly delayed flight to come in, treating me to a GREAT lunch, being my taxi service and MUCH MORE! Thank you to Mark Keifer of VIP Gallery for being in charge of the whole presentation, keeping me on track, setting everything up and for being very encouraging through the whole thing!! Thank you also to White House Custom Color for sponsoring me and for creating my beautiful programs!! I LOVE WHCC!! Thank you also to David Jones of David Jones Photography for being my BROTHA FROM ANOTHA MOTHA ;)!! Thank you also to David Grupa of David Grupa Portrait for buying me a MUCH needed COSMO (ok, maybe a cosmo and a shot of tequila!) after the whole seminar was OVER! (i forgot to say thank you to David, so THANKS David!!) I also have received very kind emails & voicemails from ALL of you and MANY of the seminar attendees and I THANK YOU all for you incredibly kind feedback!! I appreciate it SOO much!!

After the seminar, a HUGE storm rolled into the area and we were stuck in a restaurant until LATE…and I finally made it to my hotel and into bed at about 2:00am!! I had to peel myself out of bed at 5:00 to get to the airport in time for my flight! So, two nights with 3 collective hours of sleep is catching up with me!! In typical airline fashion, things were MAJORLY delayed and I rolled into my beloved Indianapolis several hours after I was scheduled to, so I caught a few ZZZ’s on the plane during the never ending DELAYS and all is fine and I’m about to head back out the door for a day of shoots!! It was all TOTALLY WORTH IT, though…and I had a SUCH A blast!!

THANK YOU MINNEAPOLIS & TCCPA!!! It was a GREAT experience and I genuinely appreciate your warmth, kindness and ALL that you did to make my experience GREAT!!

I was SOO honored when Amy Zellmer asked me to speak at the Twin Cities Professional Photographers Association conference in Minneapolis! She practically had to beg me…because I’m really more of a shooting photographer than a speaking photographer, but I finally agreed after some persuading!! I sort of overlooked the fact that I would be in the midst of the busy wedding season and so to halt all work for many days to prepare a daylong seminar and leave town would be a bit on the TOUGH side! DUH!! SILLY ME!!! It will work out fine…though and I’m SOOO grateful for the opportunity to speak to this great group of people!! Hopefully they will be patient with me!! I will be out of the office for Sunday, Monday & Tuesday! WISH ME LUCK!!

Soo…I’m a little behind the times right now!! I just figured out that BLUDOMAIN has a NEW blog…AND I haven’t bookmarked the new one yet, so I just stumbled upon the old one while doing a quick blog check from my bookmarks!

So, I happened to end up at the OLD blog…and I DISCOVERED Kailee’s MOST VIEWED BLOGS list…and to MY SURPRISE…I WAS on her LIST!!! SERIOUSLY!!! I was totally stunned and SOOO honored!!! Kailee…YOU ARE THE BEST!!! THANK YOU soo very much!!!! I’m SOO honored!!! (I stole the I love Kailee pic from Fred Egan’s Blog!!It was too cute, I could resist!! Fred is amazing, too!!)

As you may have heard, Canon finally figured out that they needed to UPDATE their MAIN ultra wide L zoom lens, the 16-35 2.8 L Lens!! I was soo glad to hear that they were updating that lens because it’s been a source of frustration in my work for quite some time!! The 16-35 was the very first L lens that I ever owned, now I own nearly every L lens made and I am obsessed with them!!

Anyway, I was always struggled with that lens and it’s softness issues. It’s known that a lens looses sharpness when shot as wide at 16mm, but I was to the point where I almost couldn’t use the lens because my images were soo soft. It also started really giving me the “soft focus” hazy effect on top of the fact that the images were out of focus and it was missing focus and backfocusing!

I sent it to Canon for a good thorough check up and they sent it back to me, saying all was great and what I was experiencing was “standard” for that lens! Well, that really was frustrating to me, especially for a lens that expensive! I do love the wide range of that lens, though…so I hated not being able to use it! So, when I heard that they FINALLY got the message that they needed to update the lens and announced the CANON 16-35 2.8 USM II L LENS, I was SOO HAPPY…and I was first in line to trade in the old lens for the new one!! The point of all of this is to tell you that i LOVE the new 16-35 USM II!! It’s WORLD’s better than the old lens and if you experienced the same issues that I described, go trade your old lens in for the new one!!! It costed me a few hundred bucks but it was WELLLLL worth it!! The lens is faster, TONS sharper and all around more bang for your buck!!!

Our great friend, DANE SANDERS needs HELP spreading the WORD that SIMPLEPHOTOMINUTE.com is CHANGING!!! He experienced some trouble with his hosting and basically, SIMPLEPHOTOMINUTE.com will be totally MIA any day now….and so he wants everyone to know, before the site that everyone has bookmarked DISAPPEARS…… that they can now go to DANESANDERS.NET for all SIMPLE PHOTO MINUTES!!!!

We all know and LOVE Simple Photo Minutes…and Dane is SERIOUSLY a ROCKSTAR in this industry for creating this AMAZING concept and sharing his wisdom, knowledge and helpful spirit with others VIA THE SIMPLEPHOTOMINUTE!! CLICK HERE to get the whole story on the situation, PLUS get all the NEW links, including DANESANDERS.NET!! SO…BOOKMARK WWW.DANESANDERS.NET

WE LOVE YOU DANE!!!

Soo, I’ve had a few people write me lately requesting some REAL feedback on the SHOOTSAC!! I appreciate that people want to know the facts on a product before investing in it!!

Ok, so here is my HONEST feedback!

I LOVE THE SHOOTSAC! I’m not just saying that because I know that Jess will read this, I’m saying it because it is TRUE!!! I have been searching for a product like this for 5 years! I really have! I was about to invest in a Crumpler or Timbuk2 bag or something similar because I needed a bag oriented towards the LENS CHANGING kind of photographer and I just couldn’t find a real camera bag that would do that, that was comfy and without tons of flaps or zippers!

THINGS I LOVE ABOUT THE SHOOTSAC:

1.The material of the shootsac is SOFT and makes the bag form to your hip and doesn’t bruise you!!
2. It’s comfortable to wear!!
3. It CONVENIENT and holds lots of lenses, plus other stuff! For me… 4 lenses, batteries, cf cards, a bottle of water, gum & business cards.
4. It looks great!!
5. It’s super functional and allows you to QUICKLY access lenses while shooting!! (the WHOLE point for ME!)
6. It can get fully wet and still be really functional and look good after it dries! (I recently learned that while shooting in the pouring rain!)
7. When full of lenses, the bad can sit up! So, when you finally get to eat dinner at a wedding, you can set the bag next to you on the floor, it will sit upright and it doesn’t look messy or dump all the stuff out!
8. That it has a cover that you can use and also take OFF! At times, I want the priority to be quick access and at other times, I want the priority to be looking professional and not having my lenses hang out…so I can have both!
9. You can have a standard black cover or a fancy cool cover! Again, at times, I want to look schmancy and at times, I don’t even want to be seen…so I can have the best of both worlds!

THINGS I HAVE YET TO LEARN TO LOVE ABOUT THE SHOOTSAC:

1. The lens slots are pretty tight and sometimes the lenses get stuck in them. This really isn’t a bad thing, though because I think it needs to be tight now because it could potentially stretch out after lots of use & wear and tear! So, I’ll probably add that to the “things I love” list after a year of the crazy wear & tearn that I manage to I put on my stuff!!
2. Not soo sure that it’s super functional for things beyond lenses and the stuff I put in it! I DID HEAR that you could fit a bare 5D Camera body in one of the slots but I haven’t tried it. I am also pretty sure that standard flash could fit in one of the slots…just haven’t tried that. After I try those things, I’ll probably add to the “things I love” list, too!!!
3. I fear that my 70-200 will stretch out the bag. I know Neoprene (the fabric it’s made of) is what wet suits are made of, so it would be tough to really stretch it out…but the lens is pretty big and I’m already noticing that it’s stretching it’s “home pouch” out a little bit. Again, that’s a contradiction to item 1 on this list, so I’m sure that with time, I’ll find a happy combo between the two. Maybe I just need to have a good rotation of lenses & pouches going and all will be fine!

I really do love this bag and would HIGHLY recommend it IF YOU ARE A LENS CHANGING kind of photographer OR like to have QUICK access to your stuff, while remaining COMFORTABLE AND FASHIONABLE!

Hope this helps!

MANY THANKS to Jessica Claire for being sweet enough to feature ME as the FIRST EVER “show me your sac” photographer!! “Show me your sac” is a new feature on her SHOOTSAC BLOG, showing photographers with their Shootsacs…and giving a blurp about them, their work, etc!!! I’m soo HONORED to be the first one!! Jess is an awesome person whose work is easily the best I have EVER seen! She’s SUCH an inspiration….and I think that the SHOOTSAC ROCKS!!!!! MUCH LOVE TO YOU, Jess…THANKS!! CLICK HERE TO CHECK OUT HER SUPER COOL SHOOTSAC BLOG!!!!

that my SHOOTSAC has FINALLY ARRIVED!??? YES!!!

It came yesterday and I wasn’t fully sure of what it was….and THEN….I opened the box and this bright green card caught my eye and I was soo excited!! SO, JUST an FYI…if you ordered your SHOOTSAC from Jessica Claire in Las Vegas then YOURS will arrive shortly TOOO!!!!

I decided to go with the black damask pattern for my first cover, since it goes with my black wedding suit really well, and it goes well with a white, bright yellow or bright green tee & jeans (my standard for shooting engagements & such)! I do plan to branch out into some more fun covers in the future!! I also appreciate the standard black cover that comes with it…for those times when you really don’t want to draw too much attention to yourself! I’m headed to Ohio tomorrow for an engagement shoot and then down to Southern Indiana on Saturday for a wedding, so I will get lots of opportunities to use it! Can’t wait! I still think this was SUCH a great idea and I’m soo glad Jessica Claire created it because I have been in search of something JUST like this for a LONG time!! THANKS JESS!! You are GREAT!!!:)