Vegas Photography Blog

This is perhaps my most ambitious blog topic to date. To start the new year of 2012 I wanted to write about a topic to which I’ve been receiving a large number of emails about lately. The most recent of which arrived in my Inbox last month. Melinda from Atlantic City wrote, “Hi Adam. My husband and I are coming to Las Vegas next Spring for our anniversary and I want to hire you to take some photos of us around the Strip while we are there. I’m sold on your work but my husband has said that we have a good point-and-shoot camera we will be taking with us so what is the value of hiring a professional photographer? Please help me sell him on this!”

It’s an excellent question Melinda! While I can go on and on about the technical details of professional equipment and my years of experience in photography, I thought it would be best to actually show you the difference. To do so, I decided to conduct an experiment with the sole purpose of answering this question. To do so I setup a series of photo shoots up and down the Las Vegas Strip, just as I do with the many dozens of couples, birthday parties, and bachelor/bachelorette parties I shoot all year long. This time, I made use of a professional model as my muse.
 

Model Crystel Rivera - Adam Sternberg Photography of Las Vegas - www.shotbyadam.com

This is Crystel Rivera. She is a professional model here in Las Vegas and perhaps one of the most talented and professional ones I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. A Las Vegas native, Crystel started go-go dancing in the major casino nightclubs when she was 18 and fell into modeling at the same time. She has been featured in FHM Magazine, on Penn & Teller’s show “BS!” on Showtime, and currently works as a Playboy Bunny at the Palms Hotel & Casino. (At the time of this blog, Crystel is redoing  her website but if you are interested in booking her for an event or photo shoot, you can do so via email at crystelrivera@hotmail.com).  

To conduct the experiment I would photograph Crystel in different poses in different locations. While I do have lots of high-end, portable lighting equipment which I frequently use on the Strip, I decided to keep this simple and only shoot Crystel with the photographic equipment I could carry in a camera bag.

Here is the fun part of the experiment comes in. I also brought along a small, point-and-shoot camera as well. Specifically the Samsung ST100. It’s an outstanding little camera I bought for my wife and it takes wonderful photos. Amazon.com gives it a 4.5 out of 5 stars and while we paid much more for it over a year ago when it was new, it currently sells for $234.94, making it a mid-priced camera it its class.

Samsung Point & Shoot camera used for my experiment

Here are the rules I set for this experiment. So that I can remain an impartial person in this test, I handed the point-and-shoot camera  to a complete stranger on the street and asked them to photograph Crystel. These strangers would give her direction to pose and then take as many photos as they liked until they were satisfied with the results. They would take her photo using fully automatic settings in the point-and-shoot, just as the vast majority of people do when they use their own cameras on vacation. I would then go and take a photo of my own of Crystel in the same location but utilize my over 15 years of experience in working with models and using top-notch professional camera gear to get my own result. Crystel was instructed not to add too many creative poses for the different photographers but to take direction from whomever was shooting her to get the resulting photos. So I present to you the side-by-side comparison of both shots in each location. One shot by an amateur with amateur equipment, one shot with a professional with professional equipment. All the "Before" photos were left as-is, as your average person does not have access to advanced retouching tools as I do such as Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop, as well as all the other plugins, filters, and after effect tools. What you will see first is the image captured by the amateur followed by the photo taken by myself and retouched as if it were one of my clients. In some cases you'll see more than one image from me as I was able to get a bit more creative in the results from some locations. Let’s take a look at the results!

PHOTOS AT BELLAGIO

Photo by Nichole of Los Angeles, California

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Mark of San Diego, CA

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

PHOTOS AT CAESARS PALACE

Photo by Mik of the Netherlands

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Melanie of Long Island, NY

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Jonathan of Reno, NV

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

PHOTOS AT THE MIRAGE

Photo by Jules of Seattle, WA

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

THE VENETIAN

Photo by Sam of Phoenix, AZ

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

THE "WELCOME TO LAS VEGAS" SIGN

Photo by Marteen of Dallas, TX

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Larie of Marselle, France

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

DOWNTOWN LAS VEGAS – FREMONT STREET EXPERIENCE

Photo by Lawrence of Atlanta, GA

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Mariella of Mexico City, Mexico

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Matt of Tuscon, AZ

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

Photo by Breena of Las Angeles, CA

Photo by Adam Sternberg Photography

The photos pretty much explain my point for me. The ones with the Samsung point-and-shoot camera took some fairly good photos at times, but in most cases the images were washed out, devoid of any emotion or depth, or just created bad photographs. I was recently doing a photo shoot for the television show Vegas Strip (seen on TruTV) and I was shooting some photos of one of Las Vegas' Finest for the show. I got some really creative shots with him and his squad car on the Strip and when I showed him what I shot in the camera he said, "Wow, your camera takes really good photos" to which I responded with, "Yeah, and the guy behind it had a little something to do with it too" and we had a good laugh. Part of the reason I wanted to hand the smaller camera over to a stranger on the street was to prove that many people take snapshots whereas a professional photographer with years of experience knows how to take a camera and capture a moment…create a memory as it were.

With the advancements of digital photography, picture-taking is more prevalent in society now than ever before. Chances are that if you probably have a camera in your mobile phone plus an additional camera somewhere in your home. Most people are familiar with posting their photos to Flickr or Facebook nowadays without even a second thought. And while we live in a society of shutterbugs, many people often lose sight in the importance of hiring a professional photographer for their events, their businesses, or even their vacations. I often tell my clients that a person with a cell phone creates a fun photo for Facebook, a professsional photographer creates something to hang on the wall.

[EPILOGUE]

Before writing this blog, I sent these photos over to Melinda, the woman from Atlantic City I mentioned in the opening of this blog entry and she showed them to her husband. We are now booked to shoot her Anniversary photos in April. If you are coming to Las Vegas for any important event or even just to capture some awesome souvenir photos on the Strip, email me at adam@shotbyadam.com or call me directly at 702-204-1740 for questions and availability.

Before I was born my father owned a machine shop in Las Vegas in the late 60’s. Located at Charleston and Main St. it was a heavy industrial area reserved primarily for metal fabrication companies, auto parts stores, and warehouses, Whoever would have thought that 45 years later this would be come the Arts District of Las Vegas? I can assure you, my father never saw it coming.

Today, the area is now brimming with cool restaurants, art galleries, hipster hangout bars, small theaters, and is a central hub for the growing trend of mobile food trucks serving everything from Hawaiian hamburgers to “Ballwiches” (yep, that’s not a joke). A little over a year ago, a friend of mine told me of this awesome new condo he was renting in the Soho Towers…a newer condo tower built right on Las Vegas Blvd. (The Strip) and Charleston Blvd…right in the heart of the Arts District. His 14th floor view of the  Las Vegas valley is nothing short of spectacular but even more cool than that is his close proximity to all the new, fun happenings in Vegas for those tuned-in to the city’s new heartbeat. Downstairs, there is a series of small retail shops which are now just starting to populate the building. There’s a cool hair salon and even Resnick’s, a mini-market specializing in great prepared foods, organic offerings, and even, on occasion, a life DJ mixing the latest sounds…in a grocery store. Yep, this area is just, plain, cool.

So one day I get a txt message from my friend who resides there and he attaches a few photos of this new bar that opened in the building…The Lady Silvia (900, Las Vegas Blvd., South). This place was cool…I mean REALLY cool. As a professional photographer I’m always looking at places I go to and paint a scene in my mind of what I can do with it for a creative photo shoot or location for a corporate client in need of something unique. My brain is a never ending database of locations to shoot in. Yep, that’s how us goofy photographers’ brains work. So while I had never seen this place up close, the photos on my cell phone sold me that it was just a cool place to check out one day. Named after the mother of owner Sam Cherry’s business mentor, the lounge/bar is modeled after an old world library and is very unique, especially for Vegas.

Last October I wrote a blog about a recent photo shoot I did with two awesome models, Mariah and Madelon, over at the Cleveland Clinic here in Las Vegas. To day it’s one of my most read blog entries (big shock…it features two gorgeous models wearing super hero outfits…go figure?). Ever since I did that shoot, I’ve been booked for no less than two dozen other cosplay shoots. I never realized there was such a demand for people wanting to have photos taken of themselves in costume but with the huge popularity of the hobby and events like ComicCon promoting this, it doesn’t surprise me any longer.

Batgirl & Robin photos, circa 2010

One such shoot I was booked for came from a woman named Lisa that wanted to do a shoot as a birthday gift for her husband who used to be an avid comic book fan. If you were to take a snapshot of Lisa’s life today you’d see a woman who’s a mother working in a professional, white-collar, nine-to-five job. Hardly the kind of person you’d expect to be hiring a professional photographer for a cosplay shoot but in Lisa’s previous life some years ago, she was a professional model. Now it all makes sense. She had a professional vinyl “Harley Quinn” costume made custom for her by a well known costume designer and was dying to get some photos of her in it. This outfit was nothing short of amazing. For those of you not familiar with Harley Quinn, she is the psycho girlfriend of The Joker in the Batman series. We went into a studio and got some killer shots for which she has since told me were some of the best pictures of her she’s ever gotten. My already over-inflated ego just got a bit larger.

Anyone who ever says that modeling isn't difficult has never met Lisa!

After the shoot she told me that she was hungry for more and said that if I ever wanted to do a larger, more complex cosplay shoot that she’d really want in. In addition, she also had other friends who might want to get involved in it too. This got me to thinking, how fun would it be to do a photo shoot with all of the major players from Gotham City? VERY fun. The question is, who could I get involved and where could I shoot it? This would require a bit of thought. I didn’t want to just hire models, I wanted to find people who trusted in my vision to create something fun just for the hell of it and to get some fun shots in their portfolio. A fellow photographer friend of mine recently referred to me as a “Jack of All Trades Photographer” to which I had to chuckle and agree with. He specializes in more commercial shoots but I tend to bringing a creative edge to photo shoots in ways many people never thought possible. In the last three months I’ve been hired to shoot for a real estate company needing pictures of their properties for their website (you’d be shocked at how creative of a mind you need to make photos of an office building look exciting), a wedding where we shot paintballs at the bride and groom, and even a photo shoot of a tattooed model in a ghost town to submit to magazines. Yep, if you can think of it, I’ve probably shot it at some point in the last 15 years. Because I’m frequently booked for professional shoots, I rarely have time to do what the industry refers to as a “TFP” shoot (Trade for Photos/Prints). This is where everyone involved donates their time and energy in an effort to create photos that will benefit each other. I turn down offers for these types of shoots several times a week but occasionally an idea pops into my head that makes a TFP shoot worth while. Different photographers have different opinions on TFP shoots but it’s always been my belief that, if done well, a creative TFP shoot helps to stir up the creative juices once in a while and I know that doing a TFP photo shoot of a model (Jessenia Fernandez) screaming in a tattoo parlor while “Painless Wayne” paints her helps to make me a better photographer when it comes to shooting a car for a rental car company. Creativity leads to creativity.

Green Lamborghinis and "Painless Wayne", welcome to Las Vegas!

Now I’m on a mission to create a shoot before Halloween of some sort of fun, cosplay shoot. The first person I call is Mariah…my Batgirl from the shoot a year prior. I love working with Mariah as she’s always a great sport and has a creative attitude that always yields photos that are way better than you can imagine. There is a reason you see Mariah in my portfolio in several locations! I called her up and asked if she’d be interested in doing another TFP shoot as “Batgirl”. “Are you kidding? I’m in! I even have some time off from school soon!” (Mariah is studying to get her Masters degree right now). Perfect, now a call to Madelon…my Robin from the prior shoot. She did such a great job I wanted to offer it to her first in this new shoot concept of mine. Madelon is the kind of model that a camera just loves. You can’t take a bad picture of this girl and her body of work is reflective of this. She has a very long list of magazines and commercial projects she’s shot for. A full-time student as well, she’s now foraying into movies now having gotten a part in an independent film now being shot in Vegas. I fire off an email to her and got an immediate response saying she’d love to be part of it. YES!

I get back on the phone with Lisa, the Harley Quinn. I tell her that I’ve got a Batgirl and Robin who want to do a shoot and she tells me she wants in, plus she knows a model who would be a perfect Cat Woman…AWESOME! Now all I needed was a “Joker”, but that would make it an odd-numbered bunch so I needed to think about a sixth model as well to round out the group. Hmmmmm…oh yeah, a Poison Ivy would be a good addition to this group, but who could I get for this? Then it hit me…SARAH JANE! Sarah is a model like none other. I did a shoot with her as a post-apocalyptic showgirl in Vegas earlier this year. Truly, the weirder the shoot, the more excited Sarah is to be part of it. In addition to modeling, she’s also a photographer and writer for one of the local magazines. A self-proclaimed addict to “shoes and wigs” she’d be perfect for this. I called her up and pitched her the idea. She laughed and said she was in. Now I just needed a Joker and a place to shoot. Lisa’s husband actually had a Joker costume but he unfortunately was out of town in the window of time we had to shoot this so that wasn’t going to work. Then it hit me…some time ago I did a shoot for Mariah and her boyfriend, Robert, who had never modeled before in his life. An ex-Marine, he was really new to all this. When I did the couple shoot for them, I was impressed at how easy he was to work with and he has a great look too. The energy the two of them share on camera is awesome. I asked Mariah if she thought he’d be game for being a Joker. After a quick consult with him, he said he’d love to participate!

Robert and Mariah on a prior shoot. Wow these two are great to work with!

So now everyone was researching makup, costume designs, poses, character personalities, etc. I even found a professional makup artist, Janet Chavez, who wanted to participate in this shoot to help Robert become "The Joker" so things were coming together nicely. This was going to be a great shoot…but where were we going to have it?

I didn’t want this to look like a sterile studio shoot; I really wanted it to have a background that was really unique. My wife Bethany fully admits that she couldn’t take a good photo to save her life, but she does have a really creative mind when it comes to these goofy projects of mine. She suggested I shoot it in a bar in town. But not any bar, it had to be some place COOL. There are a few lounges in town we frequent that I thought would make for a great backdrop and I contacted all of them. Some never got back to me, some had this theory that I was actually going to shoot porn in their club and turned me down, and some just didn’t have a clue what I was asking of them. The truth is, there are so many places in Vegas to get great photos. Seriously, if you’re coming to Vegas from out of town and have a camera, you’ll see very quickly that this city is a canvas for fun photos unlike any other place in the world. Even though I’ve been booked to do professional shoots in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, London, Sydney, Melbourne, and countless more countries and cities around the U.S., Las Vegas is still my favorite place in the world to get photos. The opportunities here are endless if you know where to look, even if it’s just fun snapshots in some very cool places.

So while I’m on my hunt for a location, my window of opportunity to do this shoot was rapidly closing. Rounding up six different models and a makeup artist to do a shoot at the same time is like herding cats. Then it hit me….THE LADY SILVIA. I got the name of one of the the owners and I pitched him my idea. The beauty behind working with creative people is that they understand creative ideas and the benefits therein…I was elated when Grant agreed to let us shoot in his location in exchange for getting photos of the place from the shoot. YES! Here’s the catch though, I was going into this blind. I still had never seen the place for myself, so this was a pretty big gamble. All my expectations of this place were based on some blurry iPhone photos. Maybe I needed to reconnoiter this place before I got my hopes up too high. That night I went to the bar to check it out. The moment I walked in I knew this place was beyond perfect. There was a live DJ mixing tunes from a booth in the back. The walls were adorned with literally thousands of cool, old books. The furniture was something right out of a movie set and the black-and-white tiled floors and victorian light fixtures made this one of the coolest looking bars I’ve ever seen. The place was packed and the staff was friendly and created an environment conducive to such a great looking location. Everything in this place just clicked, and it’s location, right in the Arts District couldn’t have been more appropriate. This place was a home run!

The Lady Silvia. A cooler Vegas hangout I haven't seen in a very long time!

Two days later before the bar opened for business, I arrived and started setting up lights. I turned this bar into my own photography studio and not long thereafter the models started showing up. First it was Lisa and Jes…my Harley Quinn and Cat Woman. They would take the longest time to get get into their complex costumes and do makeup so they went right to work and started to get ready. Madelon was next. She left to go change into costume and do makeup as well. Then Sarah arrived and entered the place in full costume and makeup. When I saw her in the green costume with her hair dyed red and pulled up my jaw hit the floor. My wife tagged along on this shoot as I really needed an assistant on a project this big. She even commented that Sarah looked the part better than anyone could have ever expected. People couldn’t stop commenting about her.

Sarah Jane IS Poison Ivy!
 

Madelon and Robert then arrived and Robert went right into another room to start on his makeup which we all knew would take some time. An hour later, everyone was ready to go and we had a team of models who looked nothing short of spectacular. We started shooting and the results we got were just fantastic. After we got the shots we needed, we had to rush to put the place back to the way we found it. After all, this WAS a business we were in, and the place was due to open soon. We were all having so much fun it was difficult to stop…everyone was in costume and wanted to shoot more and more and more. With what little time we had, we kept shooting until the very last minute we could. Once all my gear was packed and the doors opened, we all sat around and had a few drinks to celebrate a successful shoot. One thing is very true…the bartenders at The Lady Silvia sure know how to mix a drink!

After the shoot. Even super heros and villains need a break once in a while!

So after the shoot, I had a few local magazines that were interested in using some of them for a Halloween issue but due to deadlines for publication, they never got published. The idea for this shoot was great, the timing, not so much. Still though, the resulting photos below are what we made. It’s this level of creativity of all involved that makes those involved experts at what they do. Special thanks and shout-outs to all involved: Mariah McBride (Batgirl), Robert Runkle (Joker), Madelon Cullen (Robin), Sarah Jane Woodall (Poison Ivy), Lisa J (Harley Quinn), Jes Castor (Cat Woman).

Remember too, that creative thinkers get creative results where others cannot. To book your next photo shoot, email me at adam@shotbyadam.com or call me direct at 702-204-1740. Of course, for details and to see my complete portfolio, please visit my website at www.shotbyadam.com.

A Vegas native, you’d think that after all these years I’d be used to the heat here? Just yesterday, the Las Vegas Review Journal posted an article stating that the recent temperature of 111 degrees has set a new Vegas record. Even though we are approaching September, the heat in Sin City is showing no signs of getting cooler any time soon.

This past weekend I had a very weird experience shooting in the heat that was quite odd. I was on a shoot out at the Eldorado Canyon ghost town doing a shoot with a lovely tattooed model, Krystal, for a magazine submission (photos from the shoot coming soon to my Facebook Fan Page). Temperatures out there usually parallel the Las Vegas thermometer readings pretty close and it was a real hot one, that’s for sure. Planning ahead, I packed a cooler with several ice-cold bottles of water. When I arrived with the model at around 5 in the afternoon, we did some location scouting and I then began to setup equipment while she went to change clothes. An hour later, I had already gone through two liters of water and I still felt dehydrated so I reached for a third 1-liter bottle and started slamming that one down. We moved on to another spot, did some more shooting, got some great shots, and were moving to another location. I stopped over at my car, changed lenses, and grabbed another bottle of water. Prone to getting headaches from dehydration, I really thought I was doing the right thing…how wrong I was!

I downed bottle #4 and as I started walking, I felt a little dizzy and a little nauseous. I figured I wasn’t drinking enough and was just a little dried out so I setup for the next shoot and waited for the model to come back. I’m standing next to one of my light-stands and I started to feel worse and worse by the minute. Krystal came back and when she looked at me she jokingly said, "You don’t look so hot…you’re not going to die on me, are you?" In that moment, I have to admit, I wasn’t exactly sure how to answer that question! Was I having a heart attack? Was I ill from something I ate earlier? What in the world was wrong with me? I didn’t know what it was, but I knew something wasn’t right. I told her I just needed to sit down for a minute as the heat was probably getting to me. She asked if my car was unlocked and told me to relax for a minute and she’d go get me some water. By the time she returned, i started to feel better. I got up, gladly took the water bottle from her, and started chugging some more.

We started to shoot again and I was feeling just fine. As we were finishing with this set I went from feeling fine to feeling drunk in a matter of seconds. I had difficulty standing, it was challenging just to stay focused and I felt like a truck hit me. We started moving equipment over to our last shoot location and I was really struggling. I managed to pull it together and we did our last shoot with success. Exhausted, I walked back to the car and Krystal was a huge help carrying a few items for me. I loaded up the car and began the 1 hour drive back to Vegas. Ten minutes down the road I started feeling sick again…REAL sick. I was approaching the Railroad Pass casino on I-95 and I pulled into the parking lot. Was I just tired from working a lot of late hours or was it the heat? A million things were running around in my head but I wasn’t feeling all that much better sitting in the car. Trying to think about what my best course of action would be, it hit me. I had a friend who is a retired family doctor so I gave him a call. I explained I was on a photo shoot, it was really hot out and I was doing my best to stay hydrated and I must have gotten sick from the heat so I needed to know what I should do next. I’ve had Heat Exhaustion before but this was very different.

"You mentioned you were drinking lots of water, right" said Dr. Michael. "Yes…I’ve been drinking water like a fish!" "Hmmmmm…how much water and in what period of time?" he said. I told him about 5 liters of water in 2 1/2 hours. "Oh, this is simple, you have water intoxication." Water intoxication? What in the world is that????  Wikipedia’s reference on the topic states it is "a potentially fatal disturbance in brain functions that results when the normal balance of electrolytes in the body is pushed outside of safe limits by over-consumption of water." I’ve never heard of such a thing! He went on to tell me that by drinking so much water in such a short period of time, my body didn’t have enough electrolytes in it and that I was putting in way more liquids in my system than it was able to process it out. My stomach was filling up with water and it couldn’t send it out which was causing the nausea. Because of the electrolyte balance it was making me feel sick and causing all the other symptoms too. He went on to tell me that if I was having a serious problem focusing or my words began to slur it could actually lead to serious complications.I wasn’t anywhere near that bad so I asked him what to do next. "Is there a restaurant in the hotel you’re at? If there is, go inside and order a Coke with some french fries."

Now I’ve heard of odd medical advice before but this one took the cake. "The fries will have lots of salt. You need salt to balance your system which has been sweating it out for the last 3 hours. Normally I’d tell you to drink some Gatorade but you already have way too much fluids in your system so go get a Coke or Pepsi and sip on it…you need the sugar. Just don’t slam it…sip on it, and eat the fries slowly." he told me. I staggered into the casino and made a bee-line for the coffee shop. As soon as I started munching on some fries I started to feel better almost instantly. A few sips of soda and a bowl of french fries down the hatch, I felt like a million bucks.I called my doctor friend back to tell him the good news and he was glad I was better. He told me next time I’m out in the heat, drink slower and let my body absorb it over time. Chugging tons of water is actually very unhealthy, and also mix it up with some sports drinks too. The electrolytes in them really do help replenish what your body sweats out. At the end of our conversation, he laid this little gem on me…"I didn’t want to tell you this before" he said "but people can actually die from this. Water intoxication can be fatal." WHAT?! Yep, it turns out he’s right. It turns out he’s correct.

Google shows dozens upon dozens of news articles showing how people have died from this. Some are marathon runners who drank too much water after a run and some are college kids who died over consuming water for radio station contests. When you flood your body with way too much water, to the point where it cannot process it fast enough, it can actually cause brain swelling to the point where it can be fatal. Yep, no joke.

I just wanted to share this odd story with my readers because Vegas can be a very hot place. I’ve lived here for 40 years and I’m still learning how to cope with the dry heat here. For tourists traveling here from cooler climates, it can be a real shock to the system. We still have many more weeks of extreme heat here in Las Vegas so when you’re out and about, remember, it’s very important to stay hydrated properly. While tempting, alcohol actually has the opposite effect and dehydrates you so remember, the free casino drinks and the outdoor heat are not a good mix. If you’re walking around Downtown or on the Strip, be sure to keep a bottle of water with you and don’t do what I did and down bottle after bottle in a short period of time. Your good intentions can actually make you real sick. Remember, too much of a good thing can sometimes be bad for you and water is no exception. So if you’re out in Las Vegas taking pictures, stay cool, stay hydrated, and stay safe!

One of the things I’ve learned as a photographer in the modern era of digital photography is that we so often lose touch with the beauty of a printed image. My office is adorned with the more creative shots I’ve done over the years, framed and mounted in their own, unique way to highlight photographs within. Whenever I arrive home from a recent trip to the photo lab, my wife always likes to be the first to see the photos I’ve just picked up. She often reminds me that while photographs look great on a high quality computer monitor, it’s not the same as seeing them in a tangible form, on paper.

I’ve experimented with a few labs here in Las Vegas and it wasn’t until somewhat recently that a new one was brought to my attention. A fellow photographer friend of mine, Adam Shane, told me about a lab that has been around for a long time but never showed up on my radar. I met up with him for lunch one day and he showed me a few recent prints he had just picked up, printed on high-quality, Fuji Pro Pearl paper. I couldn’t believe how the color of his photos just seemed to explode off the page! He told me about a new photo lab he was using now and was blown away by the quality of their work. Of course, I needed to know his little secret!

Now I really don’t like to use this blog as a source for plugging people but I do feel a need to share this location with my readers. The place is Cashman Pro Photo Lab, located at 3580 South Polaris Ave., Suite #1 here in Las Vegas. On my friend’s suggestion, I sent over a few images through their website for printing. Through their online service, you can choose from a very wide variety of printing sizes, paper type, and other options of your choosing. It’s actually a pretty nice way of ordering prints. The next day I got a personal email telling me they were ready for pickup. When I saw the prints I had seen so many times on a computer screen now in high-quality paper, I couldn’t believe my eyes. It’s so true that we tend to forget what a picture is physical form is really all about. I had a long discussion with one of the photo technicians, John Lovell, about how they did the color and the process on which they made the prints. Most tourists to Las Vegas are very familiar with their other devision, Cashman Photography, as Cashman owns the concession to the majority of Las Vegas showrooms to take photos of the guests while waiting for the different shows to begin. But this is a completely separate portion of the company dealing just with high quality photo printing. John went on to tell me that their teams of photo technicians work until the very wee hours of the night processing photos for wide variety of wedding chapels here in Vegas to do 24 hour turnaround for those just married so they can have their albums the next day. I suppose I never really thought about it but when one goes through a drive-through wedding chapel and has photos done for them, someone has to print those, right? Well, Cashman Pro Photo is most likely the place who does.

Since my first trip there, I’ve had long discussions with their team about my photography and how I’ve shot this photo or that photo and it’s always a lot of fun. Back in March I had the pleasure of taking a trip to Singapore, which is, by far, one of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever seen. One night I had the pleasure to visit a nightclub atop the new Marina Bay Sands Hotel, the most expensive hotel in the world at $8 billion. Owned by the Las Vegas Sands Corporation (think Sheldon Adelson and the Venetian Hotel & Casino here in Las Vegas), atop the three towers span a platform that extends off the side by over 200 feet. At nearly 70 stories up, the view of the Singapore skyline from the top of this property is nothing short of awe inspiring. To say it’s breathtaking just doesn’t do it justice. Luckily for me, I brought my camera! Shot wide at 14 mm, this 2 second exposed shot looked great in the camera, but I knew I just had to see it in printed form. Before I ever left for home, I already uploaded the photo to Cashman’s website so I could pick it up after my 21-hour flight home.

Click Image for Larger Version, opens in new window

When I walked in to the lab’s offices John greeted me and asked where in the world did I shoot this photo and showed me the 10 X 24" print in all it’s glory. Blown away by it’s quality, I told him it was taken just four days prior in Singapore. After a brief conversation about the when and how it was shot, he said they liked the photo so much, would I be OK if they could make another, larger print and hang it on the wall behind the counter for all their customers to see. I was so honored, of course I said "yes"!

A few things to consider when printing your photos. While there is nothing wrong with printing vacation photos at Walgreens or Costco, understand that all your photos you send to them are processed not by a human, but by a computer. While it’s true that an actual person may look at the monitor briefly before sending them to print, the images are rarely, if ever, calibrated properly from what the person sees to what actually prints. The machines are occasionally calibrated for accuracy but every camera stores the digital data a bit differently. Dynamic range of color in a modern Nikon D700 professional SLR camera will be different than a Sony Mavica MVC made back in 1997. To understand what the finished photo will look like before it prints takes a trained eye and a lot of skill and that’s something you just don’t get with drugstore photo processing.

So if you are vacationing here in Las Vegas and get a really killer shot of The Strip or a great view from atop the Stratosphere Tower, are a local with a photo you just know will look great in a larger format on the wall, or if you have professional photos done by me, I encourage you to send them over to Cashman Pro Photo Lab as the results will be just wonderful. Even if you are not from around the Las Vegas area or don’t have the time to wait for Cashman to do your processing, I encourage you to find a local professional photo lab in your area for the photos that are really special to you. The difference you see is worth the very small, extra price for professional work.

The spring and summer months in Las Vegas is wedding season. And while many people are tying their nuptials at one of the drive through wedding chapels or exchanging vows in one of the hotel/casinos, it’s the party before the party that most people think of when they think of a Vegas night out. That’s right, I’m talking about the bachelor/bachelorette party! I’ve noticed a huge influx in photo shoots for these parties and I’m often asked a lot of questions about how to book them by people coming from out-of-town and also about where to get great photos from these events so I thought now would be the perfect opportunity to write about bachelor and bachelorette parties in Vegas.

Having lived here my entire life I’ve noticed two different scenarios as to how these tend to play out. Bachelor parties tend to be planned somewhat conservatively and wend up being really wild and the ladies at a bachelorette party talk a big game but often end up being pretty relaxed. Having been a hired photographer for both these activities, I’ve noticed that guys tend to want a photographer tag along less because they are always afraid of "the evidence" whereas women see a bachelorette party as something wind and fun but not too wild and fun, and as such, they will tend to want memories of the event more than the guys will. I’m basing this not on any real scientific study, but I’ve noticed as a professional photographer I’m booking over the last few years about 10 bachelorette parties to every 1 bachelor party so I’m going to base this blog mostly for the ladies. 

So what kinds of photos does your average party-goer take when they are in Vegas in a bachelor/bachelorette party? Generally, your average party of this nature goes through two phases through the evening. The first part of the evening is all about getting a few drinks, roaming around on the Strip, getting some killer souvenir photos of the evening and then ending at some destination which moves into phase II of the night which typically end up at a gentlemen’s club for the guys (or even sometimes the ladies!) or a male-review show for the women. Sometimes the evening may conclude at one of the many awesome nightclubs here in Sin City.

The thing is, this is probably going to be a once in a lifetime event and while it’s fun to take cell phone pictures, ultimately photos of close friends on a trip to Las Vegas are ones you want to keep. The photos on your mobile phones will be ones to laugh at and post to Facebook, the ones you want to have as a real memory in a photo album or on your wall, you will want professionally shot. As such, I tend to book a lot of photo shoots for these parties and the same questions generally are asked when people are inquiring about hiring a photographer for their party night so I thought I’d address a few of them here to help make your bachelorette party a fun and memorable one:

Q: What about transportation? Vegas is a big place…should we walk or take a taxi?
A: There is a lot of things within walking distance but if you’re trying to cram a lot of activities into a short evening, you want to hire transportation. While taxis are plentiful, you should definitely want to look into renting a limousine. For a group of people it’s the best way to go and you would be shocked at how cheap it is to rent one for just a few hours. It’s also a great feeling knowing that your personal driver is just a moment away from wherever you are and you’ll feel like a big shot everywhere you go and you and your friends step out from a giant Hummer limousine. It’s a blast, and for the price, you can’t beat it. Best of all, you’ll get some killer memories and photos of your posse’ cruising around Vegas in your own limo…how cool is that???

Q: Is there anything we should bring for our bride-to-be to make sure she has fun? 
A: ABSOLUTELY. I suggest stopping by a local party supply store back home before heading out to Vegas. Better yet, plan a short trip to one of the many adult boutiques near the Strip as part of your party. When I’m shooting a lot of these parties where a limo is inYou’ll want to get a tiara for the bride, a sash, and any other miscellaneous items to make the night a blast. Heck, if you want one-stop-shopping, just order from AMAZON.COM! 

Q: Where can a photographer go with us and where can’t he?
A: Most casinos are fine with you taking a photo or two in a casino with a small camera or cell phone but they tend to get more aggressive at groups with a professional photographer. So while you may get a few photos inside the casino of everyone pulling the handle of a slot machine, generally it’s a good idea not to do it. Nightclubs don’t allow professional photographers at all unless you’re willing to spend some serious $$$. Here, you’ll be relegated to using your cell phones or point-and-shoot cameras. Most of the clubs have staff photographers they use for their own purposes and those guys get very defensive when they see another person roaming around with expensive gear. Showrooms are another no-no and no professional or sometimes even amateur photos are allowed at any of the many famous clothing-optional pools in Vegas either (yes, I’ve been asked this several times as crazy as that sounds). There are a few other exceptions but that’s pretty much it.

Q: What part of the bachelorette party is best to book a photographer for and where should we go to get shots?
A: It’s the first part of the bachelorette party where you want your photos. A typical bachelorette party shoot for me will consist of meeting the group at one of the landmark properties on the Strip, getting some photos there and then hopping in a limousine to a few different destinations that make for fun, "girls night out" photos. The Bellagio is a must, the volcano show at the Mirage is always fun, walking on Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas is always a favorite for bachelorette parties, and the evening wouldn’t be complete without some great souvenir photos of the Welcome to Las Vegas sign. Even just walking as a group on the Strip is always going to yield some fun photos. The best part is, when you have someone tagging along to get them, you can just unwind and have fun.

Most importantly though, plan out your evening and don’t stress about it. What I always tell bachelorette party planners is to reverse-engineer your evening and schedule things around major events. If you know you are going to wind up at a 11 PM show, know you will be out around 12:30 AM so if you are planning to go to a nightclub afterward, know you are going there during prime-time hours and will probably wait in a longer line, especially on a weekend. So if you know your show starts at 11:30 PM and you want to do some roaming on the strip either by foot, limo, or taxi, give yourself plenty of time. I shot a bachelorette party a few nights ago and I remember when I was speaking with the Maid of Honor who booked the shoot back in February, she asked me how much time should we budget for photos at their hotel (Casesars Palace), walking to the Bellagio for photos of the fountain show and a few other properties and then end up at the Vegas sign. I told her it would be easily be 2-3 hours. I had to explain that a group of women walking around in heels is not exactly fast-paced. It turns out that after all was said and done we were right at the 3 hour mark. Activities take time, so plan accordingly. Do some research and find a good limo company and book them far in advance. While there are many limo companies in Vegas, demand can be higher than the supply so if you think you only want a limousine for 3 hours, book it for 4. Traffic and activities can take longer than you expect or could plan for and chances are your limo driver will be picking up their next client immediately after they drop you off so if you’re running late in your evening, extending your time may not be possible.

Most importantly though, when you are planning your bachelor or bachelorette party in Vegas, make it an experience, not just a "get together". Remember, this is VEGAS, BABY! Every time I’m booked to shoot a bachelor or bachelorette party I’m told that by having a professional photographer around for just a few hours made the entire night just so much better, plus you get professional quality photos to remember it by…at least the family-friendly parts of the evening anyway. So if you are planning a bachelor or bachelorette party in Las Vegas and would love to have your own personal paparazzi for the night, give me a call at 702-204-1740 or email me at adam@shotbyadam.com for availability, questions, and booking. Mention you read this blog and from now until September 30th, 2011, and receive 10% off your bachelor or bachelorette party booking plus another special gift so contact me today as I tend to book quickly. Here are some kind words from one of my recent shoots…