Here is the information on the new members course!
Click on the image to see the enlarged view!
If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact a member of the board and we'll be happy to talk to you!
des@bluelionphotography.com
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
New Members Course 2010
This course is no charge to our members! You don't have to be a new member to join us - everyone is welcome! We will be providing a free lunch to all who attend. It will be held at Marlene Fast's studio in Mitchell and starts at 10 am on Sunday, February 7th. It will likely end at about 4 in the afternoon. If you need directions to Marlene's place, her email is mfast@wiband.ca
Here is the information on the new members course!
Click on the image to see the enlarged view!
If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact a member of the board and we'll be happy to talk to you!
des@bluelionphotography.com
Here is the information on the new members course!
Click on the image to see the enlarged view!
If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact a member of the board and we'll be happy to talk to you!
des@bluelionphotography.com
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Restructuring PPOC
Hi everyone,
I have a report from the last PPOC restructuring meeting held via conference call January 13th. As you know, there has been a large effort expended in the last few years to achieve a greater harmony in the diverse groups which now form PPOC. There is in this message, two links that are quite long for you to read, so I will keep my comments to a minimum.
Fundamentally, PPOC is trying to standardize their "brand" so it is consistent from coast to coast. There are varying guidlines for qualification for membership, member categories and labels, and print award categories right now in each of the provinces and regions. There is also much duplication of services that we want to try to reduce. We have discovered that at this time it is not possible to form one new National PPOC and "park" the existing associations across the country which was the original intent for a variety of reasons, but we are committed to working hard to harmonize our efforts across the country. That will include changing the name of our membership classes in PPOC-MB to match what is used Nationally so an RPP in Manitoba will become an Active PPOC member. Same qualifications, just a different name. We plan to have this changed this year as we draft a new set of By-Laws that reflect the reality of our Association in 2010 instead of 1970ish. When you have a moment, please read the two attached links (call me if you have any problem with them) and when you have done so, let me know if you have any comments or concerns about changes to the PPOC By-Laws. There are not huge changes as you will see if you read them next to the old By-Laws but the first steps in harmonizing our efforts are built in along with changes that make them more relevant today. These by-laws have been crafted line by line, by a large group of people over two years and checked and corrected as necessary by our PPOC National By-Laws chairman, Chester Goosen as well as PPOC's corporate lawyer. I think we are done with corrections but have learned to never to say never in this process.
Because our association members are so electronically linked, I think it will be possible and reasonable to hold a vote for a qualified member to sit on the new board of PPOC instead of calling a Special General Meeting of PPOC-MB. In the interests of getting this information to you as soon as possible I am sending it before we have nominations for the job outlined in Brian's letter. Our board will get nominations ready in the next short while that we can present to you and have you vote. Please let me know if you wish to "apply for the job" or know of someone you wish to nominate (they have to agree to be nominated). This has to be done before our national convention in May, so there is not a big rush but I would like to push the process forward sooner than later.
Brian Boyle, our PPOC Vice-President, has crafted an excellent letter that is presently going out to all members in all of the constituent provinces in Canada. We have customized our letter to read PPOC-MB but otherwise the content is the same for everyone in Canada. This letter is available on Google documents at this link:
https://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0Af6iUrNVwrQmZGNwazg5NnJfMjFka2J0N3NnZg&hl=enThe entire new document that forms the By-Laws for PPOC that will be presented at the National convention in May is located also on Google documents at:
https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B_6iUrNVwrQmYzQzNjZhODAtNTU3ZC00ZGU2LTljNDktODZiZDQxMjkzNjJh&hl=enAgain, if you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me at the studio at 204-727-8884 or ken.frazer@gmail.com anytime.
Sincerely,
Ken Frazer MPA, F.Ph.
Presdient PPOC-MB
Friday, January 8, 2010
New Members Course!
On Thursday, December 10th we announced by email and blog, the New members course we are holding Sunday, February 7th.Here are the rest of the details as promised.
Marlene Fast has graciously agreed to host the event at her beautiful studio near Steinbach. The program will go like this. We will begin at 10 am with Marlene, who will guide us through all the ins and outs of association policies and benefits. How to work toward your degree designations and pretty much everything you should know about our association both Provincially and Nationally. This segment will go from 10 am til 12 noon.
After lunch, we will begin with another Master of Photography who will impart their knowledge of posing and lighting. This is not designed to be a full photography school but rather to help our newer members get a good base knowledge from which to work on. I will be able to announce the person who is teaching this segment next week. We expect this segment will also last roughly two hours.
I will host the final segment which will deal with the business of photography. There are obviously a very wide variety of business models in our profession that are valid. Nevertheless, if you want to be able to continue to be a photographer, you need to eventually make it financially viable. An old Chinese saying deals with the core principle of business, specifically contracts. Every job you do is basically a contract. Essentially it says that unless a contract is favorable to both the client and the provider of the service, it is invalid. In the long run, your business model has to look like this to be sustainable. We are not going to tell you how to run your business but rather point out some landmarks to help you establish policies and pricing that will be fair to you, so you can stay in business, and fair to the client, so they will want to be a repeat customer.
Finally on this subject, we are very happy to get this course off the ground after much discussion. I think it will be a great benefit to anyone who is a new member, but everyone is welcome to come. There will be no charge for this event. This kind of event has been held in Saskatchewan for the past ten years and in their province, attendance to this event for new members is actually mandatory. Although we will not force this issue this year, I think it is very important for all new members to make time to attend this event.
Marlene's address is 231 Highway 52, Mitchell, MB. The studio phone number is 204-326-1813 if you need further instructions. You can also email Marlene at mfast@wiband.ca
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
A Time for Renewal!
Hi everyone!
Can't believe another year has begun already but here we go for the second decade of this century. This is the time of the year for renewal and re-evaluating where our lives and businesses are going. This is also the time for renewal to your association. The new board has met just a few days ago and brainstormed to get some new ideas and projects going. The list is very long!
This is a transition year because we are changing from a fall convention to a spring event. We are the last of the western provinces to make that change but feel it is for the best. A few of us think it would have even been better if it was never switched to fall many years ago, but that is water under the bridge. Because of this change, we plan a slightly different strategy to deliver education and services to you, the member this year.
Next month, we will launch our first New Members course which will be held at Marlene Fast's studio in Mitchell, MB. We are working hard at this moment to secure a very high profile speaker for a major educational event, roughly in the April timeframe. Because we had many members last year who were not able to make it one day or the other at our two-day convention, and because of the additional costs of running that kind of show, we plan to do a couple full one-day programs at different times of the year instead. We will be offering the best pricing we can for this event for members. Non-members will be able to sign up also, by paying a fee that will be determined, that will cover their membership for the year as well as the educational event. This is the way that WPPI has run their convention for many years. The first full day event will be run no matter what but we plan a second large full day event this year in the fall, that will happen on either a Sunday or Monday so the most people will be free to attend. The second event will be run like a business, with an advance booking "drop dead" date which means that without firm committments from enough members to support the event we will not run it. It is time that we need to run our association like a business and this is just one small step in this process. We also plan some smaller educational events and social events to round out the year that we will publish as soon as we possibly can! We would like to reach out to the photographic community that are not currently members to some social events that will hopefully encourage them to become members. There are plans to deliver some webinar content, to replace the website with a new shiny one that will have the ability to post video tutorials and much more. We will connect via Twitter and Facebook on this site.Certainly we realize this is a lot to bite off this year but I believe this overall plan will give our members great value for their membership dollars and we'll work very hard to make it happen. This will be the year of "Just Do It!"..
There will be some behind the scenes work that will need to be done this year as well. As you know, PPOC nationally has been working hard to restructure and harmonize the various regions of the country. In that same direction, our association is making changes that will make our whole national body more consistent. Our membership category titles will change to be in line with everyone across the country this year. There won't be any status change, but as an example, an RPP will now be an Active member of PPOC and PPOC-MB. You will probably notice some of those changes already on your membership renewals this year. We are going to work hard to get our by-laws re-written to follow in line with the national direction wherever possible as well.
There is one other challenging issue on the table this year with regard to the Image Salon. As per our discussion at the AGM, it was clear that we cannot afford to run a full nationally recognized Affililiate judging on our own. We could potentially lose thousands of dollars doing this. We are changing from a fall to spring "convention" along with the rest of the country so there will be no one to share the costs of running an image salon later in the year. That means we have to do it early in the year. Saskatchewan is actuallly facing the exactly same dilemma in the same timeframe this year. This factor likely influenced the relatively low entry we received from Saskatchewan at the judging held in October. One of the ony places we could get our images judged would be at the Saskatchewan/Alberta Symposium this year that starts in the last few days of February. This clearly is too close for some to prepare a new set of images for salon. If that means that the number of entries from Manitoba in the Sask/Alta show is lower than we had in October, it would not meet minimum requirements for the number of photographers competing for Photographer of the Year (miinimum 15) for example, which would not have a good effect on the credibility of that major award. I will be sending out a form to the entire membership shortly after I finish this to ask you, the members whether you want to proceed with an Image Salon this year, or skip this year and hold the next judging in the spring of 2011. There has been some concern expressed after the AGM about this and that is why we are asking the question. This is one decision that should be made democratically by the members of the association instead of just the board.
Once again, I have rambled on long enough so I will end this message to the members now. To all of your who have not yet renewed your membership, I ask you to do so as soon as possible. As a united force our association can achieve great things an individuallly you can benefit in so many ways that I do not have space to articulate here. Finally, if you have any concerns or questions, please feel free to contact me at my email address ken.frazer@gmail.com and I will get back to you quickly. I wish you all the best in the New Year along with great success in your life and businesses.
sincerely, Ken Frazer MPA, F.Ph.
President PPOC-MB
Can't believe another year has begun already but here we go for the second decade of this century. This is the time of the year for renewal and re-evaluating where our lives and businesses are going. This is also the time for renewal to your association. The new board has met just a few days ago and brainstormed to get some new ideas and projects going. The list is very long!
This is a transition year because we are changing from a fall convention to a spring event. We are the last of the western provinces to make that change but feel it is for the best. A few of us think it would have even been better if it was never switched to fall many years ago, but that is water under the bridge. Because of this change, we plan a slightly different strategy to deliver education and services to you, the member this year.
Next month, we will launch our first New Members course which will be held at Marlene Fast's studio in Mitchell, MB. We are working hard at this moment to secure a very high profile speaker for a major educational event, roughly in the April timeframe. Because we had many members last year who were not able to make it one day or the other at our two-day convention, and because of the additional costs of running that kind of show, we plan to do a couple full one-day programs at different times of the year instead. We will be offering the best pricing we can for this event for members. Non-members will be able to sign up also, by paying a fee that will be determined, that will cover their membership for the year as well as the educational event. This is the way that WPPI has run their convention for many years. The first full day event will be run no matter what but we plan a second large full day event this year in the fall, that will happen on either a Sunday or Monday so the most people will be free to attend. The second event will be run like a business, with an advance booking "drop dead" date which means that without firm committments from enough members to support the event we will not run it. It is time that we need to run our association like a business and this is just one small step in this process. We also plan some smaller educational events and social events to round out the year that we will publish as soon as we possibly can! We would like to reach out to the photographic community that are not currently members to some social events that will hopefully encourage them to become members. There are plans to deliver some webinar content, to replace the website with a new shiny one that will have the ability to post video tutorials and much more. We will connect via Twitter and Facebook on this site.Certainly we realize this is a lot to bite off this year but I believe this overall plan will give our members great value for their membership dollars and we'll work very hard to make it happen. This will be the year of "Just Do It!"..
There will be some behind the scenes work that will need to be done this year as well. As you know, PPOC nationally has been working hard to restructure and harmonize the various regions of the country. In that same direction, our association is making changes that will make our whole national body more consistent. Our membership category titles will change to be in line with everyone across the country this year. There won't be any status change, but as an example, an RPP will now be an Active member of PPOC and PPOC-MB. You will probably notice some of those changes already on your membership renewals this year. We are going to work hard to get our by-laws re-written to follow in line with the national direction wherever possible as well.
There is one other challenging issue on the table this year with regard to the Image Salon. As per our discussion at the AGM, it was clear that we cannot afford to run a full nationally recognized Affililiate judging on our own. We could potentially lose thousands of dollars doing this. We are changing from a fall to spring "convention" along with the rest of the country so there will be no one to share the costs of running an image salon later in the year. That means we have to do it early in the year. Saskatchewan is actuallly facing the exactly same dilemma in the same timeframe this year. This factor likely influenced the relatively low entry we received from Saskatchewan at the judging held in October. One of the ony places we could get our images judged would be at the Saskatchewan/Alberta Symposium this year that starts in the last few days of February. This clearly is too close for some to prepare a new set of images for salon. If that means that the number of entries from Manitoba in the Sask/Alta show is lower than we had in October, it would not meet minimum requirements for the number of photographers competing for Photographer of the Year (miinimum 15) for example, which would not have a good effect on the credibility of that major award. I will be sending out a form to the entire membership shortly after I finish this to ask you, the members whether you want to proceed with an Image Salon this year, or skip this year and hold the next judging in the spring of 2011. There has been some concern expressed after the AGM about this and that is why we are asking the question. This is one decision that should be made democratically by the members of the association instead of just the board.
Once again, I have rambled on long enough so I will end this message to the members now. To all of your who have not yet renewed your membership, I ask you to do so as soon as possible. As a united force our association can achieve great things an individuallly you can benefit in so many ways that I do not have space to articulate here. Finally, if you have any concerns or questions, please feel free to contact me at my email address ken.frazer@gmail.com and I will get back to you quickly. I wish you all the best in the New Year along with great success in your life and businesses.
sincerely, Ken Frazer MPA, F.Ph.
President PPOC-MB
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