Christopher Cuttriss's Blog
Oh boy I am super excited to write this post!
I first heard of PhotoShelter through a tweet by prolific photographer and blogger Scott Bourne (check out Scott’s GoingPro2010.com!). It was a link to their blog and a free PDF book they produced that gave photographers a guide to social media and how to use it effectively to increase online visibility.
I had never heard of a company that gave such useful information to the public, not just their own members (which in itself is a cunning marketing move). At the time I was a solid Zenfolio user due to their integration with Mpix (a printer for whom I still have great affinity) and their very reasonable priced print-fulfillment services. While more expensive than Zenfolio, PhotoShelter impressed me with their openness and dedication to their customers. I just couldn’t justify the expense at the time but I became a regular visitor to their blog.
The first photographer I saw that really struck me with his proper integration of PhotoShelter to his blog was Todd Owyound. We both utilize Graph Paper Press to turn WordPress into a fully functional (and expandable) platform for our imagery, but he takes his site to an entirely distinct level. Todd posts his fantastical live music images to his blog and links them directly to his PhotoShelter account to give his visitors an easy way to purchase and license his images. He also has very well written reviews of camera gear and lessons on lighting and processing (which I strongly recommend everyone read).
Earlier this week I decided to take the plunge and give PhotoShelter a shot. Although I have only a smattering of images posted, PhotoShelter makes the entire process a cakewalk and gives photographers granular control over print, product, and licensing rates. Not only does this make the business side of photography easier, but it streamlines the purchasing process for both commercial and personal customers.
I’ll be rolling out more content with PhotoShelter in the coming weeks. Until then, however, I would entirely appreciate using the following links to check out these services. If you decide they are right for you using these links will also help support my efforts here at Studio386!
Thank you for being so awesome, PhotoShelter!
Referral Links: PhotoShelter, Graph Paper Press.
My clients are incredible, without you there would be no Studio386 Photographers!
As a way of showing my appreciation for all of you wonderful people I am sending you a little treat! For every new client you send my way you can choose from:
- A free print from our last shoot (up to 16×20);
- Four sets of free wallet prints from any of our sessions;
- Or an free hour for an upcoming shoot!
This is a really great way to introduce your friends to Studio386 and get a little something in return!
Just send your friends to the contact page and tell them to put your name in the Referred By field!
Weddings are once-in-a-lifetime, don’t-get-a-second-chance events. Choosing a photographer can be an arduous task, but it shouldn’t be. When you’re planning your wedding, the most important thing you can do is to find a photographer whose vision grabs you.
At the end of the day your flowers will wilt, your cake will be eaten, and the guests will have gone. Your wedding pictures, however, will be there for generations.
Wedding imagery starts at $1500. Contact me!
There are few things more humbling than being asked to photograph someone’s wedding. The trust a couple places in my hands is something that can only be treated with the utmost care and respect. It is a huge responsibility that I do not take lightly. I consider my clients my friends and truly value being there with a camera as their family grows.
My vision will transform your wedding into an album that you will want every guest in your house to look through. You will have an album that stays on display, that is put just out of reach of the toddlers, that brings back the feeling of that blissful day.
I create my images with Canon’s venerable 1D Mark IV with an array of professional L-Series lenses including the 70-200mm f/2.8 IS Mark II L, the 16-35mm f/2.8 L, and 85mm f/1.2 L. My formal training is rooted in the art of narrative storytelling; listening to couples tell the story of how they met inspires me to help create the story of how they were married.
After the wedding the couple and family are welcome to order prints online. Canvas wrapped prints and appropriate frame styles are available as well as wonderfully printed custom albums.
This is all centered around providing the bride and groom with the most personalized service I can offer. I do not have set packages for weddings I photograph. Rather, I work with the couple to figure out what works best for them. If you are interested in getting to know me and want to know more information, please contact me.
Thanks to my good friends at Inprnt an edition of my new print, “Nine One Half” is available! I love the prints from Inprnt, who only use archival giclée paper and have exceedingly stringent quality standards. Available in two sizes, 13×19 for $24.99, and 18×24 for $40.00. If you purchase one please let me know!
See the print!
During the drive back to Los Angeles from Joe and Danvi’s wedding I did an impromptu project: Analog Interstate. Having just procured the oft-reviewed, lampooned, and very kitschy iPhone app Hipstamatic (iTunes link), this was an experiential project exploring the people and places of Interstate 5 as seen through a vintage eye.
I have know Joe since I was a little tyke. Growing up in the same, tiny little town affords the opportunity to get to know everyone in your age group. We went through middle and high school together until Joe went to Berkeley and I went to film school.
A couple years after that, during a trip to San Francisco, I met Danvi. We were having dinner at the Cheesecake Factory on the top floor of the Macy’s building with two people who would end up asking me to photograph their wedding. If I had only known then I would have taken more pictures!
Before July 11th I had never photographed a traditional Vietnamese ceremony. Throughout all the weddings I’ve photographed I have never seen as many family members with cameras as I did in Danvi’s parents’ house. I could hardly find a position!
After the ceremony we drove to Berkeley to do the bridge and groom ‘formal’ images. I was blown away by the campus and wish I had hours more time to shoot!
The ceremony was held at Rios-Lovell Estate Winery in Livermore. Nestled in the rolling hills and within spitting distanced of the famed Livermore National Laboratories, the vineyard was utterly charming. Presided over by a close friend of Danvi’s, the ceremony had a small, intimate feeling that belied the number of family and friends who came to wish them well.
Joe and Danvi’s wedding day was one of the best I’ve experienced. Thank you both! 
It’s not you, it’s me.
When I bought my 2009 Mac Pro I was under deadline pressure and looking at a dead PC that I had rigged to run Apple’s OS X. The PC had caused me nothing but pain for the eight months since I built. Having three days to process over 1,000 images, however, changed that consideration quite quickly.
I called my local Apple store and picked up the last Mac Pro they had in stock.
The box would hardly fit in my car and I had to jam my arm into it to keep it from perpetually changing the song on my stereo. While I mourned the loss of my bank account balance I was elated that I had finally acquired a Mac Pro — the Holy Grail of Apple ownership. Over the next 14 months I would come to heavily rely on that all-aluminum case: it was cool, it was fast, and it was an investment that almost demanded reverence (from those who cared about such things anyway).
About half way into my time of ownership I began to realize why it was, in fact, such an investment. The Mac Pro uses Intel’s Xeon processors and ECC-equipped RAM sticks. A translation for those of you who didn’t dedicate the formative years of your lives to dark rooms illuminated only by the cold glow of a cathode ray tube: the absurdly expensive computer used components of such price that they could feasibly be a down payment on a new car.
In my frantic rush to purchase the machine and finish my images before the deadline, I settled on the least expensive Mac Pro (and the only model they had in stock): a $2400, single processor, four core machine with a paltry 3GB of ECC RAM. It only took a handful of months before I had outgrown those specs and needed to expand. In order to put a second processor in the Mac Pro I would have to buy an entirely separate CPU/RAM board for approximately $800 (if you can find them in the first place) in addition to a second Intel Xeon processor which was itself nearly $1000. Each additional Gigabyte of RAM I required was around one and a half times as expensive as normal non-ECC equipped sticks.
I had to put out nearly $4200 before I had a computer that was as capable as a PC that would have cost me half as much to build outright.
A little background information: I’ve used Apple products for about the past seven years. Like many others I was introduced to the platform through the iPod, then fully baptized in the form of a 15″ G4 Powerbook. I have a deep affinity for Apple products and it pains me to transition away, but I am no longer tied to the platform that once was the only real habitat for proper post-processing applications.
Adobe Lightroom was the beginning of the end.
Apple released Aperture in 2005 and was basically the reason for buying my first Mac. Aperture was a new workflow management application that brought the powers of Photoshop, desktop publishing, and image cataloging into one coherent ecosystem. In 2007 Adobe introduced Lightroom, a competitor to Aperture which I regarded (foolishly) as kind of Aperture Light — a program for weekend photographers who did not need a serious workflow system.
In 2008 I saw the err of my ways.
Lightroom was incredible. It was sleek, fast, and offered direct integration to Photoshop (for those images that just need a bit more editing than Lightroom was capable of). Worst Best of all, it was for both Mac and Windows.
With Lightroom, Adobe created a tool that I could use regardless of my platform: opening up the creative realm to more than the silver towers that dominate the artistic domain. PC’s were now a viable platform that professional photographers could really embrace, at a fraction of the cost.
I bought my Mac Pro for around $2500 after tax and sold it fourteen months later for nearly $1600. In effect I rented it for $64 a month. Not bad when you think of it that way. With that $1500 I was able to build a PC that in many ways is more capable than the Mac Pro and finally purchase a Drobo S to make sure that all my irreplaceable files are kept safe.
While I will dearly miss the design of my Mac Pro and the absolute joy that is Apple’s OS X operating system, I won’t miss having to justify the expense of upgrading it. Nor will I miss the inevitable compatibility-checking of new devices, hoping that the company thought the market big enough to produce a Macintosh edition of their product.
From what I can tell I am in a very small minority. Out of the millions of search results for “switching from Mac to PC” only a handful didn’t auto-correct my query to what I surely must have meant. As it is though, I’ll enjoy spending my money on what a professional photographer should really be concerned with: bribing photo editors with $200 bottles of Johnnie Walker Blue Label.
July 14, 2010 Update: Received the new PC parts: Intel Core i7 930 (OC’d to 4Ghz), 12Gb DDR3 RAM, USB3 and SATA6Gb/s support. The Mac Pro was a Xeon 2.6Ghz with a paltry 6Gb of RAM.
Two weeks ago I received a call from a Vice President at CalArts asking me to photograph the condominium she and her husband are selling. Coming from the highest echelon of a nationally recognized art school her inquiry got my blood pumping!
I went down to her condo, nested in the hills of Los Angeles, and it was beautiful. Polished cement floors mixed with the bright texture of an otherwise bamboo wood floor opened the main room up to the vista over Echo Park. The hills of Los Angeles transport you out of the hurried lifestyle of the deep city and into a more intimate community that, if even just a mirage, contradicts the storied indifference of Angelinos.
Over the past few years I’ve only had a handful of opportunities to photograph interiors but each one presents its own unique challenges and opportunities and I’m very much looking forward to the next one!
Timelapses aren’t as easy as they look. After a number of attempts I’m still working on nailing it down. Here’s my latest attempt!
Canyon Country Timelapse from Chris Cuttriss on Vimeo.
I’ve been working at CalArts for just over a year and a half and until yesterday had never been to a graduation. Even if you have no connection to the school I would wholeheartedly recommend coming by next year for the festivities. It is a wild experience!
When the festivities were all wrapped up there was a giant chicken, a fellow covered completely in pink frosting, and a heavy metal marriage ceremony with a cross-carrying groom presided over by the Dean of the Film School.
