Over the years, since the early 1990's to be exact, I have attended the Photo Expo at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City.  I have been witness to a gradual change from a chemical/film based industry to digital capture.  On openning day, while waiting for the doors to open, I found myself thinking about how different the show is these days.  My recollection is that the Kodak booth was the largest in the hall.  Fujifilm being their biggest competitor had a booth that nearly matched Kodak.  There was Canon, Nikon, Hasselblad, Leica, Pentax, and all the major filter producers were represented.  You could browse Photographic paper companies, check out the latest in enlargers and so on down the line.  In fact I remember being facinated by a horizontal 8 X 10 enlarger with a liquid negative carrier.  What a great piece of engineering.

This years show ran from October 25, 2012 to October 27, 2012.  Sitting right in front of the main entrance was a booth as large as a small house, Nikon.  That was my first stop, since I use Nikon gear exclusively, I looked at the newest offerings.  While there I also listened to a professional photographer deconstruct an on location photo shoot.  He touched on all the preparation and planning that is necessary for success.  How to avoid potiential trouble and increase the ratio of "keepers".  It was then time to move on, so I visited the Zenfolio booth.  This is the company that hosts my web site.  I had an enjoyable conversation, and it was great to put a face on the company my web site is dependant upon.  A short walk brought me to the MPix booth.  They are a professional quality photo production company.  They will produce everything you might need in the way of photographs, from small prints to gallery wraps, to metal prints.  Their sales staff was very knowledgeable and a big help for me. While walking to another booth I wanted to see, I stumbled upon Carry Speed.  This firm makes what in my opinion is the best camera sling/strap in the industry for professionals or serious amateurs.  It prices out at $70.00 and is worth every penny.  A short demonstration covered all its benefits.  It is comfortable, strong, and quick to get the camera into any postition you might need.  This booth was very crowded.  Do yourself a favor and navigate to; www.carryspeed.com and give this product serious consideration.  The link will be posted on my links page.   

Next on my list was print media.  There were two booths on my check list.  I wanted to see up close the Epson Velvet Fine Art Paper.  It is beautiful, with no surface reflections at all and is rich looking.  I plan to get a sample pack and test it for myself.  I also wanted to see the paper being manufactured by Hahnemuhle.  This is very beautiful fine art paper.  I picked up a media sampler, and checked out where it is distributed, they do not sell direct.  I will give this paper some of my time and make some test runs.

Many things need to be combined in just the right way to produce a professional quality photograph.  Education, equipment, software, testing new materials, travel time, supplies, and lots of smaller things that never end.  Like any other business professional photographers factor these costs into their product.  While that is not surprising, every once in a while potiential customers question the cost of a photograph.  Some even hint that the camera is responsible for the quality work.  Those of us that work at a professional level are always aware of what it takes to produce our unique view or vision in the form of a quality photograph.  Spending a few hours at the pdn Photo Plus Expo brings home the knowledge of our production cost.  Being able to look at all the various componants that go together all in one place is enlightening.  There are many things that are packed into that piece of paper with the image on it.