I was invited to participate in the Austin Portrait Symposium hosted by Randy Kerr and Doug Box. The symposium was held at the Gusto Studio in Austin, Texas. There were 20-30 participants, photographers and enthusiasts from Texas. Although, I think I heard that one person was from Louisiana. Model Alva Sim, who works for the studio, posed for the group while Randy and Doug demonstrated lighting and how to interact with a model or potential photography client.
​After studio time we all went to lunch then met up again to photograph people on the street in Austin.
Doug brought his 4x5 film view camera along to demonstrate his portrait techniques. Doug is also a big fan of light meters and made sure everyone understood the importance of proper lighting of portraits.
I've always been an available light enthusiast except when I managed photography for Disney. There the photography, primarily advertising, was all about lighting and capturing the Disney Magic. This is a whole other conversation but the lighting options at Disney were so dramatically different than what I used when I was the President's photographer.
Hopefully I will be invited to the next Austin Portrait Symposium where I can share more of my experiences in photography.
Thanks to Randy and Doug for asking me to participate in their symposium. It was also great to meet so many photographers and share a few stories.

I have been invited by Randy Kerr, photographer to participate in the Austin Portrait Symposium in Austin, Texas May 27,2017. I'm looking forward to attending and hopefully I can help contribute by sharing some of my experiences. Below are a few portraits I have taken over the years.

Apple holds numerous classes in their stores to educate Apple users. I participated in a photo walk at the Barton Creek Mall Apple Store in Austin, Texas. I would highly recommend attending one of the Apple Store photo walks in your area. I know I will go back for another class.
John, the Apple Genius, led the walk after some iPhone camera instruction in the store. The theme of the the day was light and shadows. I have held iPhone classes myself but you're never too old to learn something new. John reminded us of the great exposure options in the iPhone camera, using filters before shooting and some of the great editing options. On Apple.com there are numerous short videos that give the highlights of iPhone photography to improve your images. Follow the Apple videos links to see some of the iPhone camera operation tips.

I had an opportunity to photograph the Habitat for Humanity/National Women Build Week sponsored by Lowes in Round Rock, Texas. I have been a part of Habitat for Humanity for more than 30 years starting back in the days when I worked as a photographer for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Living now in Georgetown, Texas I got involved with Habitat for Humanity of Williamson County. The National Women Build Week was a national event the week of May 8, 2017. I volunteered to take the still photos for Habitat's social media for the 2 days I was at the build in Round Rock. 
I shot the original photos on my Nikon D750 which has wifi,using a Nikon 28-300mm Nikon lens. From the construction site I sent photos to my iPhone6Plus, edited in Camera+ and texted the photos to my Habitat contact. She then posted images on the Williamson County Habitat Facebook page and texted photos to the leaders of the various volunteer groups who in turn posted my photos on their social media. Glad to be a part of this great effort.

All photographers take different paths in their career. When I was 18 and an Airman in the United States Air Force starting my photography career I never new where life would lead me.  After being a photographer for 4 years in the Air Force I moved to the Washington DC area to be with family who had moved there and to finish my college. I thought I wanted to pursue photojournalism, work for a news magazine or newspaper.  So I ultimately earned a degree in journalism from the University of Maryland in College Park, Maryland. While I was taking classes at Maryland, I also worked in photography in Washington, D.C. at Dunlop Studios as a color printer. 
I left there after about a year and went to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. There I was still a darkroom technician but they sent me on assignments with Agriculture scientists in Beltsville, Maryland and I did studio work in the Agriculture headquarters building. 
One day a Human Resources person approached me about a photographer's position at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. I really didn't know anything about HUD but it meant a promotion and I would be taking photos full time. I had become a full time U.S. Federal Government photographer documenting the history of the United States of America.
At HUD I worked with one other photographer Joe Barcia, who was the lead photographer and he taught me a lot about available light photography. He loved using his Leica cameras with Kodak Tri-X film. In those days we processed all our own film and made our own prints. Our mission was to document the activities of the department. Joe took primary responsibility for photographing the HUD Secretary and I did everything else. At the time FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Administration was a part of HUD so I went on a lot of national disasters around the country. Also during this time which was in the early 70's we were rebuilding inner cities. I spent a lot of time in Watts, Harlem, Baltimore and countless cities around the country. On a few occasions I would also photograph U.S. Senate Hearings on Capitol Hill. That is where I met a lot of the photojournalist who I admired and who I follow to this day.
At one point Joe retired and I was promoted in grade and took over as the lead photographer. Funny, they didn't replace Joe so I was a staff of one. This gave me a great opportunity to photograph the HUD Secretaries full time and go to the White House with them during our housing events. During this time the Presidents were Nixon, Ford, Carter and Reagan. Little did I know at the time that I would become a Presidential photographer like David Hume Kennerly, Ollie Atkins and Michael Evans all of whom I had an opportunity to work around when I would go to the White House.
For me HUD was a great stepping stone to the next phase of my photography career. When I left HUD I went on to be the Chief Photographer for Nation's Business magazine which was published by the United States Chamber of Commerce.