It’s that time of year again spring is waning, school’s almost out: summer routines are about to begin.

If you have a student who’ll be graduating in 2012, or know someone who does, stop by the shop to pick up one of our flyers to keep or give away.

At photography studios across the country, just like this one, it means it’s time to gear up for senior portraits for the 2012 graduating class. This year we’ve expanded the lifestyle, reworked what comes in packages, and also added a studio fashion package.

The Fashion Package is almost exactly what it sounds like. Working with Sheep’s Clothing we organize fashion shows and also produce a lot of photos featuring garments supplied by a variety of companies. Since we have the experience, the lighting, and a fantastic makeup artist (whose kit we’ve stocked full of makeups that survive the intense lights that this throws at it) the next step seemed to be to start offering it as a service. Fashion senior portraits were born.

Returning this year are senior trading cards, these are press printed on a heavy semigloss paper and then die-cut to give rounded corners. Each one is customized to be exactly what you want and we have a variety of templates to start out with. Put your contact info on and either hand out at school or drop in graduation announcements in the fall so everyone knows how to get a hold of you when school’s out.

Speaking of grad announcements, they’re here this year! We’ve settled on a couple of formats, the ones included with several packages are 5×7 cards on the same heavy semigloss paper as the trading cards. Not only are they fantastic, customized to be unique, and containing any information you want without having to fill in blanks on generic cards they are priced competitively to the major school graduation supply shops.

Get out and about for your photos and show off who you really are. We can go almost anywhere in the Tri-Cities and encourage you to bring what’s close to your heart; sports uniforms, letter jackets, or stuffed animals.

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Road Trip $675

You will spend a combined two hours in the studio and at the location of your choice in the Tri-Cities. The Road Trip package brings you the best of both worlds and provides the products you want to show off. Included are a 16×24” gallery wrapped canvas, two 8×10” prints, six 5×7” prints, ten 4×6” prints, twenty-four die-cut wallet prints, fifty custom trading cards, and seventy-five custom 5×7” cards with envelopes that can be grad announcements or whatever you see fit.

Adventure $450

With an hour at the location of your choice the Adventure package brings out your personality and gives you plenty of photos to give out. Included are a standout mounted 11×14” print, two 8×10” prints, six 5×7” prints, ten 4×6” prints, twenty-four die-cut wallet prints, fifty custom trading cards, and seventy-five custom 5×7” cards to send out.

Scenic $250

Capturing the real you with the best of lifestyle photography, the Scenic package brings you a traditional set of prints. Included are an 11×14” print, two 8×10” prints, six 5×7” prints, ten 4×6” prints, and twenty-four die-cut wallet prints.

Studio Portraits

Show your personality in a relaxed studio setting, bring a few outfits and props and see how getting your picture taken really can be fun. Shoots last up to an hour and there’s no other limit on poses or outfit changes.

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Fashion $250

Not everyone picks modeling as their career after school, but there’s no reason not to have senior portraits where you look like one. Our Fashion package includes professional make-up and the same fashion lighting we use for fashion show clients. The package also includes fifty 8×10” press-printed modeling composites of the best images from your shoot, fifty custom trading cards,  and two 8×10” prints.

Studio $150

Have fun in our studio, pick up set of traditional prints and hit a sweet price point, or start here and build to exactly what you want with a la carte products. Package includes three 8×10” prints, two 5×7” prints, five 4×6” prints, and twenty-four die-cut wallet prints.

All Packages

All Packages include online gallery with images suitable for web, e-mail, facebook, etc that you can choose to be public, hidden, password protected, or require a login at no charge.

To celebrate the love that we share, and that other couples share, we’re proud to roll out “Love Portraits.”

Love portraits are for couples in any stage of their relationship, new love to 90th anniversary and anything in between. We’ve spent the past months putting together some packages that fit what we would look for as a couple. We’d also like to thank those like Terris and Cheryl (pictured) and their new puppy (yup, dogs are allowed!) as well as the others who helped out with the development process. You’ll see many of those who helped out in the advertising this year.

Packages start at $150 and include a large print for your home and silk accordion books to keep or give away. In studio, out and about, both, or an entire day of your choice anywhere within reasonable driving distance. Several of the packages also include custom cards that can be used for announcements, wedding invitations (love portraits make great engagement gifts), Christmas cards, or anything else you can think of.

We hope you’ll love Love Portraits as much as we do. Drop by the studio or call for more information or to book your portraits.

If you are a US military service member who is about to be deployed, home on R&R, or just home from deployment your love portrait session is free.

Why not get them from an engagement session to include with your invitations or save the date cards?

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Hyak Photo Packages PDF Form

Senior Portraits – Prints Included – 3 8×10, 2 5×7, 6 4×6, 24 wallets*.
$150 – 1 hr studio session
$175 – 1 hr outdoor session
$250 – 2 hr indoor/outdoor session

Studio Portraits**
$150 – 1 hr studio session – 1 11×14, 3 8×10, 2 5×7, and 6 4×6
$250 – 1 hr studio session – 1 11×14, 6 8×10, 4 5×7, 8 4×6, and 16 wallets*.
$400 – 1.5 hr studio session – 1 16×20, 1 11×14, 3 8×10, 10 5×7, 32 wallets*.

Children’s Lifestyle – Natural Unposed Photography Series
$175 – 45 minute session – 1 8×10, 2 5×7, 6 4×6, 16 wallets

Maternity
$100 – 1 hr studio session – 1 11×14, 1 8×10, 2 5×7

Newborn
$150 – 1 hr studio session – 1 11×14, 1 8×10, 4 5×7, 24 wallets*.

In Home Studio*** – Studio Portraits in the Comfort and Convenience of Home
$100 – 1 hr session – All Prints A la Carte.

Grow With Time
$550 – 1 hr studio maternity session, 1 hr studio newborn session, 30 minute         “Free Studio Saturday” sessions monthly for first year with 8×10 and 8         wallets* from each monthly session. Includes all prints normally         included with Maternity and Newborn packages.

A la Carte
Additional prints are available by the print as an add-on to any package.
Full Resolution Digital downloads (with rights) available for $750.

All Packages
All Packages include online gallery which may be public, hidden, password protected, or require username/password login at no charge.

Weddings, Rites of Passage, and other photography available upon request.

* Wallets are printed in sets of 8 per pose.
** Limit 4 people, including children. $25 per person extra. Max 4 adults 4 children.
*** Limit 4 people, including children. $25 per person extra if space is available.

We’ve signed papers on the new studio space.

No, I’m not going to do away with in-home portraiture. This has very little effect on what I see as my primary focus which is bringing in a level of fun while reducing the headaches of going to the portrait studio.

So, if business as usual, what does going from hourly rental to having our own studio mean? Reduced in-studio sitting fees! Lower minimum time requirements! It’s simple math: the current fee schedule includes up to 1 hour travel time each way for in-home sessions and matches the minimum 3 hour studio rental that we have now. A fixed location means lower set-up times, less wear and tear on equipment, etc.

I don’t know how this will affect scheduling yet. Right now when you book a session a 3-4 hour section is blocked out on the calendar. That means I can do 2 or at most 3 sessions per day. As existing clients know we make an effort to keep a number of blocks available each week so that wait times are at most 2-3 days. I will be floating the idea of “studio days” where we’ll block off, say, 8am-6pm on a Saturday and divide that time into 30 minute sessions. That’s not enough time to do a family of 6 or a full maternity set but would be enough to do as part of a series. A newly born child could schedule a full newborn session in studio or at home and then use 30 minute sessions once a month to produce a first year wall collage.

But, there are some issues with the current pricing plan. A couple of these are obvious, but several of them are less apparent. In no specific order, the following are the big issues.

• “Package Price” (older printed material) or “Second Printing” (newer and web material) prices have been found to be confusing.
• A la carte pricing is nearly always lower per shoot than package pricing. This was in some ways the point, but I need to discuss it further below.
• Many inquiries of the “how much would it be to…?” type come in. 90% of the time you will be receiving a response from me. The vast majority of these do not end with a booking but consume 15-30 minutes of my time working up a package for them.
• There is no readily available path to get a DVD of selected high-resolution images.
• Package pricing is nearly always lower per print, so it is difficult to compare ahead of time the price difference between photographers.
• Packages make it easier to tell a friend about us because a lot of the services can be simply lumped together.
• Many wedding consultants will not list a photographer without a fixed package fee schedule.

To touch quickly on weddings, wedding packages have been in the works for a while now and will be rolled out next year after the exciting changes here have died down. Our schedule is allowing for very few weddings this summer so it made more sense to turn that into a long-term project that will be rolled out this fall. This may remove the a la carte pricing option for all weddings booked next year.

There’s simply no way to get around that a la carte pricing always looks higher per print than the packages. The economy is down right now, we can all see it, we all know it, and we are all looking for the best deal. When I developed our a la carte pricing setup, and yeah, I will take all credit and blame for that one, my feeling was that it would appeal to budget minded people like myself. It was last night when I was ordering some minor products and was almost ready to get 500 for 50 cents each instead of the 4 for $6 that I really needed. That was the wake-up call I needed to look again at bulk package pricing. The issue is one of perceived value, and I had forgotten that there is real value to perceived value.

So, the changes. Right now a la carte pricing is not going away, it may never go away. In the next few weeks we have a print run of marketing materials coming out and these will be updated to include some initial packages and pricing. At the same time the website will be refreshed in the same way. Feedback is welcomed.

The packages are as yet unnamed, I may put my nerd hat on and name them after the periodic table, or I may make names up, or go with silver, gold, marsupial, platinum, or even just I, II, III. At first these are simply going to be based on requests I have gotten on the phone or via e-mail and so have already worked up estimated pricing for. For instance an in-home session with 1 11×14 and 1 8×10 is already $100 since the print credit covers both of those. Yesterday I worked out that a 1 hour newborn session with 1 11×14, 3 8×10, 2 5×7, and 6 4×6 was about $150. I have to differentiate between the in-home pricing and the studio pricing. Right now both are the same, but that is changing soon there may be two separate price lists or there may be package price + surcharge.

All in all I am somewhat saddened that in some ways I see this as an end to my a la carte pricing experiment, but I look forward to working with our clients to bring forth high quality photography at reasonable package prices.

The blog has been quiet as there are some exciting developments in the pipeline coming along this July. Stay tuned as there will be specials and promotions to celebrate.

The second week of December is even still in time to get prints made to give as gifts. Remember that if you’ve just started a family your parents are going to want to have a framed 8×10 somewhere in their house!

peace unto you

We ended up ordering 50, and included photos from our wedding and the honeymoon in Australia, can’t go wrong with kangaroos!

If you and your family are looking to send out photo christmas cards you’ll need to call schedule your photo session with enough time to spare to send the cards out. I try to process images as fast as I can, but it may take up to 2 weeks after the photo session for the cards to arrive without placing a rush order. If you are sending out in time for Christmas, the first week of December would be the absolute latest time to schedule your session.

You can pick out your template ahead of time at pickyourholidaycard.com or view my printed samples of some of the most popular 4×8 and 5×7 flat card sizes before or after your photo session. Cards with envelopes start as low as $1 each.