Bizy week

I have some super fun shots from the plane trip but I left my camera in the car so I'll have to show you later... Virgin was running a deal so I flew first class which I'm so glad I did because I had been up almost all night filming a bunch of Freedom Club videos. It seems that everyone loves the content which is awesome and now I'll focus on raising the consistency.

Some other cool news is that my buddy Frederick hooked me up with a gig for Adobe and I'll be kicking off a press event for them in New York next week where I'll show the media how it's possible for wedding photographers to wiz through our workflow using Lightroom.

Then come meet up with me at PhotoPlus! I'll be at the Adobe booth from 11:30am - 12:30pm on Thursday the 18th. Free copies of Showit Web will be given out too. :)

Lastly, if you want to be the first to demo the upcoming Showit Sites come to Jason Groupp's studio next Wednesday morning at 8am. You can get an address from his website
and more info about the workshop at this website.

This is a great trip because I'm cramming a lot in. After this I have one more wedding in November and that's it. I have a full two months without a single thing on my schedule and I'm so amped.

Tricked out plane!

Tricked out plane!, originally uploaded by davidjay13.

Sent from my iPhone

Full Hands?

I'm not sure if I just posted about this but it's something I'm fascinated by so it's worth two posts- it is the importance of being available. My friend Deyl and I talk about it a lot because we constantly see how the best opportunities come to us when we haven't filled our schedule in advance.

It's so weird how it works but in the C.S. Lewis book, The Problem of Pain, he quotes St. Augustine saying, "Often God wants to give us something, but cannot, because our hands are too full."

Are you working hard to free up your life? There are lots of ways to do it - Automation - Outsourcing - Delegation - Elimination and probably many many more. The fastest is Elimination but it's not the easiest. This week I want to challenge you to think of one thing that you can eliminate or maybe just trim down from your daily routine.

Living in the Clouds

Ok...so...my biz partners often tease that they bring me back to reality because I do tend to be overly optimistic about projects and things and in all honesty they are optimists too and I love that. I love living that way.

Although recently I've realized that I've possibly spent a bit too much time trying to convince people of how great it is to live this way and not enough time growing with and enjoying people who are already live this way. I'm not into the debates and unfortunately there are some people who will not choose this way of living and when I'm around them a lot I see how it affects my own attitude and my own life. So I decided to make an immediate change in who I spend time with and where my thoughts go.

The last couple of nights I've gotten into bed and started laughing because of how excited I am about life and how surreal my life feels. I think it feels this way because I'm consciously making the effort and taking the time to grow and focus on how I can make positive changes in my own life and hopefully in others lives as well.



This morning I woke up quite literally in the clouds. Can you believe how beautiful this is. My house is just above the layer of fog that rolls into Santa Barbara sometimes and it feels like heaven.

Crystal is more valuable than diamonds.

I've worked with several amazing photographers, many incredible programmers and videographers and there is no doubt in my mind that my friend Crystal will be playing the most important role in making sure that my businesses and my life keep moving in the right direction - which of course is that of freedom. :)

I met Crystal a little over a year ago through Gary and Missy Fong on a trip to Catalina and then had the chance to go out and work with her at the Alive Festival. She felt like it was time for a change of pace so she uprooted her life in Ohio to manage my life out here in Santa Barbara!



She's only been here a few weeks and has already made a world of difference and this past weekend she did one of the things she is brilliant at which is host a party! Some of you know she was the wedding coordinator for Gary and Missy's incredible wedding and after seeing her put on that show I knew we were going to be able to host some sweet parties...and last night we did.

It wasn't the official house warming party so don't trip out if you didn't get invited. It was an alumni party for all of my friends who I went to Westmont with and I don't know how many ended up coming but probably 60 people and it was soooooo much fun! We picked out bottles of wine from every country we could find and ordered sushi from Sakana to have alongside all the yummy treats that Crystal and Jasmine made.



My dear friend, client, and ridiculously awesome photographer Jasmine Star came up for the weekend and helped out a lot too - including taking all these gorgeous photos. Jasmine also wrote a sweet note on her blog about how blessed I am and she is spot on about that and a huge reason I feel blessed is because I have friends like her in my life.

Life is so short but can be made so sweet by surrounding yourself with the right people and I am very thankful to have the luxury to work with my friends.

Wii Boxing at the Freedom House

Last night Westmont had a Presidental Gala (I have no idea what that means) but afterwards I invited some friends over for some fun and we couldn't help but break out the Wii which my buddy Todd had just sent up to me and it's amazing! Just watch this video! These are my dear friends Erin and Paige beating each other up.

U R Loved

I've been loving getting up each morning and having the library all setup. I've been wanting a place like this for so long.

Today I was looking back through some of my books and I came across this quote from Henry Nouwen and I want to encourage all of you to look for a time this weekend, whether you're out shooting a wedding or whether you're at home with your family, to get yourself to a place where you can show someone that they are loved. I'm sure it will change their world - and yours.

So Excited!

Yesterday I found the most amazing piece of furniture! I'm picking it up today and you'll trip out. It's so beautiful.

...also yesterday Crystal received the bookshelf and lamps from Design Within Reach and got it all setup. It was basically a giant lego set and it totally confused me but she figured it out and I love it! She thought of the idea of putting the lamp inside of it. She's artsy like that.

I feel a little bit bad about the raindeer rug but it looks really cool and the only thing this room needs now is the rest of my books, a big painting and a little shelf in the corner to put a flower on. :)

Animal Karma

Last night I continued my animal whispering with the Freedom house cat. It's a really friendly cat. The end of the video is so funny because it didn't want to leave and kept trying to sneak in.

My favorite is still the hummingbird video though!

Back to School

I was really excited to go and chat with the marketing class at Westmont today and share my story with them.

I wanted to challenge them not to sacrifice happiness for a sense of certainty. Uncertainty is inevitable and so why not be happy and pursue something with purpose and passion!

I actually think some of them were not into my philosophies but it was an 8am class so I can't blame them for being a bit out of it...and at all my talks I tend to go a bit overboard on the philosophies and not give enough practical "How to" but I'd rather error on that side... and it was the first time I talked about my new Get-FIT idea.

FIT stands for Flexibility - Income - Time which are what Tim Ferris would call "Freedom Multipliers"

I had a great time and all the pretty faces made the experience worth it. If you want to listen to a good song click on Ben Harper's "Forever" in my little audio player to the right and listen to the words.

People spend so much time
every single day
running 'round all over town
giving their forever away.

Don't give away your forever.

Helicopter

This is so cool - you guys have to watch this. The painters have been working 14 hour days to get everything done by this evening. I really just need a break from having everything torn up and having workers here and the painting is the final thing for awhile so I'm so excited!

Tons more furniture coming in next week but what's even better is my new helicopter. I haven't gotten a handle on how to control it yet but I'm learning.

Just steal one...

All of you have been hearing me yap about showing your personality online and a little while back my friend April asked what advice I would give to someone who lacked in the personality area.

My advice would be to spend 100% of your time developing that area of your life.

...another faster option would be to just steal someone elses. LOL.... This is too funny not to post.

Click here.

to read more...and click on the picture to see the identical blog posts. Melissa Jill is such a sweet friend of mine and I've wanted to steal her personality but this is a big no no.

New Chair :)

So when I came home from Nashville I was so stoked because my new chair had come in and Crystal had already set it up! How awesome is that. I'm going to order a pretty cool bed today because I'm still sleeping on a $50 aero bed. lol. I'm a nice employer because I left my king sized tempurpedic bed for Crystal to use in the apartment.

So right now I'm sitting in this chair* waiting for the painters to come. As soon as they finish painting I'll be able to move the chair down to the Library. That's going to be my favorite room I think and I'll be doing tons of Freedom Club videos from in there. I've been dying to have a stable setup.

Also, Internet business is so fun and for some reason I get really excited when people order from other countries and before 8am we had orders from 5 different countries. Norway, Germany, Belgium, Canada, and Alaska which is kind of another country.

ok...painters are here...gotta go.

*Design within Reach is a cool store/showroom, but to get a lot of the exact same stuff at 1/4 the price and in 1/4 of the time go to PGmod.com. They don't have as good of descriptions though so go into a DWR showroom and check everything out but don't buy it there before checking online.

Sweet Pics!

Max and Shara had such a wonderful wedding and I'm waiting to collect a few more shots from the other photographers before I make a slideshow. I think there were 6 of us there so the pics area all spread out and I was kinda handling the guy shots and few of the groups which was really fun. Max and the guys were awesome and were up for anything so we had a good time.

I shot this at f 1.2! I just double checked! Sweet! Never done a group at 1.2 before.

Max and Shara Hsu Wedding!

I am drifting in and out of conciousness. I had a lot of donuts and coffee today.

I will post some pictures tomorrow but here is a fun one of all the groomsmen. Max is the dude that started Superchick for those of you who follow Christian music and I met him randomly a year ago while I was giving a presentation here in Nashville.


Out of nowhere this crazy Asian dude with a gnarly mohawk started harassing me about music copyright but afterwards he came up and we talked and became friends and now we're working on a solution to bring music licensing to the wedding industry. It's a long road but it's been kind of fun to see the labels imploding along the way. Quit frankly they deserve it.


Here's another shot of Shara and Max Hsu, Jen Kroll, and me. Jen Kroll got some INCREDIBLE pictures from the day so be sure to check them out on her blog.

Great wedding

Great wedding, originally uploaded by davidjay13.

But this post wedding snack made me really happy!

Sent from my iPhone

The Symphony and LeAnn Rimes

Last night I went to the Symphony and it was so fun! I had no idea!

*Don't pay any attention to the woman in the background being strangled

Nashville just built the most incredible new Symphony building and they have these Pop-Symphony concerts and last night my friends Jen Kroll and Tiffany McCullough invited me to go see LeAnn Rimes and it was amazing. Tiffany is an accomplished violinists so she scored us some great seats!

At one point in the show LeAnn Rimes even waved to me. The guy sitting next to me mistakenly thought she was waving to him because he helps produce her records but I know she was actually waving to me.

Be Like Jasmine

I think we can all agree that Jasmine Star is someone who's success and sweetness go hand in hand. Every time I present on the importance of "Selling our Personality" I think of her because her personality is worth millions.

She just wrote a wonderful article on ProPhotoResource about how her career exploded and in her first year she booked 36 weddings and was named the Photographer of the Year by Blu.

Everything about this girl is incredible and you can read a little piece of the article by clicking on it here and be sure to go to PPR and read the rest.

PPA Sacramento!

Sacramento has a fantastic PPA group and last night was great. Nathan Smith has done an incredible job making this a community of friends and it was so neat to go hangout until the wee ours of the morning and hear about how they're helping each other succeed.

I'm headed back home just to get repacked because I head out at 6am for some fun in Nashville! I really like Nashville!

lots of stuff

This past weekend Sarah Barlow and Bob Davis stayed at the Freedom House and it was crazy! I was in the final stages of getting the floors put in so it was chaos and people were sleeping everywhere! I even slept outside in the hammock a couple of nights because there was no place to sleep inside. It was wonderful having them here though and it's funny because even though they both live in Chicago I see them almost every other month.

Here's a video of Sarah jumping off the balcony and I hope her dad doesn't see it. lol. Don't try this at home kids. We are trained professionals.



I'm so glad that today they finished the floors and I started buying up furniture like crazy. I've been dying for just one thing to sit on. I bought this place two months ago and I haven't been able to put any furniture in until today.


Crystal, who I'll introduce to all of you in another post has been such a huge help. When she first arrived she said, "Wow DJ - you finally figured out that you've been putting your bed spread on upside down." and I didn't know what she was talking about because I hadn't figured anything out but Sarah Barlow had been staying in the guest apt and she made the bed for Crystal so thanks EVERYONE for NOT telling me that for the past two years I've had my bedspread upside down!!!


In a few hours I'll be hopping on a flight to Sacramento to meet up with the PPA group up there. They are going to be the first group ever to see a demo of Showit Sites which is beyond cool and then I'm heading to Nashville for my friend (and business partner) Max Hsu's wedding.

That's all for now folks.

Are you consistent?

In athletics there is one thing that separates good athletes from great athletes and that is consistency. This is true in business as well.

In order to do this you must have defined what you're going to be about. What do you value and do the companies you partner with, the people you associate with, and the jobs you accept fit within your values?

Specifically one thing I've found is that photographers are tempted to adopt a "Nascar-like" approach. Taking any job they're offered or slapping any sponsorship they can onto their body and "partnering" with every company just to get a little publicity without thought or consideration of what they are about. I've certainly been tempted by this at times and have made mistakes even recently and that's ok. We all make mistakes but what's important is that we fix them asap.

Our reputation is the most valuable thing we have and the people we associate with and the ideas we spread certainly affect that.

Beautiful bamboo

Beautiful bamboo, originally uploaded by davidjay13.

I am so excited because they are almost finished putting in the bamboo
floor and it looks so beautiful! I can't wait to finally get some
furniture and live here!!!

Sent from my iPhone

Lightroom Update

You should get an update message through Lightroom or you can click the links.

Click here to get the update on Mac

Click here to get the update on Windows

Stars

Stars, originally uploaded by davidjay13.

I'm sleeping under the stars tonight. I have an abundance of friends
here so I'm sleeping outside. :) Sarah Barlow is in the guest apt and
Todd Watson and Bob Davis are on Aero beds. I love having people stay
here and this is my first time sleeping outside at the Freedom House
so I am curious what sort of creatures will come out.

Sent from my iPhone

PartnerCon Day 1

Once again Pictage's community shows itself to be one big family and when we get together it's just incredible. Thanks to my dear friend Melissa Jill for snapping this pic of me! Also, I filmed my whole presentation for the Freedom Club. I've been on the road non-stop so I wanted to offer a special treat to all of you this month b/c this presentation is packed with important info.

Last night we threw a rocking party! ...and I mean it was off the hook! Special thanks to everyone who has bought Showit Web for helping fund the bar tab and the guys at Kiss Wedding Books. I'm not sure anyone wants to see the pictures from inside the "KissingBooth" but no doubt they will end up all over the internet so stay tuned...and who's idea was it to have me speaking again at 9am this morning after a party like that!

You'll have to check the forums to see how fun it was but here's a shot of Kevin Swan throwing out some free ShootSacs.

LA PartnerCon

I flew in from Boston and headed straight down to LA for PartnerCon. So Fun!

I love PartnerCon because so many of my friends are here and it's like a big reunion. Also, There's a big party tonight and if you don't know the details ask me because you don't want to miss out!

Yummmm

Yummmm, originally uploaded by davidjay13.

I just got to Logan airport and I'm so excited because I found a
Dunkin donuts! ... And I took a risk putting my large coffee in my
computer bag so I could sneak it into the Red Carpet lounge. LOL.

Sent from my iPhone

Cool people

Cool people, originally uploaded by davidjay13.

I had such a great time at this PPA convention! I shot and posted this photo on my iPhone during the presentation and showed everyone how easy it was to put pictures on the blog.

Originially I thought I was doing an all day show like I did in Rhode Island earlier this year but I was actually only doing three hours. LOL....oops...It was awesome and jam packed with new info.

The majority was about creating your personality on the web! I'll be giving it again in LA on Wednesday and Thursday at PartnerCon.

I miss my friends

I had to leave SB just has my friends arrived! The Holritz's, from Tennessee, were staying at my place, Bob Davis was out shooting for Oprah and Shyla even came up and I had to leave. :(

Nathan took this sweet panoramic shot from my balcony and you can click it to see it bigger. After Boston I fly to SB just to pick up some clothes and then I head straight to LA but when I get home from that the bamboo floors will be in and I can finally buy furniture! Yea! I'm so amped!


Today was pretty funny because this convention is pretty big and they have a full on trade-show and everything and I poked around a little bit and as I was walking I heard one lady ahead of me ask her friend. "Who's this David Jay guy?" and the friend said, "He's good at streamlining workflow and he is into all that Lovecat stuff we've been hearing about." I had to turn around and duck into another room because I was laughing so hard.

I get the impression that people sometimes think the knowledge sharing and likability stuff is a fad. Something like selective color that will go out of style in a few years. Whether it's popular or not I think it's the best way to live and I'm so excited for my presentation tomorrow. It's totally new and I think this is the first time in two years that I'm not giving my Get-FREE talk. Yea! I'm finally gonna put that whole thing on the Freedom Club so it's super important info but I need to move on from it. I think I gave that talk over 30 times.

Boston

Yesterday Joe Dunn came to pick me up and on our way to dinner we came across this funny dude from Australia who was such an awesome street performer!

He juggled knives and even squeezed his body through a tennis racket and a toilet seat! We ate at Cheers and then drove by the "real" Cheers location from the TV show.

I always unplug my phone at these conventions because hotel phones ring so loud and they scare me...and it's usually somebody asking questions about Showit Web or "What lens would you use in this situation..." or something and I tell them to checkout OSP. :) I love to meet with and talk to people but if I'm going to talk to somebody one on one I like it to be about things a little more meaningful than that. I do understand that there are few things in life more meaningful than Showit Web so maybe I shouldn't unplug my phone. I dunno.

Jeff and Julia Woods are coming tomorrow and I'm really excited about seeing them! They are incredible photographers and great people and they are speaking all day on Tuesday.

2 cool things!

I'm at LAX on my way to Boston for the PPANE convention but I just had to tell you about two cool things that just happened.

My mom used to always say that God blesses people who bless people and here's a cool story that just happened to me.

You know from my post below that I signed up for the Kiva organization two days ago and I committed to loan $500. Just a few hours later I received a random check in the mail for $5,000! I shot a wedding exactly a year ago and I shot it for free because the father of the bride has helped me so much over the years. A year later they said they still hadn't figured out how to thank me for the pictures so they were sending me this check as as gift! Wow! How amazing is that!


The next thing is that Showit-DVD has been cranking (19 orders yesterday) and we just had our first order from Japan! All our other products are instant download off the internet but it's kinda cool to think we are actually shipping something from the U.S. in this little box and it's gonna go all the way to Japan so a couple can enjoy and preserve their Showit slideshow.

We've found that the best way to sell Showit DVD's is to tell them that you can only keep the Showit Web show up for a few weeks and if they'd like to preserve the slideshow forever they can click on the order button at the bottom and order a show.

Be a Loaner!

Over the past year I've been reading about some big time entrepreneurs like Richard Branson, Robert Kiyosaki, Donald Trump, and others and one of the things that I've learned is how important it is to know how to manage debt. If you are one of those people who thinks borrowing money is bad I want to encourage you to think through it again. Understanding and managing debt is one of the most important skills a business person should have.

My friend Allison Trowbridge told me about this awesome organization! It's called Kiva and they allow you to give loans to small businesses in other countries! It's the coolest thing ever because you can see who you're giving a loan to and it tracks the repayment of it and then you can either take your money back or fund another business. Deyl has been working with another organization that works a little differently but I definitely like Kiva the best because it ads a story element to the transaction.

If you click on that link you can see my profile and read the stories of the people I'm loaning money to and sign up yourself!

Colorado Photographers

My buddy Josh is shooting a wedding in CO this weekend. The groom is a former Westmont soccer player so you KNOW the guy is a stud! :)

Anyway, if you wanna shoot with Josh hit him up here ASAP. I'm off to Boston on Saturday otherwise I would've come out and shoot it b/c it's gonna be a gorgeous wedding with a gorgeous couple.

Rock on!
DJ

Scaling your personality!

I just put this video up on the Freedom Club but I wanted to put it up here as well because I think it's a good intro to get people excited about PartnerCon next week.

I'm doing a brand new presentation on selling yourself over the web and I'm going to film it and put it up for all the Freedom Clubers b/c I know a lot of you can't make it and the content is amazing and super important.

This video is clearing up some misconceptions about WHY I outsource and WHY I absolutely DO NOT outsource certain areas of my business. In a small, personality driven, service industry like wedding photography we must find ways to continually sell ourselves in ways that scale.

3 Weeks no Spam! :)

I've been using Spam Arrest for 3 weeks and I love it.

It even has these little graphs showing how much good mail is coming and how much bad mail. In 23 days it's saved me from almost 4,000 spam messages - an average of 166 each day!

A step backwards :(

I've been in this industry for five years and I've seen a radical shift in mindset amongst wedding photographers who can now happily embrace each other as friends and collegues instead of competition.

Typically Studio Photography and Design does a pretty good job but this article really irks me. We've all worked incredibly hard to change the environment in our industry from one of scarcity to one of abundance and then to have some writer publish an article based on a *trivial 1250 responses pretty much calling new photographers "wannabes" and claiming that they "steal" business is something we must fight or we'll see the environment change rapidly back to where it was.

Here's my response to her and I'd encourage you to respond as well.

*Click here* and let them know how you feel.

------------------------

Dear Ms. Propper,

I'm writing about your August article, "Is a Pro Photographer Wannabe Cutting Into Your Business?"

I've been in this industry for five years and have seen a radical change in the culture that exists from that of scarcity and competition to that of abundance and community.

Your article not only implies that we (photographers) are competitors, which I don't believe we are, but it also encourages negativity towards newcomers. Many of us have worked hard to rid the industry of these attitudes and beliefs and publishing things like this takes us a step backwards.

Please consider the strides we have all taken to make this industry a better place to work and live and write articles that keep us moving in a positive direction.

Respetfully,
DJ

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* FYI - I got 1979 responses to my workshop survey overnight so I think it's pathetic that they would write an article after only receiving 1250.

Read a Book

Instead of doing your typical routine. Read a book today...and pick a book that will help you develop into somebody who can help others. (that means if Fabio is on the cover you need to save it for another day)

Below are links to my two booklists and by the end of the year I'll have another list to put up. I talk to so many people and so often their problems could be solved if they'd just invest some time in reading these books.

If you're looking for a great one to start with choose Love Is the Killer App. by Tim Sanders. I was given this book a couple of years ago by my friend Dane Sanders at a pivotal time in my career and embracing the ideas of giving and sharing knowledge is one of best things you can do for yourself and for others.

I'm living proof that even in "a saturated market" these principles work and if you want to be a leader you'll need to live in abundance.

Booklist One
Booklist Two

Read Read Read,
DJ

Thankful

This past week of celebrating Gary and Missy's wedding was one of the best weeks of my life. I love them so much and seeing them so in love and with all of their friends around them was an incredible experience that I wish I could live every day.

One of the reasons it was such an incredible week is because Crystal Hutchinson has been devoting her life to it and I feel like the luckiest man alive because in a few weeks she's moving from Ohio and into my guest apt and is going to essentially be in charge of my life and so a lot of you will get to meet her and see for yourself how wonderful she is.

Last night we stayed up almost all night because nobody wanted to say goodbye and I only got one hour of sleep so when I got home today I crashed out and slept for 7 hours this afternoon. When I woke up I didn't know where I was. I was expecting to see Gary's staircase above my head but once I realized I was back home I became so grateful for my friends and for all the people who have brought meaning to my life.

I also wanted to thank all of you for the wonderful birthday wishes and gifts. I haven't opened the mail yet but I'm excited to go through it.

Below is a little highlight video that Elysium Productions put together and it's really fantastic so be sure to click and watch it. There's a fun shot of me jumping into the pool with Bob Davis' son on my shoulders! :)

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