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The Professional Photographers of The Ozarks
Keith Branch Transcript Page
Keith Branch Expert PageANNOUNCER: This VTalk Radio's Spotlight is sponsored by morephotos.com the online photo sales solution to professional photographers worldwide. Welcome to the VTalk Radio's Photographer Spotlight with your host, John Bentley.
JOHN: Today we are in the studio with Keith Branch. He is President of the Professional Photographers of the Ozarks, based out of Fayetteville, Arkansas. Welcome, Keith, to VTalk Radio's Photography Spotlight.
KEITH: Thank you very much.
JOHN: Glad you could join us the morning.
KEITH: Welcome.
JOHN: Now give our listeners an overview of your organization.
KEITH: Well it's the Professional Photographers of the Ozarks which started in 1954, and I'll be honest with you, some of the nicest people you'll ever meet. Every year regardless of who's speaking at the convention, I'm there just to be around friends that I've grown accustom to over the years. It's there to help other photographers, not only in their professional career, but in their personal growth as well, their photography endeavors.
JOHN: Certainly the networking aspects of a photo organization has to be very helpful for the professional photographer.
KEITH:
Exactly. And there's some times that you can learn more just by sitting
down to have a cup of coffee or a meal with another photographer who may have
information that could be helpful to you. Not discounting the speakers
that we have, but sometimes you can get some incredible information just sitting
down and chatting.
JOHN: Now how many members are in the
organization?
KEITH: I want to guess about 300 - 400 right
now.
JOHN: And you guys have a yearly convention?
KEITH:
Actually we have two a year. One in the fall which is coming up usually
the end of October is Eureka Springs Best Western in the Ozarks there, and it's
always a big convention. The biggest of the year. The second one is
based out of Branson in the Middle of February and it's great as well being
Branson.
JOHN: Well when you join the organization, you get some kind
of discount passes or do you just automatically get passes to go to both of
these?
KEITH: When you join your membership gives you membership and of
course you get a discount as you mentioned on the convention registration
itself. It doesn't include the registration, because some people don't
want to go both, or just cannot make it in one year. So that's an
additional fee.
JOHN: Now tell us a little bit about the
convention. What exactly is going on there?
KEITH: Well this
particular convention coming up I'm very proud of. I've got a bright
mentor or a gentleman I was always looked up to, Larry Peters, who's been in
photography for at least 25 years, and as soon as he started out, he started
making things happen and become well known and well respected in the
industry. He is an incredible photographer out of Ohio, has three studios
there. Another one we have is Criag Meest. He is incredible, more
artistic minded and just really creative. You can tell by looking at his
images, he has a creative mind about him, and he's going to be on our Sunday
night schedule. Larry is all day on Monday. The last day is going to
be Scott Purcrand from Professional Photographers of America. He's the
CFO. He's going to be speaking on "It's your money, keep more of
it." More on the business aspect of photography which everybody needs to
know about.
JOHN: Certainly now what about some of the other benefits
of joining the Professional Photographers of the Ozarks?
KEITH: Some of
the benefits are actually the biggest thing we've talked about it's
networking. We have a great bunch of people there that are so open to
sharing. I've made many friends over the years and I think I've been a
member for about 9 or 10 years. I was going before I even moved to
Arkansas when I had to drive 7 hours to the convention, and that is the biggest
benefit. The networking you have with other people. We have a full
directory on our website www.ppozarks.net
that you can go to and see the directory of all the different members any time
you've got something down, you can go to them. That's the biggest
benefit. You also get discounts, of course, as we mentioned to the
conventions themselves, we have a trade show at the convention. The fall
one is the larger one, and we have that benefit as well.
JOHN: Now what
about a newsletter? Anything like that going out on a monthly basis, or
bi-monthly?
KEITH: Well since we're smaller that would be a great idea;
however, since we're a smaller organization and a little bit smaller budget, we
do two, I guess you would say, newsletters a year which is actually larger
postcards that are sent out reminding people, here's where our convention is,
what's going on at our convention, and get ready and start making your
reservations. But as far as a newsletter, no we don't have one so
much.
JOHN: We are in the studio today with Keith Branch. He is President of the Professional Photographers of the Ozarks, and you're listening to VTalk Radio's Photography Spotlight. We're
going to step aside for these important messages, we'll be right back.
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ANNOUNCER: This VTalk Radio Spotlight is sponsored by morephotos.com, the online photo sales solution to professional photographers worldwide.
ANNOUNCER: We now return you to the VTalk Radio's
Photography Spotlight with your host, John Bentley.
JOHN: We are back in the studio with Keith Branch. He is President of
the Professional Photographers of the Ozarks, and you're listening to VTalk
Radio's Photography Spotlight. Welcome back to the program, Keith.
KEITH: Thank
you.
JOHN: Now we've been talking about your photo organization down there in Arkansas, the
Arkansas area. Let's talk a little bit about you. First of all, you
are the president of the organization. How long has that been going
on?
KEITH: Well you start out at the bottom. You start out
as board of director number 4 and then you work your way through to treasurer,
secretary, vice president, president. It takes about 7 years to become
president. But through that you do learn the steps. You learn each
job coming up so that once you get there, you're more comfortable doing your job
and making sure that the memberships are taken care of.
JOHN: And what about
you, personally. Let's just talk a little bit about your experience as a
photographer.
KEITH: Oh, I've been a photographer...I actually
had a studio for 21 years now. I've actually been in photography for about
25 - 26 years. I started out in a little town called Alamo in west
Tennessee about 70 miles NE of Memphis and there I did more seniors than
anything, but I did a little bit of weddings, families, of course, and children
and school work, and then about 9 years ago, I changed to Arkansas.
I saw a lot of greener pasture so to speak in Arkansas, and saw that there was a
lot of potential here for me. So I did that, and sure enough that has come
true. I still do a lot of seniors, doing a little bit of weddings...a
little bit of everything, and of course over the years, I've done what I could
to give back to the organization while being on the board in Memphis, Ozarks,
earning my masters and craftsman and certified degrees.
JOHN:
Now let's get back to the organization a little bit. Now there's some
other things going on in the organization like a, I would imagine, a print
competition. Tell us a little bit about that.
KEITH:
Exactly. In print competition we have the same rules as the national
Professional Photographers of America. Now people can enter prints,
folios, albums, wedding albums, or portrait albums as well, and that is
usually our day. We start out on Sunday morning about 10:00 and go through
our print competition.. it easily goes til about 3 or 4. It's very
educational sitting in the audience and watching prints that come around and
listening to what judges have to say so that when you're watching print
competition, you can really see yourself getting motivated to do something
different and creative and knowing what to do and what not to
do. So it's educational as far as learning, but it's also sort of a
pat on your own back kind of thing when you do really well.
JOHN: Now
is there a...is maybe the winners of the competition presented on your website
or something along those lines?
KEITH: Yes they do. If you
go to www.ppozarks.net and I
believe award winners click on it, and it will actually show what awards
were presented and who won them, and sometimes it will actually show the actual
images and who won those. So it's good PR too for
them.
JOHN: Now if I was a professional photographer interested
in joining your organization, how do I apply?
KEITH: The easiest
way to do it..you can contact Frank Washburn in Little Rock, he's our
executive director, but the best way to do it is to go through our website
and just click on membership application and it's right there for you. You
print it out, fill it out, and send it into Frank, and you're a
member. It's that easy. Jim Lursh out of Nixonburg, Missouri,
has done an incredible job in doing our website.
JOHN: Now why don't
you share the website address with our listening audience.
KEITH: Sure
our website is www.ppozarks.net.
JOHN:
We've been in the studio with Keith Branch. He is President of the
Professional Photographers of the Ozarks, out of Fayetteville, Arkansas,
and you're listening to VTalk Radio's Photography Spotlight. Keith, I want
to thank you for tuning in and joining us today.
KEITH: Well thank you,
I've enjoyed it.
JOHN: And I want to thank everybody out there in the listening audience listening to us talk about photography here on VTalk. Everybody, John Bentley, signing off. Have a great day.
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