We Have a Winner!

We have a winner in the What is it? Memory Maker bracelet contest! Congratulations, Abby Meyer! Your name has been selected by using Random.org. Your bracelet will be mailed to you next week. Hope you enjoy it!



So...What was it?


My Pig. Her name is Penny! Great guessing Guys!! I will have another what is it give away soon!

Card Club Winner

I am still waiting for the winner of the card club giveaway to reply to the congratulatory email I sent. If I do not hear from this person by October first, another winner will be selected.

Bayview Dog Park

This past Sunday, I had the opportunity to spend the day with the best friends any human could have! Bayview Dog Park, located close to down town Pensacola, is the best dog park I have ever seen! A good sized area of the Bayview Park has been fenced so dogs can run free from the leash! The enclosure even includes a beach area for swimming! At any given time through out the day, I watched no less than 15 dogs of all sizes, shapes and breeds playing in the park. Call me crazy, but the dogs reminded me of kids on a playground. You could tell they were smiling and laughing as they ran in packs chasing each other! The excitement was contagious because all the humans were in high spirits, as well. Remarkably, all of the dogs got along well together. I did not witness any aggressive behavior while I was there, although, I am sure it happens from time to time. If you own a dog and have not yet been to the Bayview Dog Park, you and your dog are really missing out on something very special. Not only is it a great way to exercise your dog, it is an opportunity to meet other dog lovers.

As you can see from the photo above, little dogs have just as much fun and really hold their own with the big dogs. If you own a small dog, please don't be afraid to bring him or her to play at the park. I saw a Great Dane running with a poodle and everything was fine! Somehow, I think the dogs know they must behave or their owner's might not bring them back! Speaking of Pet owners, all that I witnessed on Sunday were very responsible and kept a vigilant eye on their dogs.

This is all well and good, you might be thinking, but how am I going to transport a smelly, dirty, wet dog back home? Not to worry! The Bayview Dog Park has thought of everything! A dog wash station is provided right by the exit! Bring your own shampoo and towel, and after his bath, your dog is ready for the ride home! If you are concerned about him being wet, let him air dry as you walk through the lovely park or stroll out on the pier to watch the boaters and jet skiers.

If you are thinking of visiting the dog park, there are a few rules that you should take note of before you go. I will skip the common sense rules and just tell you about the ones you might not be aware of. First, children under the age of 16 are not allowed to be in the fenced enclosure. This is for the safety of the child, obviously. I did witness this rule being broken time and time again without any enforcement so use your best judgement here. Another rule for all you multiple dog households: Limit 2 dogs per person. I think this is a great rule because a dog owner really needs to be able to control their dog(s) in the event that something bad does happen. I spoke to several people at the park, who told of a woman that brings 5 dogs every time she comes. They complained about how out of control her dogs are and how she does nothing to correct the problems. To me, this ruins the experience for everyone and also creates a dangerous situation for all dogs and humans at the park. With so many "no dogs allowed" areas, I would hope everyone would cherish this park and follow the rules so it will not close!

The Bayview Dog Park is open 6am-9pm and is located on 20th Ave. near Osceola Drive. Click the link for map and additional information. http://

I am definitely going to return with my dogs next weekend! See you there!

Win a Memory Maker photo bracelet!

Everyone loves pictures of their loved ones and pets right? We love them so much that we keep them in wallets, digital key chains, on myspace and facebook pages, taped to filing cabinets at work and framed all over our homes. The Memory Maker company created a way for us to wear our favorite pictures in a trendy piece of jewelry. As a photographer, I love the Memory Maker line of jewelry and Key chains. The only challenge for the average person is getting their pictures re-sized to fit into the very tiny frames that the jewelry offers. Most people try to cut out portions of pictures that they already have printed. This doesn't always work out and frustration takes over! With a little knowledge of photo editing software, the frustration is gone and you can re-size and print any pictures you want to fit into the jewelry perfectly! Most of my clients don't want to take the time to do this, so I have them email me the pictures they want re-sized. I get them all cropped, re-sized and placed onto a 4x6 size jpg so they can then print with their home printer or send to a lab.

NOT TO WORRY! For this giveaway, I will re-size your images for you!

How to enter

1. Take a look at the "what is this?" photo and comment with your best guess of what it is.

2. make sure to leave me your email address so I can contact you if you are a winner.

3. one entry per person

4. Entry deadline is October 1st, 2008 at 11:00pm central time.

That's it! Winner will be selected via random draw on October 2nd, 2008. Your answer does not have to be correct to win.

NOW....WHAT IS IT???

SEND SOME SNAIL MAIL LOVE -WIN A CARD CLUB MEMBERSHIP!

Do you hate your mailbox? I know, I do. The relationship has been going down hill for several years now. I blame it on email, myspace and the digital world! No one sends cards anymore and I miss that! It is for this reason that I created my card shop! I now offer Hallmark quality cards that you can mail to friends and family using your very own pictures! I also offer gag cards that I create for you in photoshop. Let's say you really don't like the guy your daughter is dating. Well, get a full face shot of the guy and also one of your daughter and I will create the " if they mated" card to show your daughter a very scary offspring! I also have card clubs for people who never want to have to send a belated card again! Business plans are also available for better client relationships!

To find out all about it, please visit my website at: http://www.paulaspictureperfect.com/ and click on custom cards.


To kick off this new card business and blog I am going to give away a card club membership! This entitles the winner to send 12 cards throughout the year! You can select a card from the card shop or you can send me your own pictures and I will create a card with them! You can also request a certain photo and I will do my best to create it for you. I am doing this because I am still building the card shop. I know you will love this service and your friends ,family and mailbox will too!

To enter check out the details under Custom Cards on my website: http://www.paulaspictureperfect.com/ and come back and post a comment with your favorite quote, joke or greeting card verse. Don't forget to include your name and email address. Giveaway ends on September 25th at 10pm central time. Winner will be notified via email. You may enter daily, but must leave a new quote, joke or greeting card verse each time. Winner will be selected randomly from all qualified entries received.

Thanks to everyone who enters and visits my brand new blog! I appreciate each and every one of you! If you know anyone who loves photography, send them to my blog. I will be posting tips and techniques that anyone with a camera can benefit from!

BACK IT UP!!!!

Negatives vs. Compact Flash cards: What are we forgetting? Think back to a time when cameras used film. It seems like a long time ago right? Actually, most people were not on the digital bandwagon fully until recently. Unbelievably, I still observed customers turning in their yellow film canisters at photo labs pretty regularly until about a year or two ago. Now I watch in amazement as people line up with digital camera in hand, pop out the compact flash card and insert it into a machine to order prints. Kiosks equipped with compact flash card readers have made it very easy for the average consumer to crop, brighten, darken or even color correct their digital images prior to printing. An hour later out pop 4x6 prints of precious moments frozen in time. The consumer then formats the compact flash card and starts snapping away, capturing hundreds of new pixilated memories.
O.k. , let’s get back to film for a moment. Remember when you picked up your pictures a whole week after you dropped off the roll of film to be processed? Not only did you have fabulous prints of your vacation to Yellowstone, you had a back up of all those memories in the form of negatives! What happened to the back up? Most people don’t back up their compact flash cards on their computers, much less on a CD! Even when the photo lab offers to include a CD with the picture order, most consumers turn it down to save a buck. What happens when your prints get ruined? Even worse, what happens when you keep months or years of pictures on a compact flash card and it corrupts? Most consumers do not realize that compact flash cards and memory sticks can fail. They can and they do. Trust me. I once saw a grown man cry after losing ALL of his honeymoon pictures. Was he crying because the pictures were lost or because his brand new wife was going to kill him? Who knows? All I do know is the whole mess could have been avoided if he would have backed up his pictures! Invest in a card reader, put the images on your hard drive and then burn a CD or DVD for archival storage. Never keep months and years of pictures on the compact flash card sitting in your camera. Take a few minutes to back up your images regularly. You can still keep the images on your compact flash card until you want to print them, but now have the security of knowing you have a back up and your memories are safe.

Finally captured the osprey!

Patience, and lots of it! That is what you need to photograph animals in the wild. This osprey visits my pond at least twice a day.

She is an awesome sight to watch as she circles the pond and then dives in after her meal. She is extremely accurate and usually comes up with a large fish in her talons. As I sit and edit digital images on my computer, I keep an eye out for her. Once I see her through my picture window, I grab my camera and run out the door. This has become a twice daily ritual for me. This gorgeous bird soars in the sky...mocking me! She sees me coming and most of the time she circles the pond staring down at me with her black eyes before she takes off to hunt someplace more private. Other times, she takes a dive before I can get the camera in focus. I try not to get frustrated because I know to really do it right, I would need to literally camp out by the pond in a blind. Unfortunately, I have to work for a living so I am unable to camp out for days on end waiting for the perfect shot. After I retire, you can bet I will be out someplace in the woods getting all the amazing photos I missed in my youth! The shot above was nothing but pure luck. Once I spied her, I made it to the pond so fast that I could have qualified for the olympics! She was taking a dive right when I got there so I simply dove to my knees, focused on the splash and shot. I had no time to even compose the shot, although happy to finally get something, yet it is still not the shot I have in my mind. The osprey was not happy with this shot either because she came up from the dive empty "taloned". I guess I kept her from catching her dinner. Hopefully one day she will trust me enough to hunt oblivious to my presence.

Welcome!

My name is Paula Petsel. I have been a professional photographer for 22 years now. I have a hard time telling people how long I have been capturing people's memories on film and now with pixels because I can't believe I am that old! I have a beautiful studio in Pensacola, Florida and a fantastic famliy that I love very much. For years now, clients have been asking me to teach a photography class. I finally decided it would be easier for people to log onto a blog and learn at times that would work with their individual schedules than to try and teach at a specific time. I will try to pick fun subjects with easy to understand examples. I will also use this blog as a place to share some great pictures of some of my fantastic clients and their pets. The portrait above is a portrait of my beloved pets. This was no easy task. The turkey nearly destroyed the studio! I am still finding turkey feathers! Pet photography is one of my specialties. I have always been an animal lover and was convinced, as a teenager, that I would one day work for National Geographic! I was very shy back then and just could not see myself working with people. Today, I still love animal photography , but also enjoy making people look their best. I can't tell you what a great feeling it is to have a client call or email to tell me how much love their portriats. Teens are probably my favorite subject to photograph. I enjoy taking a high school senior who might have all those normal insecurities that adolecence brings and make them feel like a top model by the end of the shoot. I love to help my clients discover how truly beautiful they are!

My studio is called Paula's Picture Perfect http://www.paulaspictureperfect.com

Currently, I shoot a lot of actor's headshots, high school seniors and families at the beach.

Check out my site if you have time and make sure you visit the portrait galleries.

That's about it for now. I will work on my first lesson and post it when I can.