Business tips for photographers: A new easier way to update your Google + business page
I am very pleased to hear that Google has announced they are simplifying the way you update your Google + Business page (as let’s be honest it isn’t currently that easy to navigate!).
To try out the new way of adding photos and posts follow the steps below:
Log into your Gmail business account account
Open up Google in your browser
Type in your business name
Voila!!
Now you can much more easily add, or correct, business information, post blog posts and share photos. You can also see how many views your listing is getting.
A pat on the back for Google for making our lives a little easier!
Business tips for photographers: Fetch as Google Tool
It’s well documented that good, interesting, shareable content is a great way to drive your overall SEO position in today’s crowded professional photography market. One tool that can be underutilised is Google Webmasters ‘Fetch as Google’ which gives YOU the power to submit new pages and blog posts and to tell Google to go and read it. Often we publish new web pages and blog posts and wait for them to show up in Google search results, but if your site it still rising up the SEO rankings, this can take weeks or even months to appear. Below is a step by step guide on how to ‘Fetch as Google’
Step 1: Log in to your Google Webmaster Account
If you don’t have a Google Webmaster Account the first thing you need to do is set one up and go through the Verification process. This is to ensure that you are the site owner. You have 5 choices of how to verify your account ranging from an HTML file upload to using your Google Analytics tracking code. I found it easiest to use the first option which includes downloading a verification code which you add to your website. For help with verifying your photography website, you can visit this help page here.
Step 2: Crawl > Fetch as Google
Click on Crawl on the menu on the left-hand side and then click on Fetch as Google. Next, enter your web page or blog link into the input field, (leaving off the www address) and click the FETCH button.
Step 3: Submit to index
Once you have pressed fetch, wait to see if you have a green tick and success message. Once you see this you can then submit your page to be indexed using the Submit to index button.
At this point, you have 2 choices
You can submit just that one page or blog post OR
You can submit that page or blog post plus all of its direct links.
If you have made major changes, or the new page or blog links to other pages on your site, then I would use the second option but please note you can only choose this option 10 times a month.
Step 4: Share, Share, Share!
The final step is now to go and share your lovely new page or blog post across all social media. You want your hard work to reach as many people as possible so consider Facebook, Google +, Instagram, Twitter and any other media where you may reach your target audience.
HELP! I have followed your steps and it’s not working!
If you have followed these steps and the result says “Redirected” and not “complete” here’s what you need to do. Thanks to Andy Dane for his technical support on how to resolve this issue.
X
Andy Says “This is a simple fix, and it’s down to the way that Google sees websites. As far as Google is concerned, the HTTP version of your site is different to the HTTPS version of your site. Also, the www.domain.com version of your site is different to domain.com.
X
When you get this error, it means that you have redirected traffic from one of these to the other. This is, in fact, the right things to do as you only want one version of your site to be reached! However, when you do this, you also need to change which version of your site you are using in Google Search console.
x
As you can see in the screenshots below, it’s showing “redirection” when my site is https://andydanephotography.co.uk because I’ve redirected all traffic to https://www.andydanephotography.co.uk/. So simply head back to your Search Console Dashboard, add the additional version of your site and it’s Sitemaps, and do your fetch from there”
x
If you are unable to resolve this yourself, you can contact Andy here.
Welcome to our April, children’s image of the month, blog circle!
For those of you that don’t know, I run a Facebook group which is all about outdoor children’s photography and I have close to 900 members now who support one another and discuss all elements of shooting outside. Last week a good friend (and very supportive member) Karen Wiltshire started a thread asking people to share their favourite image of the month. It got me thinking about starting a blog circle so we can also share all these great images outside of that group, so here is the first of our image of the month posts!
My image was taken on my Nottingham Workshop held last week at the Devere Orchards hotel which is within the grounds of Nottingham university, It’s a really interesting architectural building and also has some gorgeous formal and wild gardens outside. We photographed from 3-7pm and the image below was taken on the second shooting session around 6:30 pm. Usually we would avoid very harsh light and dappled light but in this case, we felt like we could use the light in a more creative way!
This breaks a number of lighting rules, but I loved the more editorial feel of the image. I also chose to edit the image in a different way, cooling down the greens with additional cyan and making the overall image more matt using curves. I love the colour of her hair compared to the foliage.
The image was taken on my 5diii with my 70-200 2.8L. I like to shoot at a low aperture so this was shot at 2.8.
To visit Stacey’s post about why having Mum & Dad in the photo is so important please click here
Its been an incredibly busy Summer of family & child photo-shoots, so I thought I would share a few of my favourite images from those shoots I can share (some are still being kept as surprise presents for Grandparents)…
An outdoor family photo shoot in Poole, Dorset
This photo session took place in the grounds of a stunning house and gardens in Dorset. The location had some stunning tree lined avenues, huge bamboo bushes and lots of space for the kids to run around in. I especially loved the bamboo garden which I thought made a really great backdrop for a family shoot.
A family photo-shoot at Alice Holt, Hampshire
This shoot just goes to show how lucky I am to work with such great families. It rained pretty much the entire shoot, and a lot of the test images had mum, dad and the kids in their rain jackets and then we would whip them off for the shoot. One of my favourite images was of the youngest family member inside the tunnel. I had to climb right inside to get the shot but it was worth it! I also think the roundabout shot is great fun but I must say I did make a little bit of a fool of myself as I fell off while trying to get this shot. Like a true professional photographer I kept my camera aloft so only my pride was hurt 🙂 These were taken in Alice Holt forest which is well worth a visit if you live in Hampshire. It also has a high ropes course for the kids as well as lots of really great play areas. www.forestry.gov.uk/aliceholt
An extended family shoot in Hemel Hempstead
Boxmoor is one of my favourite locations to photograph at as its very local to me and also it has some stunning fields which are easily accessible for family shoots. This family shoot was bought for mum by her 2 daughters and the entire family came along for the shoot. It was so lovely to get all of the grandchildren together and I have since photographed both family’s separately too so now I feel as if I know them really well.
A family photo-shoot in Buckinghamshire
These images were taken in Buckinghamshire and Mum is actually a great photographer herself. She wanted some family shots where she was also in the photos, something us photographers often forget to do. The 4 children were such great fun and the eldest was amazing at giving me beautiful thoughtful expressions.
Family photo shoot in Exeter, Devon
A little further than my usual locations, this summer I travelled down to Exeter in Devon for another extended family photo shoot. This shoot was bought by the sons and daughters for their dads birthday as an opportunity to get one great group shot of them all as well as Granddad with his grandchildren. Before the shoot I also spent half a day with one of the family on a 1-2-1 session teaching her more about how to use her DSLR to get great photos everyday. A really fun afternoon and lovely to spend time with a family that clearly have so much love for one another.
Child Photographer in Hemel Hempstead
This family shoot was again up at Boxmoor in Hemel Hempstead. We had a glorious day of sunshine and real fun searching for bugs in the logs and long grass and trying to catch the flying seeds in the field.
An indoor / outdoor family photo shoot in St Albans, Clarence Park
I love working with families in their home and their home and then heading outdoors – the kids have an opportunity to get to know me and show me around their room and then by the time we head to the park we are ready to play. The girls looked gorgeous in their dresses but I loved that Mum & Dad would still let them climb their favourite tree in them – my kind of family 🙂
An photo-shoot at home to celebrate the arrival on a new baby
This is the second time I have photographed this family and I loved meeting their new addition. We started the session in their daughters room and then progressed to a Peppa Pig cake baking session.
If you would like to book a family photo-shoot in 2016 then please email [email protected]. I also train both beginner and advanced professional photographers and all details can be found here .
Nina Mace child photographer of the Year – The Guild of Professional Photographers
Children’s photographer, creating your what to wear guide clothing for outdoor photo shoots
Over the next 2 months I will be running a number of children’s photography workshops all around finding great light and using environmental backdrops. Ahead of my photography training days, I brief my families on what to wear to ensure that THEY are the focus of the images and not their clothing. I believe it is very important for a Children’s photographer to liaise as much with a family in advance to get the best, and widest variety of images, they possibly can.
” We want the child to be the first thing we see in an image, not their clothing”
Images captured on the Basingstoke Children’s Portraiture Workshop in June
Using a colour wheel as inspiration
As your photography style and vision grows you will start to develop a stronger sense of how you like to style children for your shoots. I personally like strong contrast so will often add a pop of colour which would be considered a complimentary colour on the colour wheel. There are 3 different ways that you can use a colour wheel for inspiration:
1. Complimentary colours – opposites attract so choosing colours on the opposite side of the colour wheel.
2. Analogous Colours – Colours next to one another.
3. Triad colours – This is more complex where you use colours from every third of the wheel.
Creating your own bespoke colour pallets to share with families
As technology moves on, the colour wheel has now become an interactive tool in the form of ‘Coolers‘. This is one of the most useful free tools I have come across online and not only can you use this on your desktop, you can also install it as an app on your phone!
To start you identify one colour as a base colour. For example, being Summer there are a huge amount of Summer greens around, like the ones shown below. I would dropper off any of these greens in Photoshop to get a HSB reference, and drop this into Cooler and then lock that colour in.
Here are 4 colour sets generated, using the same green as a base, and you can see how they move between complimentary, analogous and traid colours mentioned above. My style leans towards the 4th panel which keeps a more neutral based with the light blue and green, and then adding a pop of purple or magenta.
Using Pinterest to share your style & colour vision
Once I have generated my colour charts I then share these with the families in the form of a pinterest board like the one shown below. I show example of boys and girls of different ages. If you would like to follow my board you can visit it Nina Mace Photography Pinterest board .
Feel free to share any tools you use for deciding on your outfits for children’s outdoor photo-shoots in the comments below.
For more of my blogs for Professional Photographers please visit here and to subscribe so all the latest blogs come straight to your inbox just pop your details below.
