In 2011, my husband and I went on a short-term mission trip with our church to help out at Esperanza Viva, an orphanage in Puebla, Mexico—not one of us returned the same. I think it’s safe to say that I left a piece of my heart in Mexico. The children have so little and yet they are full of love and joy. We felt overwhelmed by the wonderful work God is doing there. There were countless stories of redemption for children who were born into abuse and neglect and rescued by the orphanage. In the week that we were there, we learned about many transformations that have taken place from the staff who dedicate their lives by serving these precious children.
Depending on a child’s background when they arrive at the orphanage, there is a natural adjustment period for them to learn what it is like to live in a supportive environment, where they are loved and can learn to trust others. The experience of witnessing the joy in these children and learning about how they have overcome heart-breaking circumstances, caused us to question what is really important in life. For me, I felt so selfish at living in such comfort with so much of my effort focused on improving my business—I love being a wedding photographer here in Pittsburgh, but could I do more?
The orphanage is at maximum capacity with 88 kids (the last time I checked) and there are so many more children in Mexico who need to be rescued. Esperanza Viva has great plans for expanding the Puebla campus as well as a few other locations throughout Mexico, so I have been praying about how I could help, and I’m hopeful in introducing a new project: Prints for Prosperity. This project is a small way for my business to support Esperanza Viva in its efforts to accommodate more at-risk children by providing them with a loving home and a good education. Twenty percent of each sale through Captivating Imagery client proofing galleries will be donated to Esperanza Viva. At the close of each year, I will post a fundraising report and share highlights from the orphanage. I’m thrilled to see how this project develops and I pray it will be a blessing for all involved.
https://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.png00kmillerhttps://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.pngkmiller2012-02-17 15:47:132013-11-18 16:05:40Prints for Prosperity, a project by Captivating Imagery
About a year ago, I made a change in how I sell prints to my wedding and portrait clients. I’m pretty excited about it because I believe it really improves their overall experience with Captivating Imagery and ensures top-notch quality photographic prints. First, let me describe what brought me to this change.
If you’ve shopped around for wedding photography or portraits before, it’s likely you’ve come across Pictage, a large company based in California that provides an online platform for selling and fulfilling print orders through their in-house lab. At first, it seemed like a no-brainer for photographers who want to focus on their craft and not get tied up with fulfilling client orders. I used Pictage for sales and print fulfillment for a few years and was happy to have someone else handle my print orders especially as I was busy building my business.
But the photographer in me, a.k.a. my type A side, could not overlook the fact that I wasn’t seeing my work going out and into the hands of my clients. How could I be certain of quality control? Not to say that I doubt Pictage’s print quality, but there’s a lot more than meets the eye that goes into making good prints, so I decided to take back control and personalize this process by accepting orders though my own online proofing galleries.
In the wedding photography business nowadays, most clients expect to get a disc of their images with permission to print them for personal use. And I don’t see why they shouldn’t, because it’s great to have a thorough set of images documenting their day. The value of that is substantial and increases with each year that passes. But I’d like to point out some flaws in this business structure and encourage other photographers to elevate the quality of their prints by getting in between sales and print fulfillment.
When you process 500 plus images to burn to a disc, you can’t possibly ensure that each photo will print as the best print possible because of the shear quantity of files you’re dealing with. As a result, it’s standard to make general adjustments to each file for exposure, color-correction, contrast, or by adding a vignette and then move on to upload the images to a web gallery where clients will order their images and photographers are no longer involved in the process. This is where I think this method falls apart. If you could know which files your client would purchase from that web gallery, wouldn’t you take some extra steps to make sure the file looks its very best? For example, by my decision to get in between the print sales and print fulfillment, I now have the ability to retouch the images I know my clients are ordering and I feel that is what really separates my prints as professional prints from the photographers who use Pictage or its many competitors like SmugMug. Taking the extra step of retouching every image in a set of 500 or more is pretty much unheard of—and if there are photographers out there who offer this service, they should be charging beaucoup bucks, because the time that it would take to do that is incredibly valuable.
To further my point, I’ll touch a bit on some of the many things that go into making a “professional print” professional. Pros like myself use professional monitors that are highly calibrated to an industry standard so that images edited and retouched on our monitors should appear the way they will look in print. My lab has a professional lab manager who oversees all aspects of the lab to ensure the industry standard so that when I get my photos back, I am a happy girl.
In contrast, when clients take their disc of images to Target or Wal-Mart, the printers there are supervised with much less scrutiny and are set to print averages so that the darker images (think of bride and groom’s first dance in a dimly-lit ballroom) print lighter and lighter images (think of a bride by a window) print darker when that is not how they were meant to be. Treating these images as average exposures is a mistake and results in poor prints. Yuck. And you don’t even want me to get started on color variances in labs like that.
I hope I’m demonstrating the value of professional prints and by professional, I don’t mean Pictage or SmugMug, or any other company out there that’s making money off of photographers and their helpless clients. Prints and albums are the final product in most cases and I want to leave my clients with a great experience and not wonder what they’re seeing as the fruits of my labor. I feel so strongly about this that I’m confident in offering a money-back guarantee on prints ordered through all of my client proofing galleries. Yes, this approach requires more time and effort on my part, but I get the satisfaction of knowing my clients are getting good quality prints and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
https://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.png00kmillerhttps://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.pngkmiller2012-02-10 10:58:022013-11-18 16:06:37Online Proofing vs. Print Sales Companies Like Pictage
Congratulations to Kelly McCullough, winner of the drawing for a Studio Bridal Session by Captivating Imagery! Over 200 brides entered the drawing over the last two days at the Cavanaugh Bridal Show at the Wyndham Hotel in Downtown Pittsburgh. And Kelly was drawn as the lucky winner. Her Studio Bridal Session includes a 2-hour photo shoot, complete with a stylist, an online proofing gallery and a disc of 10 retouched images of her choice with permission to print for personal use. Whoohoo!
Thanks to everyone who stopped by my booth! It was such a great weekend! I love meeting brides and getting to know about their weddings.
Here’s a glimpse of my booth at the show (please excuse my lackluster cell phone photo):
https://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.png00kmillerhttps://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.pngkmiller2012-01-30 11:41:012013-11-18 15:40:12Announcing the Winner of the Studio Bridal Session from the Cavanaugh Bridal Show
Over the last few posts, I’ve been sharing new album designs for Captivating Imagery’s 2012 Album Collection. This last design is what I’ll refer to as the Chic Album—my husband calls it the mammoth because of it’s size. It’s a 12×12 flush mount album that comes with a custom album box and pearlized pages. It’s a definite favorite of mine and an alternative to the Handcrafted Fine Art album (included in the Premium and Ultimate Packages) for those who prefer flush mount albums. Plus, the design really sets it apart with lightly distressed neutral wallpaper patterns and accentuated borders.
I’ll be posting photos of these albums after the bridal show this weekend, but for now, here are the spread designs starting with the custom cover.
This album features Callie and Brian’s lovely September wedding at Callie’s family home.
The ceremony site was gorgeous with an arbor made especially for the occasion.
Callie was simply stunning.
The bridal party was completed by an adorable flower girl who ran down the aisle.
We took a few minutes for photos of the bridal party around this gorgeous property.
The details at the reception were sweet. The same shades of pink and white in her bouquet were repeated in the centerpieces with distressed votive holders on top of cream runners. And their favors were dark chocolate bars with caramel and sea salt, wrapped in paper with a blue and white ticking design. Delicious!
The toasts were so heartfelt and warm that it was easy to see how much the best man and maid of honor adore Callie and Brian.
The sun set and the party carried on well into the night between the dance floor in the tent and the lounge in the barn. What a fabulous way to celebrate!
So this post completes the introduction of the 2012 Album Collection. Although there will be more products to come soon!
https://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.png00kmillerhttps://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.pngkmiller2012-01-25 21:53:412013-11-18 15:37:022012 Chic Album
In my last post, I introduced the 2012 Captivating Imagery Wedding Album Collection and unveiled the Classic Album. Today, I’m excited to share the Contemporary Album featuring images from Katherine and Robert’s lovely July wedding at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts. Like the Classic Album, the Contemporary Album is a flush mount album in a rectangular 10″ x 7″ format rather than the traditional square. This 20-page album is designed as 10 spreads so that the photos stretch right across the gutter, or the crease in the center for the binding. So you’re seeing what the pages look like side-by-side when you open the album. For now, I’m just showing the design for the pages, but the cover is a dark red alligator leather to compliment Katherine’s color scheme and it looks great!
Oh and the actual album is not watermarked—that’s just for the website.
I love Mellon Park—I think I must have shared that a million times already. So sorry for my redundancy! But I was thrilled that Katherine and Robert would be exchanging vows there. It was a beautiful, sunny day and the walled garden was a lovely setting.
It’s tough to select images to include in the album when you have upwards of 500 to choose from. But this image of them kissing on the right is, by far, my favorite of the day. I love their embrace and the emotion in their family members who officiated the ceremony.
And here comes my favorite part of the day—this is where image selection really gets tough.
Katherine and Robert are dog lovers and they really wanted a photo with their pugs, so they made arrangements with a friend to bring the pugs to the park for a few shots and then take them back home. These little guys were so great! They nearly stole the show!
This next spread takes some explaining—the Cascade bottle is what brought Katherine and Robert back together after years of being apart since they dated in high school. Katherine ran out of detergent and went to the grocery store to pick some up. They ran into each other at the store and have been together ever since. It was really sweet to see how she incorporated little details like this one into their wedding day.
The food by Tallulah’s Catering was delicious and Joy, the PCA’s director of special events, was fabulous. So this spread is a tribute to their success.
Katherine and Robert and their guests were really having a great time and really celebrated on the dance floor.
This last spread has a lovely image by Alex. Alex’s photos are sprinkled throughout this post, but this one of the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts deserves special recognition. Thanks Alex!
Next up, I’ll be sharing the design for the Chic album featuring photos from Callie and Brian’s September wedding.
https://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.png00kmillerhttps://www.captivatingimagery.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Web-Use.pngkmiller2012-01-18 14:11:022013-11-18 15:38:162012 Contemporary Album Featuring Photograph from a Pittsburgh Center for the Arts Wedding
Prints for Prosperity, a project by Captivating Imagery
/by kmillerIn 2011, my husband and I went on a short-term mission trip with our church to help out at Esperanza Viva, an orphanage in Puebla, Mexico—not one of us returned the same. I think it’s safe to say that I left a piece of my heart in Mexico. The children have so little and yet they are full of love and joy. We felt overwhelmed by the wonderful work God is doing there. There were countless stories of redemption for children who were born into abuse and neglect and rescued by the orphanage. In the week that we were there, we learned about many transformations that have taken place from the staff who dedicate their lives by serving these precious children.
Depending on a child’s background when they arrive at the orphanage, there is a natural adjustment period for them to learn what it is like to live in a supportive environment, where they are loved and can learn to trust others. The experience of witnessing the joy in these children and learning about how they have overcome heart-breaking circumstances, caused us to question what is really important in life. For me, I felt so selfish at living in such comfort with so much of my effort focused on improving my business—I love being a wedding photographer here in Pittsburgh, but could I do more?
The orphanage is at maximum capacity with 88 kids (the last time I checked) and there are so many more children in Mexico who need to be rescued. Esperanza Viva has great plans for expanding the Puebla campus as well as a few other locations throughout Mexico, so I have been praying about how I could help, and I’m hopeful in introducing a new project: Prints for Prosperity. This project is a small way for my business to support Esperanza Viva in its efforts to accommodate more at-risk children by providing them with a loving home and a good education. Twenty percent of each sale through Captivating Imagery client proofing galleries will be donated to Esperanza Viva. At the close of each year, I will post a fundraising report and share highlights from the orphanage. I’m thrilled to see how this project develops and I pray it will be a blessing for all involved.
Online Proofing vs. Print Sales Companies Like Pictage
/by kmillerAbout a year ago, I made a change in how I sell prints to my wedding and portrait clients. I’m pretty excited about it because I believe it really improves their overall experience with Captivating Imagery and ensures top-notch quality photographic prints. First, let me describe what brought me to this change.
If you’ve shopped around for wedding photography or portraits before, it’s likely you’ve come across Pictage, a large company based in California that provides an online platform for selling and fulfilling print orders through their in-house lab. At first, it seemed like a no-brainer for photographers who want to focus on their craft and not get tied up with fulfilling client orders. I used Pictage for sales and print fulfillment for a few years and was happy to have someone else handle my print orders especially as I was busy building my business.
But the photographer in me, a.k.a. my type A side, could not overlook the fact that I wasn’t seeing my work going out and into the hands of my clients. How could I be certain of quality control? Not to say that I doubt Pictage’s print quality, but there’s a lot more than meets the eye that goes into making good prints, so I decided to take back control and personalize this process by accepting orders though my own online proofing galleries.
In the wedding photography business nowadays, most clients expect to get a disc of their images with permission to print them for personal use. And I don’t see why they shouldn’t, because it’s great to have a thorough set of images documenting their day. The value of that is substantial and increases with each year that passes. But I’d like to point out some flaws in this business structure and encourage other photographers to elevate the quality of their prints by getting in between sales and print fulfillment.
When you process 500 plus images to burn to a disc, you can’t possibly ensure that each photo will print as the best print possible because of the shear quantity of files you’re dealing with. As a result, it’s standard to make general adjustments to each file for exposure, color-correction, contrast, or by adding a vignette and then move on to upload the images to a web gallery where clients will order their images and photographers are no longer involved in the process. This is where I think this method falls apart. If you could know which files your client would purchase from that web gallery, wouldn’t you take some extra steps to make sure the file looks its very best? For example, by my decision to get in between the print sales and print fulfillment, I now have the ability to retouch the images I know my clients are ordering and I feel that is what really separates my prints as professional prints from the photographers who use Pictage or its many competitors like SmugMug. Taking the extra step of retouching every image in a set of 500 or more is pretty much unheard of—and if there are photographers out there who offer this service, they should be charging beaucoup bucks, because the time that it would take to do that is incredibly valuable.
To further my point, I’ll touch a bit on some of the many things that go into making a “professional print” professional. Pros like myself use professional monitors that are highly calibrated to an industry standard so that images edited and retouched on our monitors should appear the way they will look in print. My lab has a professional lab manager who oversees all aspects of the lab to ensure the industry standard so that when I get my photos back, I am a happy girl.
In contrast, when clients take their disc of images to Target or Wal-Mart, the printers there are supervised with much less scrutiny and are set to print averages so that the darker images (think of bride and groom’s first dance in a dimly-lit ballroom) print lighter and lighter images (think of a bride by a window) print darker when that is not how they were meant to be. Treating these images as average exposures is a mistake and results in poor prints. Yuck. And you don’t even want me to get started on color variances in labs like that.
I hope I’m demonstrating the value of professional prints and by professional, I don’t mean Pictage or SmugMug, or any other company out there that’s making money off of photographers and their helpless clients. Prints and albums are the final product in most cases and I want to leave my clients with a great experience and not wonder what they’re seeing as the fruits of my labor. I feel so strongly about this that I’m confident in offering a money-back guarantee on prints ordered through all of my client proofing galleries. Yes, this approach requires more time and effort on my part, but I get the satisfaction of knowing my clients are getting good quality prints and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Announcing the Winner of the Studio Bridal Session from the Cavanaugh Bridal Show
/by kmillerCongratulations to Kelly McCullough, winner of the drawing for a Studio Bridal Session by Captivating Imagery! Over 200 brides entered the drawing over the last two days at the Cavanaugh Bridal Show at the Wyndham Hotel in Downtown Pittsburgh. And Kelly was drawn as the lucky winner. Her Studio Bridal Session includes a 2-hour photo shoot, complete with a stylist, an online proofing gallery and a disc of 10 retouched images of her choice with permission to print for personal use. Whoohoo!
Thanks to everyone who stopped by my booth! It was such a great weekend! I love meeting brides and getting to know about their weddings.
Here’s a glimpse of my booth at the show (please excuse my lackluster cell phone photo):
2012 Chic Album
/by kmillerOver the last few posts, I’ve been sharing new album designs for Captivating Imagery’s 2012 Album Collection. This last design is what I’ll refer to as the Chic Album—my husband calls it the mammoth because of it’s size. It’s a 12×12 flush mount album that comes with a custom album box and pearlized pages. It’s a definite favorite of mine and an alternative to the Handcrafted Fine Art album (included in the Premium and Ultimate Packages) for those who prefer flush mount albums. Plus, the design really sets it apart with lightly distressed neutral wallpaper patterns and accentuated borders.
I’ll be posting photos of these albums after the bridal show this weekend, but for now, here are the spread designs starting with the custom cover.
This album features Callie and Brian’s lovely September wedding at Callie’s family home.
The ceremony site was gorgeous with an arbor made especially for the occasion.
Callie was simply stunning.
The bridal party was completed by an adorable flower girl who ran down the aisle.
We took a few minutes for photos of the bridal party around this gorgeous property.
The details at the reception were sweet. The same shades of pink and white in her bouquet were repeated in the centerpieces with distressed votive holders on top of cream runners. And their favors were dark chocolate bars with caramel and sea salt, wrapped in paper with a blue and white ticking design. Delicious!
The toasts were so heartfelt and warm that it was easy to see how much the best man and maid of honor adore Callie and Brian.
The sun set and the party carried on well into the night between the dance floor in the tent and the lounge in the barn. What a fabulous way to celebrate!
So this post completes the introduction of the 2012 Album Collection. Although there will be more products to come soon!
2012 Contemporary Album Featuring Photograph from a Pittsburgh Center for the Arts Wedding
/by kmillerIn my last post, I introduced the 2012 Captivating Imagery Wedding Album Collection and unveiled the Classic Album. Today, I’m excited to share the Contemporary Album featuring images from Katherine and Robert’s lovely July wedding at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts. Like the Classic Album, the Contemporary Album is a flush mount album in a rectangular 10″ x 7″ format rather than the traditional square. This 20-page album is designed as 10 spreads so that the photos stretch right across the gutter, or the crease in the center for the binding. So you’re seeing what the pages look like side-by-side when you open the album. For now, I’m just showing the design for the pages, but the cover is a dark red alligator leather to compliment Katherine’s color scheme and it looks great!
Oh and the actual album is not watermarked—that’s just for the website.
I love Mellon Park—I think I must have shared that a million times already. So sorry for my redundancy! But I was thrilled that Katherine and Robert would be exchanging vows there. It was a beautiful, sunny day and the walled garden was a lovely setting.
It’s tough to select images to include in the album when you have upwards of 500 to choose from. But this image of them kissing on the right is, by far, my favorite of the day. I love their embrace and the emotion in their family members who officiated the ceremony.
And here comes my favorite part of the day—this is where image selection really gets tough.
Katherine and Robert are dog lovers and they really wanted a photo with their pugs, so they made arrangements with a friend to bring the pugs to the park for a few shots and then take them back home. These little guys were so great! They nearly stole the show!
This next spread takes some explaining—the Cascade bottle is what brought Katherine and Robert back together after years of being apart since they dated in high school. Katherine ran out of detergent and went to the grocery store to pick some up. They ran into each other at the store and have been together ever since. It was really sweet to see how she incorporated little details like this one into their wedding day.
The food by Tallulah’s Catering was delicious and Joy, the PCA’s director of special events, was fabulous. So this spread is a tribute to their success.
Katherine and Robert and their guests were really having a great time and really celebrated on the dance floor.
This last spread has a lovely image by Alex. Alex’s photos are sprinkled throughout this post, but this one of the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts deserves special recognition. Thanks Alex!
Next up, I’ll be sharing the design for the Chic album featuring photos from Callie and Brian’s September wedding.