NANPA Conference Report

Over the week of Jan 17-21 I was fortunate to attend my first NANPA (North American Nature Photographers Assoc.) Conference in Palm Springs, California. It was also my first year as a NANPA member. To be honest, I had no idea what to expect, and I had some concerns. I’ve watched NANPA from the outset, and one of my major concerns was that it was nothing but a glorified camera club; and honestly, in part it was. At nearly 3,000 members, it really is a very social organization. That’s not a bad thing, btw. But my personal interests revolves around if, how, and where the organization was working on or supporting professional business issues and education.

Prior to my arrival and check-in on Wednesday, the conference had several days worth of pre-summit workshops that I wasn’t able to attend, although I heard some good feedback on them. I spent my several days prior shooting around the area south and east of Palm Springs. Part of me would have liked to have stayed away from civilization, but the cost of attending the conference was enough to ensure not changing my plans.

The conference had a nice welcome reception and gallery of member prints, most of which were very impressive and quite well printed. The remainder of the time I was actually kept quite busy. In the mornings and afternoons were free “Breakout” sessions that covered all sorts of topics from business, environmental, workflow, and how-to’s. Often, the hour and a half allotment of time seemed a bit too short. This was especially the case with the Pro’s Meeting, where a solid third of the time was spent with building a “What should we talk about…” outline. One area to credit, the leadership of the organization was very receptive to my criticism in this regard. After this meeting, I made a bee-line for the organizations Past-President. I said how as a new member, I was looking forward to the Pro’s Meeting as one of the most valuable venues at the conference. My criticism was that I would have preferred to have filled out a pre-conference survey vs. waste that much time in session.

On the educational front, I was pleased to see some of the NANPA work with High School and College students. There was also a great trade show exhibit room and bookstore set up. The one area I didn’t get to participate in was the portfolio reviews, but I heard many great things overall about the types of comments that the reviewees received. I actually spent my time dropping my name and business card, as I would love to be one of the reviewers at a future conference. And speaking of dropping names and business cards, I won’t deny that the social networking aspect of this conference was quite appealing to me. I got to meet a good number of people who I worked with over the years, both as a freelancer, and from when I was running Mountain Light’s stock agency. In the plus and minus columns, I got to meet several pro photographers and express my admiration for their work, including Jack Dykinga and Tom Mangelsen. On the otherhand, I didn’t get to spend as much time with some of the other people I knew, but that is the nature of the beast.

Two big plus marks; The Frans Lanting presentation on his new “LIFE” work was superb and very inspiring. I also want to thank the folks at Digital Railroad for featuring my new DRR Site in the trade show; I heard it got a lot of positive feedback, and it was quite special to be featured alongside some great photographers.

The biggest minus for me was probably more a fault of the venue at the Palm Springs Convention center; some of the food was very lack-luster. The continental breakfast was pretty measly for choosings; after the second day I had to fend for myself, opting for an early run to a local Dennys or even a 7-11. One of the lunch salads was even below the standard for a Dennys side-salad. (Although a lunch pasta was pretty decent.) The other big nit was that there was no afternoon coffee or tea stand, which got put away promptly after lunch, leaving only ice water, or a very long walk back to the hotel lobby. Sadly, for the extra $60.00 that I paid for the final dinner banquet, I actually left feeling a bit insulted. The meat selection was quite good, but the fact that we were again served a very weak salad, and that you had to pay and extra $6.00 for a half-full small plactic cup of wine, or to pay $3.00 for a half can of soda left a horrible taste in my mouth. Even my kids school auction dinner outshone this venue by at least three stars.

Now that my rant on the venue is over, let me touch on the main area I was interested in for NANPA. The reason I hadn’t joined NANPA previous to this year was that I never heard much about the Professional Business Issues and Education areas, save the aforementioned Breakout Sessions. I realize that a vast portion of the NANPA membership consists of amatuers, serious amatuers, and part-time or wanna-be professionals. Yet in discussions with numerous members, including the President-Elect, the feeling I had was that yes, these areas were a concern and had been discussed repeatedly over the years. The concensus seems to be that more attention than ever is being geared along these lines now than in earlier years. And although the compass needle certainly seems to be swinging towards more dissemination of this type of material; I noticed that the organization didn’t seem to have any centralized locus or committee for that, as they did with other areas like ethics, and environmental advocacy. Toward the final day of the conference, I put up my own sheet of paper on the Committee sign-up roster, highlighting the desire for a “Professional Business Issues and Education” committee.

To see what I mean on the above point, check out the full extent of NANPA’s Business Resources Page.

So why the big interest in having NANPA take a more active role in getting good business info and practices to its membership? Namely, from where I sit, we look at an increasingly saturated marketplace, and the shift in value for our work is heading downward from both buyers and suppliers. Nature and Travel Photographers are often the worst offenders of either the, “I don’t care if I’m paid, I only care about being published”, or “Someone wants to use my photo and I have no idea what to do now” syndroms. If NANPA could provide a singlular resource venue for this type of education, regarding both the business and legal aspects of entering the profession, or even just be a point source of information for those one-time questions, I think current and future NANPA members would find this a great and valuable benefit.

To the end that NANPA has been involved with some major industry issues, I’d love to see them become as equally vocal advocates as they have been in areas like ethics and conservation. One area that I currently see them moving strongly in this direction is in joining the Illustrators PArtnership in opposing the upcoming Orphan Works Legislation.

For myself, for NANPA, and for all of us: There’s nothing wrong with being vocal; as long as your also willing to listen. Gee, I wonder if I was too vocal? “Nah!” -Or maybe I should say, “We’ll see…”