This year in April it will be 20 years since I have lived in London. Yup, I am THAT old. Last week I had a very good reason to visit “my” city – The Society of Wedding and Portrait Photographers (SWPP) yearly convention. There was an abundance of workshops, location shootings, business classes, masterclasse, superclasses… you name it… to choose from. Not to mention the Award Dinner where the Best of Category and Photographer of the Year were announced and honored. So I booked the triple whopper ticket and stayed the whole week.
I mainly concentrated on baby and children photography and it definitely gave me a jump-start to that line of photography. My highlights were:
Sandy is a multiple award winning photographer and proud mother of four, living in Littleton, Colorado. Sandy pours her passion into creating beautiful, timeless images. She is famed for her masterful children’s portraits and high volume of sessions (over 1.000 sessions a year!) and is an outstanding educator and speaker, touring 76 cities in the USA alone. Great hands-on practices and very valuable insights in child psychology, workflow and bonding with clients.
Melissa is a graphic designer from the UK who specialises in custom visual identities for creative professionals all around the world. She is perfect for photographers, artists, designers & visual performers and I love her approach of creating mood boards to organise thoughts and evolve the individual look & feel of your brand.
Wendy ranked in Arizona’s Top Ten Photographers 7 years in a row, featured in numerous magazines, and is considered a leading educator internationally. A very structured and informative presentation covering business, posing, editing and customer service.
You gotta love him. Super nice guy, very efficient as a speaker and a great photographer. He shared the “Becker System for success” with us. He takes “paying forward” seriously in his www.thebschool.com, which I will definitely join.
Joe is an international destination wedding and lifestyle photographer based in Southern California. He was very passionate about the central questions “Who am I ?” and “Who do I want to become?”. Loved it.
Adam Alex is a multi-award winning UK and destination photographer and widely recognized to be one of the UKs premier wedding photographers. He has a fun loving approach and an exceptional ability to communicate and interact. I have never met a photographer who understood light the way he does AND is able to teach others.
Martin Oliver is a London-based photographer specialising in informal photography of babies, children, families and pregnancies. I only saw his presentation for 40 minutes but his images stayed with me all week. Definitely the type of children photography to aspire to.
Robert is internationally known for his photographic achievements but more so for his passion towards portraiture and his distinctive ability in the art of posing. He mastered the delicate subject of posing plus-sized models. Cuban born and living in Miami he brought lots of sunshine to his class.
It was a very worthwhile experience and I made new friends from around the globe. I am more than ever enthusiastic about people photography with babies and children moving more and more into the center of my attention. So if you know expecting moms, newborns and children who would like to be photographed, let me know, I have great offers up my sleeve. And I learned a lot about referral incentives 
so I will make it worth your effort sending little people my way.
Love,
Petsy