A few months ago I got an email from Ann Marie Schaummann from the Columbia County Tourism Department in New York State. She had stumbled upon my photos from Flag Day 2004 in Hudson, NY. Hudson is in Columbia County.
They were planning a brochure or a calendar or something. Would I make any of my photos available? The pay would be zip.
Of course. Are you kidding? I’m too naive to care about anything other than seeing my work in print.
I gathered all the photos, even the ones that hadn’t made it online in my photo album and burned them onto a CD.
And then… nothing.
In fact, I had totally forgotten about the whole thing until I got an oversized, slightly stuffed, yellow envelope in the mail. Inside was my CD, a letter and four calendars.
Holy cow. It’s there.
The calendar is made to hang from a nail, thumbtack, or other suitable post. The top half of the June page is my photo. The bottom half is the calendar over a low contrast monotone blue version of my photo.
I can’t begin to tell you how cool this is. I am really quite excited.
I told my friend Steve, who remembered the photos in my gallery and wondered which one they choose?
I looked and looked and looked some more. The shot they used wasn’t there. It was my photo all right, but one I hadn’t thought enough about at the time to post to my website!
The photo they chose for the calendar was overexposed and not a particularly good composition. They cropped away a small portion (and I have too) where one half of a girl stood (her other half being outside my frame).
It’s OK, but it’s nothing special. Really. This isn’t false modesty. There were dozens of better shots.
I suppose this picture scratches an itch. And, with a few dozen kids at least partially visible, it’s sure to get on some walls. I even got a photographers credit at the bottom.
As I said, it’s very cool.