Page 9 - Lightroom Magazine Issue 27

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flown up there to get some pointers on how we could improve the Photoshop World conference, which had just launched earlier that year. Jim and I were walking around the show floor, when a man recognized me, stopped me, and said:
“You don’t know me. I’m Jim DiVitale, and I was at your Photoshop World
conference in Orlando a few months ago, and it was great. Really great! But you only had one class on digital photography. Digital is the next big thing, and it’s so important, and well...your instructor was just terrible. He seems like a really nice guy, but he’s a terrible teacher. I’m sorry, but he was just really, really bad.”
I didn’t get upset at Jim’s critique of that class, because I knew he was right. I had read every attendee’s evalua- tion form from the conference, and I knew that particular class was the lowest rated class of all. Then Jim started to pitch to me how next year he should be the guy to teach the class. In fact, he said we really needed more than just one class, but he’d help us put together some really solid classes on the topic. He told me about how he’d been teaching for PPA (Professional Photographers of America) at their conference, and about these workshops he was doing. It all sounded so great that I looked at my partner Jim, and he smiled and nodded, and I said:
“OK, you’re hired. You’re our digital photography
guy for next year’s conference.”
Jim kept on talking like I hadn’t said anything, and he continued on with his resumé and what he’d do if he had the chance, and I told him again. “Jim. You’re in. You’re
hired. You’re the guy. I’m serious!” I don’t think he fully believed me, but I got his business card and told him that I’d be in touch soon. That was 1999. Jim has taught at every Photoshop World ever since. He was everything he said he’d be, and then some.
It was Jim who helped us grow our entire curriculum of photography at Photoshop World, and he brought on guys who have been mainstays at Photoshop World for years—guys like food photographer Joe Glyda (one of the greatest guys ever), and fashion photog- rapher and ace educator Kevin Ames (more on Kevin in a moment). And it was Jim’s idea to create a panel where we didn’t teach at all; instead we’d celebrate the art of our incredible group of instructors. Well, “The Art of Digital Photography” panel was born. Moder- ated by Jim himself, it soon became an institution at Photoshop World, where Jim shared the stage with cel- ebrated photographers such as Jay Maisel, Joe McNally, Jeremy Cowart, John Paul Caponigro, Moose Peterson, Joe Glyda, Dave Black, and many more. Jim was the host for an evening that often included roars of laughter and tears of joy; standing ovations and gasps of amazement; and a night no one in the crowd would soon forget. He was an incredibly gracious and humble host, and the crowds loved him, and they loved seeing his work presented in this creative atmosphere.
Jim literally built my first studio. In one day, no less.
In Photoshop User magazine, we’d been doing product reviews for many years, but we had to rely on contacting companies and getting them to send us product shots to use alongside their reviews. The quality ran from top notch to terrible; from high res to low res; and usually they had to ship them to us via mail or UPS, which often delayed the magazine from going to press. We finally realized that we needed to be taking our own product shots in-house for the magazine, but I’d never used studio lighting (only flash), and only then for shooting
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