Melanie's love of photography began with a wagon full of discarded National Geographic magazines left for recycling by a neighbor down the street. These magazines inspired her to dream about people and places beyond her hometown. She never considered doing photojournalism until she was informed at her school paper that if she wanted photos with her articles she would have to take them. Realizing her love of photojournalism Melanie put writing aside and pursued photography as a career.
Eight years and a couple cameras later, now in Philadelphia, Pa., and available to travel worldwide for editorial, commercial or personal assignments. www.melanieblanding.com
Jeremy Cowart is a professional photographer from Nashville, Tennessee. Beginning his photography career in 2005, Jeremy quickly became a respected artistic voice in the industry. Jeremy is the founder of Help Portrait, a worldwide movement of photographers giving free portraits to those less fortunate. As his list of clients continues to grow, so does Jeremy’s desire to improve, share, teach, and give back to those around him.
Jeremy has shot many people in the music and entertainment fields, such as Taylor Swift, Carrie Underwood, Sting, Clive Owen, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Imogen Heap, Courtney Cox, and Ryan Seacrest, just to name a few. He also traveled with Britney Spears in 2009 as her photographer and photographed seventeen countries with the Passion World Tour in 2008.
An artist at the core, Jeremy’s focus on composition, color and light makes every image a work of art. Jeremy also spends his time on social art, developing and working on projects that have community impact.
Jeremy has worked with multiple non-profit organizations and traveled throughout Africa to photograph and bring awareness to the needs of those people. He is also the founder of Help-Portrait, a worldwide movement of photographers using their time, equipment, and expertise to give back to those less fortunate. On December 12, 2009 Help- Portrait provided free portraits for over 40,000 people in 42 Countries. Lastly, after the devastating earthquake hit Haiti in January of 2010, Jeremy responded with his "Voices of Haiti" photo essay, letting the people of Haiti express their own prayers and hopes through photography. This project was later displayed in the halls of the United Nations in New York City. Lastly, Jeremy has published 3 Coffee Table books that feature his photography: "Hope in the Dark", "The Poor Will Be Glad" and "Awakening". As his list of clients continues to grow, so does Jeremy’s desire to improve on his craft and give back to those around him.
Louis DeLuca is widely recognized as one of the top sports photographers in the country. His photos have been honored and displayed at both the Professional Baseball and Football Halls of Fame. He is currently a Senior Staff Photographer at the Dallas Morning News, and has also worked for the Dallas Times Herald, Chicago Sun-Times and the Shreveport Journal. He has been named five times, the National Press Photographers Association Regional Photographer of the Year. His work spans over 30 years as a photojournalist, accumulating over one hundred awards in state and national photo competitions. He is married and has four children, and lives in Dallas.
Bill Fortney’s employment experience spans from high school football coach to public relations, but his work in photography earned him national recognitions. Currently Nikon Professional Services tech rep and Nikon’s liaison for the Nature Market, Fortney has produced two Runaway Best Sellers, America From 500 Feet and The Nature of America, and has just released America From 500 Feet II.
Bill founded Great American Photography Weekends with his wife, Sherelene, running more than 250 field events in every major national park as well as in Africa and the Galapagos Islands.
Scott is Editor, Publisher, and co-founder of Photoshop User magazine, Editor-in-Chief of Layers magazine (the how-to magazine for everything Adobe), and is the host of the top-rated weekly video podcast Photoshop User TV, and the host of D-Town TV, the weekly show for DSLR shooters.
He is President of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP), the trade association for Adobe® Photoshop® users, and he’s President of the training, education, and publishing firm, Kelby Media Group, Inc.
Scott is a photographer, designer, and award-winning author of more than 50 books, including The Photoshop Book for Digital
Photographers, Photoshop Down & Dirty Tricks, Scott Kelby’s 7-Point System for Adobe Photoshop, The Photoshop Channels Book,
Photoshop Classic Effects, The Lightroom Book for Digital Photographers, The iPhone Book and is author of the all time bestselling book on digital photography, "The Digital Photography Book (from Peachpit Press).For six years straight, Scott has been honored with the distinction of being the world’s #1 best-selling author of all computer and
technology books, across all categories. His books have been translated into dozens of different languages, including Chinese, Russian, Spanish, Korean, Polish, Taiwanese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Dutch, Swedish, Turkish, and Portuguese, among others, and he is a recipient of the prestigious Benjamin Franklin Award.Scott is Training Director for the Adobe Photoshop Seminar Tour and Conference Technical Chair for the Photoshop World Conference &
Expo. He’s featured in a series of Adobe Photoshop training DVDs and online courses at KelbyTraining.com and has been training photographers and Photoshop users since 1993.For more information on Scott, visit his daily blog, The Photoshop Insider, at scottkelby.com.
Stephen McGee is a Detroit based photographer specializing in journalistic photography and HD video.
For the past six years he has photographed in 26 countries. He is a Eddie Adams Workshop XVII graduate.
Upon winning the 2006 Emmy for Regional News Coverage (humbled by the competition of National Geographic, Newsweek, Frontline and Washington Post) McGee left his job at the Detroit Free Press to work on films around the world.
In the past McGee traveled to Uganda in an ongoing production of his first feature length film, co-producing it with Naples Daily News' Brian Kaufman. The idea; how far the effects of one photograph can go focusing on Kim Phuc, the girl in the 1972 Pulitzer Prize winning photograph. McGee traveled with Phuc who, for the first time in her life, visited other burn victims face to face in burn clinics in the city of Kampala, Uganda.
Stephen lives a life dedicated to his Christian faith and strives to further his passion of storytelling on a daily basis.
He would like to thank Nancy Andrews, Brian Storm, and Nick Ut for everything they have done in his life.
www.stephenmcgee.wordpress.com
Bruce Strong is an associate professor in the Newhouse School's Visual & Interactive Communications department. Bruce has shot in more than 50 countries, documenting such varied subjects as patients at a Vietnamese asylum and the glamour of Hollywood movie stars, and situations as disparate as Tibetan monasteries and life on the streets of drug-infested California ganglands. His work has appeared in Time Magazine, Newsweek, US News and World Report and various international magazines, as well as The Orange County (Calif.) Register, where he was a staff photographer for more than a decade.
