PDN On THe Road Speaker Bios
Kwaku
Alston
After graduating with a B.F.A from the Rochester Institute of Technology in
1994, Kwaku Alston moved to New York City with a focus on shooting anything
and everything that caught his eye. His prolific nature and adventurous talent
was rewarded with an invitation to the Eddie Adams Workshop, where 100 young
photographers work closely with top photojournalism professionals. There, Alston
earned several awards and was introduced to photo editors and art buyers who
gravitated to his vision and began to hire him regularly.
After eight years of working with a diverse group of clients in editorial, music, film and advertising industries, Alston relocated to Los Angeles, to open a studio and establish his roots as a celebrity photographer with an artist’s mind.
Alston’s passion to stretch his boundaries and embrace new challenges has taken him to over 38 countries, to shoot luminaries from Nelson Mandela to Clint Eastwood to Barbra Streisand. In spring 2005, Oprah Winfrey commissioned him to photograph The Legends, a group of prominent African American women including Coretta Scott King, Tina Turner and Cecily Tyson. The honor of taking this historical photograph is one of Alston’s personal career highlights.
Alston is dedicated to his community with a globally conscious ethic to his photography and his life. In addition to his commercial assignments he is actively involved with charities, lecturing, teaching and the pursuit of his personal work, including several fine art projects and publications. His goals are to bring awareness to current social and cultural issues and to support and inspire young adults with an interest in photography.
Charities and other organizations Alston has worked with include The Venice Family Clinic, The Ralph Lauren Cancer Center, The Design A Cure Campaign, The Black AIDS Institute, and The Hollyrod Foundation.
Meg
Asaro
Asaro’s expertise in visual branding was built working for agencies such
as nickandpaul, Wieden + Kennedy, The Sterling Group and Toniq. She specializes
in infusing culture and consumer insight into brand development in order to
ensure relevancy both today and tomorrow. Successful brands must tap into certain
emotions and instinctual needs to resonate with the public. She believes photographers
benefit from thinking of their business as a brand and aligning their portfolio
with the visual landscape of our times so their work finds a strong audience.
Some of the brands Asaro has worked on include: Coke, Pepsi, Gillette, Unilever,
Jetblue and Target.
She also has experience as an art buyer for such clients as Accenture and Priceline. She bridged the gap to the stock photography industry, where she worked as the Creative Strategist for Photonica from 2002 - 2005 . Working side-by-side with Creative, applying Creative Research to the creative process, helped grow the collection and the bottom-line concurrently. Asaro co-founded Spark Visual Research with Karen D’Silva, Photonica North American Visual Leader, in 2005.
Michael Britt
As managing partner of the full service digital capture company, Image Mechanics, Michael Britt is working at the leading edge of digital technology. An impromptu photo show in the 4th grade set the stage for a life devoted to the craft of photography. He worked in film and television, shooting unit stills and galleries for over 10 years and served as a computer consultant for renowned photographer Michael Grecco. At Image Mechanics he was instrumental in developing their revolutionary digital capture workflow and continues to brand the company’s unique style. As a workflow specialist, Britt consulted on Aperture and wrote the manual for Adobe Lightroom. He has lectured all over the country and often speaks at APA-LA events. In addition to the Lightroom manual, he has written articles for PDN online and contributes to several online communities including the Image Mechanics Blog - DeathToFilm.com.
Vincent
Dixon
Vincent Dixon was born in Kilkenny, Ireland and relocated to Paris, France in
his early 20’s. After earning a Ph.D in molecular biology, Dixon discovered
his true passion: photography. Shortly after starting his professional career
he was awarded some of the top campaigns in Europe, such as Absolut Europe &
Perrier. Those highly visible campaigns, among others, quickly gained him notoriety
throughout Europe and North America.
Dixon’s work has won Gold awards at both the Art Directors Club &
the Cannes International Advertising Festival. His photography has been recognized
in countless other photo and advertising competitions around the world. He has
been featured in Photo District News, Creativity magazine, and his work
is seen regularly in Lurzer’s Archive and Communication Arts.
Vincent currently lives in New York City with his wife and their four children.
Patrick Donehue
Patrick Donehue is the VP/Chief Photographer for Corbis. Well-known as an industry expert, Donehue is a frequent lecturer on the creative and business aspects of photography. He is president of the Picture Archive Council of America (PACA), sits on the executive board of the Picture Licensing Universal System (PLUS) and is a member of the President's Council at the International Center of Photography (ICP). He is also on the faculty of The Art Center College of Design in Pasadena and the Santa Fe Photographic Workshops.
Jeanine Fijol
Jeanine Fijol is the photography editor of Photo District News and she is on the panel of judges for the PDN “30 Emerging Photographers” issue. Prior to joining PDN she worked as an art buying coordinator at Young and Rubicam’s Hispanic division, The Bravo Group and she has also served as a freelance photo editor at the Associated Press. She recently judged the member’s exhibition the Photographic Resource Center at Boston University.
Scott
Foster
Scott Foster is a Certified Financial Planner whose credentials include Creator
of “The Infinite GamePlan”, Charitable Planning Specialist with
Philanthropy International and a National Leap Trainer from 2000-2005.
For over 15 years clients have chosen to work with Foster because of his wisdom, passion and genuine caring for them and their families. Foster acts as a financial mission control to help his clients see what is possible while also backing them up by providing protection for their most important assets and relationships. The real benefit is the genuine excitement of a clear direction in ones’ financial life and the confidence to take the necessary steps.
Chase
Jarvis
Well-known photography writer and Editor of Nikon World Magazine, Barry Tanenbaum
recently described Chase Jarvis’s work as, “dynamic and dramatic
compositions infused with energy and motion...both art and craft—commercially
savvy and smart”.
An acclaimed sports, lifestyle, and popular culture photographer, Jarvis’s images breathe a compelling freshness—sometimes technical or conceptual, other times authentic or raw —that is rarely seen from an established commercial shooter at the ripe age of 35. Known for his artistic vision and boundless energy, creative directors, art buyers, and photo editors around the world gravitate towards Jarvis's style, location sense, and leadership. He has for 10 years been creating stunning photography for mega-brands like Volvo, Nike, Microsoft, Columbia Sportswear, REI, Philips, Jeep, Red Bull and hundreds more, as well nearly every niche active-lifestyle company in the marketplace and nearly all of the world’s largest magazines.
Already an accomplished speaker hosted by the likes of Apple, Nikon, Microsoft, the ASMP, Getty, Corbis and others; and having garnered the respect of his peers by winning countless worldwide awards and the attention of pop culture, art, celebrity, and technology magazines, as well as podcasts, TV, and numerous online buzz centers. Jarvis has earned the titles Hasselblad-, Nikon- and ASMP Master, and if he’s not the only photographer in the world to be recognized as such, he’s certainly the youngest to do so. With all this already under his belt, he is quick to bring his career back to humble basics. “I’m happy that it’s mostly about creating and collaborating with great people, meeting challenges, and keeping perspective.”
Degreed with distinction in Philosophy, Biology, and Pre-Medicine, and having spent graduate school in Philosophy of Art, Jarvis somehow escaped all that crap relatively unharmed. He is a lover of life and an adventurer and has traveled to work in every corner of the globe. He enjoys coffee, wine, cars, shiny objects, and art. When he’s not on assignment, he spends time giving back to the community and relaxing with his wife, Kate, as they split their days between homes in Seattle, WA and Paris, France.
Stephen Johnson
Stephen Johnson is a landscape photographer, designer and teacher. He has been photographing since 1973. His work has been featured in Communication Arts, Life Magazine, American Photo, Outdoor Photographer, and ABC Discovery News, among many others. His books include At Mono Lake, the award winning and critically acclaimed The Great Central Valley: California’s Heartland, Making a Digital Book and the new Stephen Johnson on Digital Photography. Internationally recognized as a digital photography pioneer, Johnson's photographs have been exhibited, published and collected in the United States, Europe, Mexico and Japan. In 1994 he embarked on With A New Eye, the ground breaking all-digital photographic look at American national parks, to be published in 2007. In 2003 he was inducted into the Photoshop Hall of Fame. Canon named him to their Explores of Light program in 2006. His photography studios, galleries and education center are located in Pacifica, California.
Ed Kashi
Ed Kashi is a photojournalist dedicated to documenting the social and political issues that define our times. A graduate of Syracuse University’s photojournalism program, Kashi has photographed in over 60 countries and his images have appeared in National Geographic, The New York Times Magazine, Time, Fortune, Geo, Newsweek, MSNBC.COM and many other domestic and international publications. His work has received numerous awards and is exhibited worldwide. Highlights from his personal documentary work include projects on the Protestant community in Northern Ireland, the lives of Jewish settlers in Israel’s West Bank, a growing body of work on the modern Middle East and the eight-year project Aging in America: The Years Ahead. In December of 2002 Kashi and his wife, writer/filmmaker Julie Winokur founded Talking Eyes Media, a non-profit multimedia company that explores social issues. Their first project resulted in Denied: The Crisis of America's Uninsured, a book and exhibition on uninsured Americans that continues to travel across the country. Between editorial assignments and personal projects, Kashi teaches and mentors students of photography, participates in forums, and lectures on photojournalism, documentary photography and multi-media storytelling.
Vincent
Laforet
Vincent Laforet is a Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer at The New York
Times. He has regularly been called on to cover major news and sporting
events around the world ranging from natural disasters, international conflicts
to the Olympics. At the age of 30, his work has been published in most major
publications around the world including Vanity Fair, Time, Newsweek,
Life, The New York Times Magazine, National Geographic Magazine,
Sports Illustrated, Stern, and Paris Match. He recently
modified his staff position to become the Times' first national contract
photographer and is now engaged in editorial, portraiture, commercial, and corporate
projects. His approach to aerial photography has been singled out as one of
the most unique and interpretive amongst photographers today.
Laforet's work has been recognized in the World Press Photo Awards, the Pictures of the Year Competition, the Overseas Press Club, the National Headliners Awards, the Pro-Football Hall of Fame and Communication Arts. He was recognized as one of the "30 photographers to watch under 30" by PDN in 2002 and was named one of the "100 Most Influential People in Photography" by American Photo magazine in 2005. He and four other photographers were awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Feature Photography for their post-9/11 coverage overseas in 2002. Laforet has been invited as a guest speaker by a variety of organizations and universities from around the world. He serves as an adjunct professor at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism and is represented by the Stockland Martel Agency.
Laforet resides in New York City with his wife, Amber, and son, Noah.
Doug
Menuez
Award-winning documentary photographer Douglas Menuez began his varied career
shooting first for the Washington Post, and then Time, Newsweek,
Life, People and Fortune magazine and many other publications
worldwide over the past twenty-five years. He has covered major news stories
including the famine in Ethiopia, the destruction of the Amazon, the AIDS crisis,
drug wars, Presidential campaigns, the Olympics, five SuperBowls and the World
Series. His portraits of key figures range from Mother Teresa and Robert Redford,
to President Clinton and Bill Gates. He was selected to shoot on nine of the
Day in the Life books, including the recent A Day in the Life of Africa
for which he shot the cover.
Throughout the 1980s and '90s, Menuez documented the rise of Silicon Valley with unprecedented access to almost every major technology company, covering digital pioneers such as Steve Jobs, Andy Grove, John Warnock, Bill Joy and John Doerr. Working first for LIFE magazine, Menuez continued covering start-ups and established giants as a personal project during one of the most turbulent and significant eras in American business history. Stanford University Library has recently acquired this work along with his entire archive for their collection.
Menuez’s advertising campaigns for global brands include Chevrolet, Nikon, Siemens, Hewlett Packard, Northwest Airlines, Coca Cola, Nokia, and Microsoft. His work has been honored by many organizations, including The AOP London, The Cannes Festival, The One Show, The Art Director's Club of NY, Photo District News, The Epson Creativity Award, American Photography, Graphis and Communication Arts.
In 1989, Menuez co-produced 15 Seconds: The Great California Earthquake of 1989, which raised over a half-million dollars for earthquake victims. In 1993, he published Defying Gravity: The Making of Newton, which was named one of the best 100 books of the past five years by Graphis. Menuez has exhibited his fashion work in Milan and personal work in San Francisco, LA and London. His most recent book projects include Heaven, Earth, Tequila: Un Viaje al Corazón de México and Transcendent Spirit: The Orphans of Uganda, in bookstores this fall. Menuez lives in Woodstock, NY with his wife and son.
Robert Messett
Robert Messett has been in the financial services business since 1997. Prior
to starting Messett Financial in 2001, he ran a prominent estate-planning firm
in Dallas, Texas. Specializing in helping high net worth individuals minimize
and many times eliminate estate taxes, Messett had the privilege of working
with hundreds of multimillionaires, several deca-millionaires and a few soon-to-be
billionaires. After spending several years focused specifically on estate planning,
he decided to focus on a more comprehensive planning approach for individuals
in both the accumulation and asset preservation stages of their lives. Messett
helps families, business owners, and individuals improve their overall financial
situation through sound planning. In addition to servicing his clients, Messett
enjoys educating others about personal finance. He has been a guest speaker
for numerous organizations and he trains other financial advisors on how to
be successful in the business.
Messett received a Bachelor Degree in Banking and Finance from Northwood University, and an Associates Degree in Management from Northwood University. His financial training also includes Securities Licenses: Series 7, 63, 65, among many other Licenses and programs.
Messett lives in Lantana Texas with his wife Jessica, son Lochlan and their two dogs. In addition to his passion for helping families with their finances, he enjoys snow skiing, water skiing, hiking, mountain climbing, pool (billiards), darts, traveling and reading.
Aaron Schindler
Aaron Schindler is a managing director with Wealth Advisory Group LLC. He specializes in financial strategies for photographers and small businesses. Before joining the financial services industry, Schindler was a photographer’s agent at Contact Press Images, Inc. and director of Photo Perspectives, his award-winning exhibition production firm. He is the preferred provider of disability, life and long-term care insurance, investments, and retirement plan services for the Advertising Photographers of America and writes for Photo District News. Schindler has a B.A. from Columbia University. He speaks Spanish, collects photography, and has won two World Hunger Year awards. He is a qualifying member of The Million Dollar Round Table.
Brian Storm
Brian Storm is president of MediaStorm , a multimedia production studio whose principal aim is to usher in the next generation of multimedia storytelling by publishing social documentary projects incorporating photojournalism and audio reporting across multiple media. Storm's professional experience includes two years as vice president of News, Multimedia and Assignment Services for Corbis, where he developed a global strategy for production, packaging and distribution as well as assignment services emphasizing in-depth multimedia reporting. From 1995 to 2002 Storm was director of multimedia at MSNBC.com, a joint venture of Microsoft and NBC News, where he was responsible for the audio, photography and video elements of the site. He received a master's degree in photojournalism in 1995 from the University of Missouri where he ran the School of Journalism's New Media Lab, taught Electronic Photojournalism and produced CD-ROMs for the Pictures of the Year competition and the Missouri Photo Workshop. Storm currently lives in New York and can be reached at brian@mediastorm.org
Mary Virginia Swanson
Mary Virginia Swanson’s goal is to help photographers find the strengths in their work and identify audiences for their prints, exhibitions, editorial and licensing placements. She works individually with photographers as a consultant and lectures widely on the subjects of marketing opportunities and awareness. Swanson contributes articles to various publications, including PDN, PDNedu and Digital Journalist, among others. She is the author of The Business of Photography: Principles and Practices (2007), available through her Web site www.mvswanson.com, where she also maintains a popular blog about marketing <www.marketingphotos.wordpress.com>.
Debra Weiss
At 14-years old, Debra stood mesmerized before Edward Steichen’s print of Greta Garbo at New York’s Museum of Modern Art. Steichen had just berated Garbo for arriving at his studio looking a mess. Garbo looked up, pulling her hair off her forehead. Steichen snapped. Debra didn’t know the backstory to that picture yet, but she knew it was something special. Ever since that day, her passion for photographic images that capture essence has inspired her to acquire a vast knowledge of photographers and their works and to become a widely recognized creative consultant. Debra has been an agent for some of the top names in the business, a consultant for Black Book and a CEO of APA National. Besides lecturing, seminars and moderating panels, Debra now works primarily with photographers one-on-one, to coach their career as an artist and a business. She inspires and guides, helping photographers explore and shape their talent. Beginning with an evaluation of their work, she edits the material, redesigns the portfolio, concepts self-promotional material and creates a marketable artistic identity that will improve their opportunities for success. Debra is a regular presenter at PDN PhotoPlus International, a frequent guest speaker at Art Center College of Design and curator of the widely-traveled exhibition Best of The International Photography Awards 2005. Additionally, she serves as curator of the PLUS (Picture Licensing Universal System) Coalition Web site and as PLUS Industry Committee Coordinator. Based in Los Angeles, Debra can be reached at (323) 650-4300 or dw@debraweiss.com.
