From the Mind of JScott

Wikipedia defines a Bar Mitzvah as the " Jewish   coming of age   rituals ...  According to  Jewish law , when  Jewish  boys become 13, they become accountable for their actions and become a Bar Mitzvah." ****************************************************************************************** I remember the email. Do you shoot bar mitzvahs? "Um, sure!" I replied. I obviously was not going to say no. I had no clue what I was getting myself into. About three weeks ago I had no idea what a Bar Mitzvah was. To me it was just that party that you see in the movies where they put a kid in a chair and bounce him up and down. I figured it had something to do with religion, I just wasn't quite sure how exactly. With only a few movie scenes and a Wikipedia search under my belt, I threw myself headfirst into one as I was hired to photograph such an event for a wonderful local family. Simply put: I had a blast! The family starting the chair d...

A few of my shots from MAIPP 2012. (First off all let me send a huge THANK YOU to the MAIPP board for the awesome opportunity to serve for such a highly respected organization! Without all the work put in by Fred Fiddelke, Barb Grabill, Steve Kelly, Eric Niceswanger, John Mohr and countless others, none of this would have been possible! I also want to thank the University of Northern Iowa for providing awesome facilities to work with that were clean and comfortable all week long!) This past week I had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to serve as a consultant for the Mid-America Institute of Professional Photography workshop that was held at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls. MAIPP is, according to its website ( www.maipp.com ), "an affiliated school of the Professional Photographers of America" and has been around since 1980.  For what it's worth, that makes it one year older and wiser than me. :) From what I knew prior to taking part is that...