Tracy Bookman Photography

A few years ago, I met the owner of a large studio here in town, and I gave him my business card. That meeting led to my being asked to photograph the weddings for this studio. A couple months later, the owner of that studio said that it was the quality of my card that he first noticed. He said that one little detail told him a lot about me.

A few days ago, I mentioned this very thing and told you all that we can provide you with your business portrait as well as the design and printing of your business literature so that you, too, can make a great and lasting first impression on your business prospects, clients, and associates.

Well, here’s another business card we just finished for Michelle Bowles, a Colorado Springs mortgage consultant.

Michelle absolutely loved her card design and has already told other people in her office about us. That kind of trust and satisfaction is the best thing we can hope for with our clients. (Now, I do have to admit that she already had her photograph done before we met by another area photographer, so the image that you see on the card is not one that we created for her. It’s a great photo, too!)

We met with Michelle a couple times about her card so we could get some information for her “philosophy of business.” You may think that her guarantee sounds kind of like ours. Well… that’s because we helped word-craft it. All I did was take some of the things that Michelle told me, mostly stories about her helping past clients, and then I put together the wording for it. We told her that we wanted it to be worded BOLDLY so that people could understand that she is not like every other mortgage consultant. Once you get to know her, you will definitely see that Michelle is not like anyone else you have gotten a mortgage with. We wanted her personality to come out on her card.

We would love to help you with your business photography and printing needs also.

Think about 1000 business cards for as low as $65, and it all comes with our own IRON-CLAD, NO-QUESTIONS-ASKED, MONEY-BACK GUARANTEE. If you don’t love your cards… if you’re not thrilled with them, we will do whatever we can to make it right for you. If you still don’t love what we’ve done, we give you ALL OF YOUR MONEY BACK!

Thanks for reading.

-Tracy

How many times have you done this? You’re at a business networking function like a Chamber event, BNI, or maybe even a trade show or business expo. You meet someone who hands you his business card. What do we all do? We look at the front, and then look at the back. It’s just a conditioned reaction.

And… what’s the rule of thumb about first impressions? You only get one shot at making a great first impression. So what does it say about that person you just met when you see that his cards have perforated edges? Instantly you know that his cards are printed on his home printer.

Next you notice that his photo was done in front of a tree. The sun is coming through the leaves and hitting him in the face in weird splotches. Maybe he’s squinting with one eye and trying to look normally out of the other. Of course he looks unnatural, not relaxed, and maybe even like he’s in pain!

Worse yet… his business card says “VISTAPRINT.COM” on the back. What does that say about you and your business? (Vistaprint gives away their business cards for free. Sure, it’s a great deal, but that speaks volumes about how much you value how you present yourself to your clients).

Now, How long has it been since you looked at your own business cards? I mean, REALLY looked at them.

If this scenario is describing you at all, and you are trying to decide on getting professionally created and printed business cards, we can help you!

You can get 1000 business cards from us for only $65! These are not printed on flimsy stock either. They’re heavy stock (16pt) and full color on BOTH SIDES! For only $65!

If you need more than 1000, you can get 2500 for only $99 or 5000 for only $149!

Not only can we print business cards for you, we can design them too, just like we did for Barry and Jeanna.

And, if you’re needing anything else printed for your business, organization, or just for yourself, we can handle it, from brochures, booklets, postcards, greeting cards, and door hangers.

What else might you need to promote yourself, organization, or business? What about magnetic car signs, or even huge banners? We can print those for you too. For example, we are working with a local church on creating a banner for them to hang on the building in which they meet. The banner they need is 5′ by 15′. The banner will have grommets every 2 feet and will be seamed on all four sides. A sign like that is only $299!

And, since we can handle the photography side too, we can do the whole project for you from start to finish, just like we did for Jeanna and Barry. You won’t need to go to a designer, then a photographer, then a print shop. Just let us take care of the whole thing for you!

Thanks for reading!

-Tracy

It’s always fun to deliver baby portraits to a client, but it was especially enjoyable to deliver Martin’s photos to his grandmother, Vicki this morning. Martin was the happiest baby we’ve ever photographed, and his portraits turned out, well, picture-perfect! Everything was working that day, including the light coming in the windows. The trickiest thing, however, in working with babies is catching their mood correctly. So far, I’ve never encountered a parent who appreciates photos of pouty, crabby babies! So, a lot of energy goes into getting happy expressions.
But, Martin was exceptionally cooperative and hung in there with great smiles for the whole session. He was even happy this morning when we delivered his photos!
Thanks for reading.
Tracy

We began doing bridal sessions last year, and I love the results.

For those of you who are not familiar with what these sessions are, it’s a time when we go out with the bride before her wedding day to capture most of the bridal portraits that we will include with the wedding images. Normally, we do this on the day that the bride has her practice “up-do” at the salon. That way, her hair looks like it will on the wedding day and all of her wedding images look consistent.

What’s the benefit of doing things this way?

Well, for starters the bride is way more relaxed than she is on the wedding day. She’s not worried about 1001 things which could go wrong or what she has to be doing. She can just relax and enjoy the session.

Second, we have a lot more time. No more rushing around trying to get a ton of great images in 30 minutes before she has to head down the aisle. We can relax, look for the best places to photograph in, and capture the best poses.

Lastly, the photographer is a lot more relaxed (for the above reasons!) 

To encourage our brides to take advantage of this great and fun session, we offer to do it for free for all of our brides. Some of them don’t take us up on it, but some of them do. The ones that do have a great time and get some wonderful images.

-Tracy
The Colorado Springs Photographer

As many of our clients and friends know, I love farming and ranching, and would love to live and work on a farm or ranch. We currently have dairy goats and we’ve had meat and egg chickens in the past. This is something that I really enjoy.

Well, in the summer of 2007, 3 of my boys and I spent a night at Lasater Ranch in eastern Colorado. At the time, I was planning to write a freelance article about Lasater, but our photography schedule, and life in general, kind of got in the way. I still hope to write the article about Lasater, and will look for outlets to publish it, so I thought that I would share some of the images from our time at the ranch.

Our visit to the ranch was very enjoyable, and I would encourage anyone to take advantage of the “Field Days” they have there to see for yourself what a real, and health-promoting, cattle ranch is like. Andy Duffy, the ranch manager, made us feel like old friends coming out for a visit. He showed us all around the ranch in the Lasater Suburban, a beat-up old SUV that seems like it might be held together with duct tape and baling twine. We got to see many of the pastures where they rotate their herds and got lots of great information about the ranch. Andy showed us where we could go the next morning to get some photos, and told us how to get in and out of the pasture. It was great to feel so trusted on his ranch to be able to come and go into the pastures to get our photos.

I really like the philosophy of the Lasater operation. Not only do they NOT use any medications which are so ubiquitous to the industry, but they allow the herds to start and finish on grass. This gives their beef a distinctive flavor that you don’t find in feed-lot beef. We visited the ranch a couple years before, and Tom Lasater made us a pot roast lunch that our children still remember!

But, that’s not all that distinguishes the Lasater operation from every other ranch. Their cattle are bred for disposition and are “gentled” when they’re young.

My boys and I let ourselves into the pasture in the morning and found the herd. We were a little nervous about it all because we’re used to goats, not cows and bulls! But, the cows were all very curious about us and just wanted to come see what we were. As you can see in the photo,

Aaron, who was 8 at the time stood in the midst of them and fed and petted them. What a great time this was for all of us! I’ll be very thankful to Andy and Lasater Ranch for a long time, even if I never get my article written!

Hopefully you enjoy the photos that we were able to get that morning. It was definitely an experience that we all loved. By the way, here’s a little plug for Lasater… you can buy their beef at Whole Foods.

If I am able to get the article written and published I’ll be sure to mention that here and let everyone know where they can get the publication.

-Tracy
The farm-and-ranch-loving Colorado Springs Photographer

Oops! I didn’t mean to make that sound like these are OUR babies, but they are a couple of babies we have photographed recently, and in the last week, we’ve had a chance to sit down with parents and show off their beautiful baby boys.

Martin actually lives in Kansas, but travels out here frequently with his Grandma and mom, and so he took a little time for the photographer to catch up to him at his Grandma’s Colorado Springs home so we could get some beautiful portraits of him. I think this one is my favorite. I think one of the things I like about this one so much is that it was done with all natural lighting. We brought them, but we never had to use the studio strobes. So, this is all window light with a reflector on the shadow side to fill that in a little bit.

What we find is that babies are typically much more relaxed and happy when they’re in their home environment instead of being dragged to a studio and have to be in a strange setting with lights flashing on and off. That would be pretty weird to you too, especially if you just woke up from a nap in the back seat of the car!

So, we really like to do baby portraits in their homes. The other photo of Gavin was done in his home in Falcon. This one is kind of funny because it looks like he’s trying to see if anyone is watching him try to get up on the chair, almost like it’s something he’s not supposed to be doing.

Here’s what Gavin’s parents had to say about his portraits.

Tracy, these photos are fantastic! This worked out so well having you come to the house instead of us having to take Gavin and Tristan to a studio. Everything looks great and we can’t decide what to get. We want them all!

Chuck & Sharon Holland,
Falcon

Thank you for the kind words, Hollands, and we’re thrilled that you love your portraits!

-Tracy
The Colorado Springs Baby Photographer

We LOVE our portraits! We wanted this to be special for our (5th) anniversary, but we never expected everything to turn out so great. Now we want to get dressed in our wedding clothes again and have you do our “wedding” photos too! We’re very happy with everything and can’t wait to get our portraits so we can put them on our ‘wall of fame.’ :-)  Thanks again!

Branden & Beth Williams,
Colorado Springs

Oh, and by the way, here’s the link to Branden’s business website. Guess what he does! He’s a magician. So he and I had a common link… I used to work at Zeezo’s Magic Castle when I was in high school.

Thanks for reading.

-Tracy
The Colorado Springs Family Photographer

p.s. Here’s one more of Branden’s and Beth’s portraits from our recent session.