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What a great deal! The kid gets to eat a hotdog and the photographer gets to photograph a happy kid. It's a win/win.

This past year I have been trying my hand at a little stock photography.

I am a contributor to iStockphoto.com. Becoming a contributor is a pretty rigorous process, and the photo inspectors are extremely... uh, let's just say, thorough.

Fact is, it's humbling. I've learned a lot about the details of digital photography and what is useful for print. The inspectors at istockphoto.com view your photo at 100% and they look at specific details like noise, artifacts and chromatic aberrations.

Prior to joining istockphoto.com I didn't even know what chromatic aberrations were. Each time I submitted what I thought was a terrific photo only to see it get rejected for chromatic aberrations, well, you would have thought I had just been told I had cancer. It was painful.

Why the angst? Each photo that does get accepted into istockphoto, and currently I have about 40, has the potential to sell multiple times. I have sold about 100 so far. That sort of "motivation" tends to drive me. Not the idea of getting rich, per se, but the idea that someone would pay money to use one of my photos. I think it's a real kick.

There is, of course, that fantasy of selling one photo a jillion times and making bank...don't get me wrong. So the gist of the photo pictured here is that sometimes on a Saturday I'll think up ideas for stock photos. I ask myself, "What do marketers need photos of?" "What sells on istock?" and "How can I get those shots?"

That said, every now and again I'll bribe one of my sons - or my friends - to model for me. It this case it's my youngest, Jamison. He's a great model as you can see. I paid him $2 for his time and he got to eat the hot dog. I did manage to get his photo accepted to the catalog on istockphoto, so we'll see. Maybe he'll be the next photo "big dog." (okay, bad joke).

To get this shot I used a white backdrop and my canon 430ex speedlight shot through an umbrella at camera right. I had it up on a stand and triggered it using the ST-E2 Transmitter.

The ST-E2 Transmitter has been my friend as of late. When I first got it it wasn't as cool as I thought. I had trouble getting it to fire outdoors. I have found that as long as there is a wall to bounce the signal off of it will work fine. I don't think it would work in an open field or on the beach unless there was a direct line between the transmitter and the flash. Just an FYI.

Well hope you enjoyed your holiday and this blog!