Dismal Swamp Generates Picture Sales Of My Wife
©Bert Gildart: In the past few days Janie has been mentioned or assured of depictions by two publications. The new issue of Airstream Life has a crossword puzzle, and a clue to filling in one of the blanks in the down column is the hint “Mrs. Gildart.” To answer the question, subscribers must have read my story about our nation’s capitol parks.
A photograph of Janie will also be featured in a new book on Virginia soon to be published by Holt and Mifflin, and I’ve included a copy of the image here.
The setting is the Dismal Swamp and it shows Janie and a guide. The guide had offered to help us with a photo shoot knowing I would be mentioning his excellent kayak service in a travel story.
Colorful setting and reflections helped sell this image of the Dismal Swamp
At the book company, editors were looking for something colorful. I also think the reflections of the red kayak and the fall setting in the swamp, helped make the sale.
The Dismal Swamp has long intrigued me, and Janie and I spent enough time in the area to gather material for the above-mentioned travel story. To set the stage for a visit you might want to make, here’s an excerpt from that piece—all, of course, copy righted.
MOSS GROWING ON THEIR BACKS
In the early 1720’s explorer William Byrd was traveling in a swampy region of Virginia and North Carolina which he later described as a “horrible desart,” a “vast body of dirt and nastiness” in which “Not so much as a Zealand frog cou’d endure so anguish a situation.” But a century later, perspectives began to change and people actually began to live in this great dismal swamp, and their testimonials began generating notions of such great cheer and felicity that you, dear reader, need not fear a visit to this body of nastiness. Testified one explorer of the time: “Death from disease has never been known in that place, and… persons were found who were so old that they had moss growing on their backs.”
STOCK PHOTO FILES
Interestingly, one of the first people to survey this area was a young George Washington, and his legacy simply adds more to those testimonials of cheer and felicity. The setting worked well for us, for images made from the area almost four years ago are still selling.
That’s one of the benefits of having stock photography as one of the components of our business. Fully captioned images from these files now number well over 100,000 and we are constantly adding. Some of my very best images are with agents while others are sold through the assistance of AGPIX. To see some of those images click in the upper right hand corner on “Best Photos,” or simply click.
For a fee AGPIX provides photographers who subscribe to the service with daily want lists gathered from various publications. That’s what has helped land me photo assignments from some exceedingly good publications-and most recently with the sale of my image of Janie. However, I think I’ll keep it a secret from her, else she may start charging modeling fees.
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THIS TIME SEVERAL YEARS AGO:
*An Old Farmer’s Advice (Know this is a good one as it’s been copied by others–which doesn’t speak well for the individual as a human being!)
