March 2014 - Paterson Photography Ltd.

Giving great customer service even when busy

May 27, 2015March 31, 2014 by Mike

Great Customer service, it has been a while since I was able to add to my list of companies that give exceptional service but today I did find one. On the weekend I was on my way back from Waterton and got a rock chip in the windshield. Called Benchmark glass and was told that they could fix it, and would take about 30 minutes, he told me to swing by around 10:30 and they would see what they could do. Unfortunately I was not able to make it then but decided later when I had to drop off some items close by that I would stop in and see if they were busy. Found that they were booked solid and I told them that I would come back tomorrow. Well to help stopping the chip / crack from spreading they have little stickers that you can put over the rock chip to keep water from getting in and hopefully stop the spread. What a GREAT idea! I may not be able to get in to get the chip fixed (as much my fault for not having time today to do it as anything) but at least with the sticker (I call it a Band Aid for my car) that I can prevent further spread. It may not cost a lot to provide these but it is a great idea for the customer. I would suggest to anyone that has a good windshield to stop by and get a set of these to keep in the car, they are free and can prevent a lot of extra costs. Funny how great customer service can be provided by the littlest things!

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Protecting your digital files

May 27, 2015March 27, 2014 by Mike

Protecting your digital files has always been a challenge and now we have one more thing to look out for when doing so. One of the newest issues we are faced with are viruses or trogans that install on your computer then at a set time will lock down your computer and not allow you access to your computer till such a time that you pay for a hacker to unlock your computer. These go by a number of names but the best one that I have heard is Ransomware Virus. I have heard from a number of industry experts that have been dealing with this problem and they tell me that once locked down your computer is done, it is very hard if not impossible to unlock the computer without paying for the code and even then it is iffy that the code will work once the hackers get your money. A good thing that has happened lately is that with the collapse of the Bitcoin this scam is in a little trouble as the currency the hackers prefered was the untraceable Bitcoin, unfortunately the hackers are changing their operation to account for this and it is continuing to be an issue and to grow.

Battery Maintenance

May 27, 2015March 3, 2014 by Mike

I decided to write about battery maintenance as much to be a reminder for me as anyone. This is something that if you forget you will end up paying the price when you can least afford to do so.

Batteries run our lives, or at least many things in our lives. Whether it is the smoke detector, cell phone, calculator, camera, flash, flashlights, laptop or many other things they all have batteries and if the battery is not happy neither will you be!

I try to have a system to check, charge or change my batteries on a regular basis and believe me it sure helps – a lot! The problem is that some batteries need more care than others.

– Phones, laptops, tablets are easy to charge – plug in leave a few minutes and they are done. If they stop holding a charge then all you can do is replace the battery as there is little else you can do to renew the battery.

– Other batteries like a smoke detector just need to be changed twice a year and they will be happy.

Time for photographers to get real!

May 27, 2015March 2, 2014 by Mike

It is time for photographers to get real. What do I mean? There is so much garbage that is circulating in the photography industry and a lot of it is being promoted by photographers that it has to stop!!

I had some time today to read a magazine article by this “famous” photographer, I have no idea if he was famous or not but according to his article he was. His work was VERY nice and I had nothing to doubt his claim that he was a world renowned photographer by looking at the quality of his work or reading how he made the images in the article. I thought “this will be some good reading as he seems to know what he is doing and his work speaks volumes”, boy was I wrong. The second paragraph disgusted me so much that I moved on real fast. What did he say that offended me? Well it was this “If you are going to make world class images you must use Lightroom, it is the only way to make your images look their best”, that was it one sentence. Why does it bother me? It seems that many photographers are more interested in dropping names and collecting cheques from manufacturers than telling the truth. Do I think that he used Lightrooom? Sure he did. Could he have used any other programs? You bet he could have! I use Photoshop and I love it, does everything that I want to do, but can other people use other programs and get some great images? Sure they can. Likewise people tell me their pictures are so good because they use a specific brand of camera. This is garbage!! I know people that use all different manufacturers cameras and they take some great pictures, and some take horrible pictures but it has nothing to do with the manufacturer of the camera.

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