I've played around with Capture NX (Nikon's RAW processing application) and wasn't a fan of it, but loved the concept of control points. What this is, is a really intelligent system that allows me to select a sky or a dress or a face and it can intelligently figure out where the object starts and ends. From there it allows me to adjust that specific area of an image without having to jump over into Photoshop or another standalone application. I never realized until I happened across the Nik Software booth that they partnered with Nikon in creating the U-point technology, and discovered they are now offering a great package for Apeture that includes the whole suite of plugins! I had been using Aperture since it's launch up until late last year, when I decided to tryout Lightroom and never bothered going through Aperture for my editing anymore. Now that Nik has a great offer as a plugin for Aperture, I just might start using it again...we shall see.

Shadows:

This is probably where I'll get a couple people to disagree or flat out hate what I'm about to say. Foam posing props (fake brick walls, foam columns to lean against, ect.) and painted muslin backdrops with unicorns or Greek columns belong in Sears or Walmart and/or 1992! I'm not saying you shouldn't use muslin/canvas/whatever backgrounds or that studio shooting is outdated, or that props are evil, but what I am saying is that I believe that professional photographers who do portraits using these types of tools should try to step it up and/or modernize their studios (try to differentiate from the bargin basement photography that Sears does). Backgrounds are critical for a lot of headshot and some portrait work, especially for corporate headshots, and for young children's portraits props are very useful in getting kids to sit still or stay in one place. The issue I have with the vendors (by my count there were AT LEAST 12 different backdrop vendors and 3 or more ugly foam prop vendors) at WPPI selling those types of studio accessories, was that they were trying to push stuff that looked like it came off a 2nd-rate TV show back in the late 80's or early 90's when everyone's hair was feathered and Tears for Fears was still selling out concert arenas. There are new technologies that now allow photographers to use whatever they want as a background (check out Virtual Backgrounds, very cool concept), by either optically or digitally inserting the background the way you want without spending hundreds upon hundreds of bucks on different colors of muslin to get different looks. There are real brick walls everywhere that don't look (and feel) like cardboard. I beg those out there that use those types of tools to look for alternatives that help you grow your business and separate yourself from the outdated competition.

Another thing that will probably get some people to disagree with me on is outsourcing of editing. There were quite a few companies (I saw at least 5) that are offering to take your digital files and then edit your images for you. Sounds like a real time saver, but in my opinion, in a digital age, what defines a photographer's style is not only the images he or she shoots through a lens, but also the way those images are edited and processed. I can understand doing outsourcing of photo editing for event or corporate photography where clean, sharp images with minimal artistic flare is what the client usually wants (depending on the type of client of course), but for weddings and portraits, I feel that outsourcing your editing is like buying tickets for a cruise and giving them to some stranger, it takes the fun out of it and you really don't get as much emotionally from the final results. There are times when some photographers might get overbooked and need to ask someone to help out with retouching on a couple select images, but I feel that's different, because the original photographer will already have done their basic edits that bring out their style in their work. Just a quick rant... sorry if it offends. Not trying to step on toes, just trying to give my opinion.