Mikkean Photography Earns the Certified Professional Photographer Designation

It's official! This past week while at my week-long school, I received the news that I met all requirements to become a Certified Professional Photographer and I have been floating on cloud 9 since.

What does this mean? Well, it means that I'm among a select few (less than 3%) of all professional photographers in the United States who have earned this designation. And of all the hundreds of photographers here in the greater Jacksonville area, I'm one of about a dozen that has earned the CPP designation.

Here's a little more about what all that means!

Certified Professional Photographer: A Symbol You Can Trust

When you hire a photographer, you want the best. Unfortunately, anyone can claim to be a professional photographer – so ensuring that you get the best photographer for the job can be a difficult task. To make it easier for you to find a truly professional photographer, Professional Photographers of America offers the Certified Professional Photographer program through the Photographic Certification Commmision.

As the leading certifying agency and association for imaging professionals, PPA’s Certification program is recognized throughout the industry as a sign of excellence. When you see a photographer displaying the Certified Professional Photographer seal, you can be assured that he or she is among the less than 3% of all imaging professionals who have successfully completed and maintained our requirements.

Those who have earned the Certified Professional Photographer designation have passed a comprehensive written examination measuring their technical expertise, and have successfully submitted their work to a panel of judges for review and approval.

Every five years, a Certified photographer must renew his or her credentials by participating in continuing education programs and periodically submitting work for critical evaluation. This helps assure you that Certified photographers maintain their level of expertise and continue to develop new skills and techniques.
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Your Assurance of Quality
Every day Certified professionals help record the most important moments in life. And while every situation brings new challenges – you can be assured that the Certified professional has the creativity and skills to deliver the best possible images for you.

Be assured that whenever you enter a studio that displays the Certified Professional Photographer emblem, you will be dealing with a professional who is dedicated to providing you with the highest level of professionalism and expertise available.

Lots of Fun Teaching Mini Seminar

Last night, I was SO nervous to teach a mini seminar, More Than F-Stops, to about a dozen of professional photographers at our PPSNF guild. Thankfully, my nerves settled after the class got started. The goal of the class was to help other colleagues prepare for their Certified Professional Photographer (CPP) exam. We went through a set of about 55 questions that are representative of the types of questions on the exam and didn't just tell the answers, but discussed them and why 3 of the 4 answers were not correct. The goal was to help the class understand why so they could apply that to when they took the test.

A lot of photography is based on different principles involving math - inverse square laws, lighting ratios, etc. I have to admit that I'm a math junkie. Always have been always will be, I'm sure. So, for some of these types of questions, I got some blank stares as I tried to describe how the answers were mathematically achieved! Yeah, I'm a geek, and proud of it, but I think we finally did get to a point where the math was understandable!

If the class achieved one goal, it was that each attendee would take at least one more bit of knowledge home with them and write their own goal to pursue the road to their CPP.