2024 was off with a bang! Last month, we visited our friends south of the border and hit up two back-to-back events - SPAC in Las Vegas from January 24-27 and Imaging USA in Louisville, Kentucky from January 28-31 - to talk about all things portrait photography and Skylab related.

SPAC:

The first stop on our American stint was in Las Vegas, attending the School & Sports Photography Annual Conference. It was great to meet so many new friends and catch up with old ones, plus hear how everyone’s season went. The team got a lot of feedback on new product requests (stray hair removal - we hear you!) and are excited to get to work on our product roadmap. Our co-founder, TJ Rak, and his siblings closed out the show at the “King and Queen of the Hill” ideas session. It was great to hear the attendees’ thoughts and ideas about what's next for school photography.

To start off the year right, we had to be repping our 2024 merch. We even added a few, new collector’s pieces to our customer’s collections. A big thank you to Jaymie Cristobal for designing this year’s pieces. Looking to commission a design? Check out her Instagram @crystalballcanvas

Imaging USA

Just as SPAC was winding down, our team was gearing up to attend Imaging USA in Louisville, Kentucky. Luckily for us, it was a mere hop and a skip away! Half of our team went ahead to set up our booth and found that Olivia Barbieri, Skylab’s Ops Manager, had forgotten to order carpet, tables and chairs… again… Why isn’t that just included in the booth price?! It’s okay Olivia, you’re still a rockstar in our eyes.

Once we located said missing equipment, we made friends with our booth neighbors in true Canadian fashion. Apparently, being Canadian is a riveting topic and our new friends were thrilled to chat about all things Vancouver, poutine and igloos. Don't worry, we managed to fit in some productive photography conversations too!

Once the rest of the team joined, it was all hands on deck again. Big thanks to PPA for providing so many great snacks - there wasn’t much time to go and eat between all of our booth visitors! When all was said and done, the team took some much needed time to unwind with a game of TopGolf. There’s nothing like some friendly workplace competition to round out a week together! Our trip ended with a walk to Indiana (it sounds a lot more intense than it was) by way of the Big Four Bridge - the perfect ending to a week full of photography, friendship and fun.