{"id":15318,"date":"2015-11-02T15:56:06","date_gmt":"2015-11-02T15:56:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/?p=15318"},"modified":"2015-11-02T16:25:58","modified_gmt":"2015-11-02T16:25:58","slug":"tgsmnps-a-smashing-success%e2%80%a6%e2%80%a6%e2%80%a6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/?p=15318","title":{"rendered":"TGSMNPS – A Smashing success\u2026\u2026\u2026."},"content":{"rendered":"

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Tony Sweet and Jack Graham share a laugh in the field at the TGSMNPS \u00a0(The Great Smoky Mountains Nature Photography Summit \u00a0– Volume I<\/p>\n

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Our first Summit was a smashing success and for a lot of reasons!!!<\/p>\n

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1. \u00a0Over 200 great, enthusiastic attendees! \u00a0We had the great pleasure of spending five days with some of the greatest folks, they were really a great group! \u00a0Below, Len Rue Jr. signs an attendee’s event poster!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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(2.) \u00a0We had the most incredible team of instructors, leaders, mentors and just plain great guys! \u00a0Scott Kelby, Matt Kloskowski, Rob Sheppard, Tony Sweet, Jack Graham, Wilson Reynolds, Len Rue Jr., Jim Begley, John “Snake” Barrett, \u00a0Bill Lea, Ken Jenkins, Brett Wells, and even the pilgrim.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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(3.) \u00a0We hit the fall color perfectly, we got peak color and then leaves on the ground!!!!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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(4.) \u00a0April Love and the Tremont Lodge and Resort Team, along with Jim and Sue Haverstock worked tirelessly to meet everyone’s needs!!!<\/strong><\/span> \u00a0 April spent months taking care of the countless items on mine and Wilson’s lists! \u00a0She did a great job!<\/strong><\/span> \u00a0Wilson stepped up to the plate and invested in the infrastructure needed to make this resort ready for such a great gathering.<\/strong><\/span> \u00a0New screens, nice, big ones, and Canon 4500 lumens projectors graced the three big meeting room venues! \u00a0The on screen images were simply the best reproduction I’ve ever seen, not great news for me, got to have a Canon WUX450 projector now!!!!!!<\/p>\n

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As the co-chairman, along with Wilson, I can’t tell you what a thrill it was to see such big undertaking go off with so few issues, of course lots of little things will be fixed or enhanced for next year, but since we will only be accepting 225 attendees next year, it looks like the TGSMNPS has many years of great events, yet to come!!!!<\/p>\n

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Don’t take my word for it, this is just a few of many comments emailed to us after the event!!!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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“After attending the Great Smoky Mountains Photography Summit this past week, I wanted to commend you and all involved on a great event!\u00a0 it was refreshing to hear from all the educators and professionals their honest opinions and appreciated how freely they shared their knowledge, experiences and technical expertise during the event.\u00a0 To me, the event proved to be more about inspiration and community than any other gathering I’ve attended.”<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Karin Smith<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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“Bill, this was absolutely one of the best events I\u2019ve ever taught at. So yes, I\u2019m in for next year, pre-conference session and all. Seriously, this was a special event for me and so many people there. I think we came pretty darn close to connecting with people the way we do on a small workshop. Anyone who wanted to really get personal interactions and learn a lot could have and had plenty of chances and I think we helped a lot of people last week. The feedback I heard was over the top great.”<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Matt Kloskowski<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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“I really enjoyed meeting a lot of truly great folks, and our time together as a team was a very special experience! \u00a0One of the best large events I’ve ever attended or spoken at!”<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Jack Graham<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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“A triple home run, out of the park!!!!!”<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Paul Travers<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Stay tuned to both the TGMNPS website and mine to see information about when registration will start for the next event! \u00a0It will be bigger and better than ever!<\/p>\n

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Blessings,<\/p>\n

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the pilgrim<\/p>\n

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Tony Sweet and Jack Graham share a laugh in the field at the TGSMNPS \u00a0(The Great Smoky Mountains Nature Photography Summit \u00a0– Volume I   Our first Summit was a smashing success and for a lot of reasons!!!   1. \u00a0Over 200 great, enthusiastic attendees! \u00a0We had the great pleasure of spending five days with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chronicles"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15318"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15318\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15342,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15318\/revisions\/15342"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}