Showing posts with label digital photography workshops. Show all posts
Showing posts with label digital photography workshops. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

What kind of photographer am I?

What kind of photographer am I? Should that be a workshop? I find that photographers tend to gravitate towards certain subjects; wildlife, people, landscapes, flowers, birds, barns. When finally I decided to pick up a camera I discovered that what I gravitated towards was lines, macro, candid photos of people and abstract images. What kind of photographer am I? This is a question I asked myself just recently when I started to notice a theme in my photographs.



What kind of photographer am I? How do we decide what it is that draws us to photograph? Is it something that just happens? Is it unconscious? Do we ask ourselves when we take up the camera - What Kind of photographer am I? Or does it just come naturally? I tell students that even if the subject is not something that interests them, they should try the workshop anyway and venture outside their comfort zone, they might find it will enhance what does interest them.

What kind of photographer am I? The kind that wants to grow and enjoy photography.

Sunday, July 3, 2011

Bringing it together

In today's tough economic times, it can be somewhat of a challenge to plan a workshop. What? Where? When? Who? How much? There is also the challenge of, how to make a workshop stand out from all of the others. When I think of a workshop I try to think about; Who would take this? What do they need to learn? What would interest them? Is it the location? The subject? The instructor? How much do I need to charge? How much is too much? How much is too little? What would someone be willing to pay for it? How long should be? Do we include critique time? How in depth should we go? What is the end goal in this workshop? These are pretty standard questions, but what I really look for is; How can I make this workshop different? To me that is the most critical. What will make this workshop stand out and how can I make it a fun experience, as well as, a learning experience? Sometimes you just need to listen - so what do you think would make a fun workshop? Where would you like to go? What do you want to learn? All you need to do is suggest.......

Sunday, May 22, 2011

Landscape workshop turns wild....

Not all things go according to plan, and our San Juan workshop was no exception. We planned (planned being the operative word) a 2 day workshop on the beautiful island of San Juan (Washington State). The workshop's focus was wide-angle photography. Some of the landscapes and areas we planned on photographing was; American Camp, English/British Camp, the poppy fields, sculpture park, sunset at Lime Kiln and some others.



Well first let me say, that photographing in western Washington state is always risky. Our weather is most uncooperative sometimes and this weekend was no exception. After what was a beautiful, sunny week, it decided to become cold, rainy and the gray skies were back, just in time for the weekend - this was not the part of the original forecast (but then they are almost never right). At American camp, we were hoping for early morning light, instead there was no light, gray skies, and rain. The sunset photograph we planned to do from Lime Kiln State Park didn't go as planned because - well there was no sunset. The poppy fields we planned on photographing was not in bloom yet - there was a total of seven poppies, not really a field of poppies. The whole weekend was this way.



So what do you do when a workshop doesn't go according to plan? You improvise and then let luck intervene. When you have a group of people who paid money to learn something and to enjoy their weekend of photography, you need to find something for them to do and hopefully quickly. Our landscape, wide-angle photography workshop turned WILD. We found wildlife to photograph; baby foxes (they were so cute and playful), deer, and lucky for us a local person on the island, who at 5:00 pm sharp, would feed the feral cats, foxes, ravens and the most exciting of all - Eagles. There we were when all of the sudden out of the sky and trees we were surrounded by eagles. They would fly by then swoop down to pick up the goodies, that the good Samaritan, left behind, then fly back up into the trees. This went on for over a half hour. It was fascinating just to watch.



Life, in general, doesn't always go according to plan, but sometimes what happens instead is just as great, if not better. So if your landscape is a little off and not quite working, turn it into something WILD, sometimes the extra little excitement that brings, shakes you up enough to get you out of your comfort zone and let's you enjoy yourself even more.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

A Fun Little Workshop with John Holtman

We recently had a class on macro and creative fun photography at Christianson's Nursery. We started the day with a discussion where our instructor, John Holtman, shared techniques and took us on a visual exploration of images that he has photographed. Then our hostess, Margie Hart at La Conner Flats, served us a delicious lunch of homemade vegetable soup and sandwiches. It was a chilly and sunny day in the middle of February, as we descended upon the grounds of Christianson's Nursery to practice all that John taught us. Everyone took to the task with a seriousness and dedication that shows in their photography. We ended the day with a group shot.

To see some of the images from this wonderful day visit our Facebook Page - http://www.facebook.com/thatphotoshoppe.

As a bonus - Christianson's was sponsoring a photography contest and one of our students won second place. Congrats to Anne - to see more of Anne's work read her blog.

Here is the image that won second place.

Friday, January 28, 2011

How to choose an F Stop and Why

How to Choose a Lens Aperture (F Stop)
from wikiHow - The How to Manual That You Can Edit

One of the most important settings on any adjustable camera is the size of the hole (known as the "aperture") through which light passes on its way from the subject, through the lens, to the film. The size setting of this hole, customarily referred to as the "f/stop" in reference to a standard measurement or simply the "aperture", determines depth of field, manages the effect of certain lens imperfections, and can add certain special effects such as spiked "sunstars" around bright highlights. Here's how to choose the best one.

Steps

  1. Familiarize yourself with some of the basic concepts and terminology. You'll need to know these in order to make sense of the rest of the article.
    • Aperture or stop. This is the adjustable hole through which light passes on its way from the subject, through the lens, to the film (or digital sensor). Like the pinhole in a pinhole camera, it blocks rays of light except those that would, even without a lens, tend to form an inverted image by passing through that central point to a corresponding point in the opposite direction on the film. With a lens, it also blocks rays of light that would pass through far from the center, where the lens glass may less closely approximate (usually with various easy-to-make spherical surfaces) the shapes that would focus it perfectly (usually much more complex aspherical surfaces), causing aberrations.
      • Because every camera has an aperture, usually adjustable, and if not at least has the edges of the lens as an aperture, the aperture size setting is what is normally called the "aperture".

    • F-stop or simply aperture. This is the ratio of the focal length of the lens to the size of the aperture. This kind of measurement is used because a given focal ratio produces the same image brightness, requiring the same shutter speed for a given ISO setting (film speed or equivalent sensor light amplification) without regard to focal length.
    • Iris diaphragm or simply iris. This is the device most cameras use to form and adjust the aperture. It consists of a series of overlapping thin metal blades that can swing toward the center of a hole in a flat metal ring. It forms a central hole that is perfectly round wide open, when the blades are out of the way, and constricts by pushing the blades toward the center of that hole to form a smaller polygonal hole (which may have curved edges).
      • Most SLR cameras only close down the iris diaphragm, making it visible from the front of the lens, during an exposure or when the depth-of-field-preview function is activated.

    • Stopping down means to use a smaller, or (depending on context) a relatively small aperture (large f/ number).
    • Opening up means to use a larger, or (depending on context), a relatively large aperture (small f/ number).
    • Wide open means to use the largest aperture (smallest f/number).
    • Depth of field is the specific front-to-back area, or (depending on context) the scope of the front-to-back area that appears fairly sharp. A smaller aperture increases depth of field and decreases the extent to which objects outside the depth of field are blurred. The precise extent of depth of field is somewhat subjective because focus drops off gradually from the precise distance of focus, and the noticeability of defocus depends on factors such as subject type, other sources of lack of sharpness, and viewing conditions.
      • A relatively large depth-of-field is called deep; a relatively small depth-of-field is called shallow.

    • Aberrations are imperfections in a lens's ability to focus light sharply. Generally speaking, less-expensive and more-exotic types of lenses (such as superwides) have more severe aberrations.
      • Aperture has no effect on linear distortion (straight lines appearing curved), but it often goes away toward the middle of a zoom lens's focal-length range, and pictures can be composed to avoid drawing attention to it such as by not putting prominent obviously straight lines such as on buildings or horizons close to the frame edges, and it can be corrected in software or by some digital cameras automatically.

    • Diffraction is a basic aspect of the behavior of waves passing through small openings which limits the maximum sharpness of all lenses at smaller apertures.[1] It becomes increasingly apparent past f/11 or so, making a great camera and lens no better than a so-so one (albeit sometimes one exactly suited for a specific need such as great depth of field or a long shutter speed where lower sensitivity or a neutral-density filter is not available).

  2. Understand depth of field. Depth of field is, formally, the range of object distances within which objects are imaged with acceptable sharpness. There is only one distance at which objects will be in perfect focus, but sharpness drops off gradually in front of and behind that distance. For a short distance in each direction, objects will be blurred so little that the film or sensor will be too coarse to detect any blurring; for a somewhat greater distance they will still appear "pretty" sharp in the final picture.[2] The pairs of depth-of-field marks for certain apertures next to the focusing scale on a lens are good for estimating this latter measure.[3].
    • Roughly one-third of the depth of field is behind the focus distance, and two-thirds is behind (if not extending to infinity, since it is a phenomenon relating to the amount by which light rays from an object have to be bent to converge at a focal point and rays coming from far distances tend toward parallel.)
    • Depth of field drops off gradually. Backgrounds and foregrounds will appear slightly soft, if not in focus, with a small aperture, but very blurred or unrecognizable with a wide aperture. Consider whether they are important and should be in focus, relevant for context and should be a little soft, or distracting and should be blurred.
      • If you want great background blur but do not have quite enough depth of field for your subject, focus on the part that will draw the most attention, often the eyes.

    • Depth of field generally appears to depend on, in addition to aperture, focal length (longer focal length gives less), format size (smaller film or sensor size gives more, assuming the same angle of view, i.e., equivalent focal length), and distance (there is much less at close focus distances).So, if you want shallow depth of field, you can buy a super-fast lens (expensive), or zoom in (free) and set even a cheap smaller-aperture lens wide open.
    • The artistic purpose of depth of field is to deliberately have the entire picture sharp or to "crop depth" by diffusing distracting foreground and/or background.
    • A more practical purpose of depth of field is to set a small aperture and pre-focus the lens to the "hyperfocal distance" (the closest at which the depth of field extends to infinity from a given distance; see a table or the depth of field marks on the lens for the aperture chosen) or to an estimated distance, to be ready to take a picture quickly with a manual-focus camera or a subject moving too fast or unpredictably for autofocus (in which case you'll need a high shutter speed too).
    • Remember that you normally won't see any of this through your viewfinder (or on your screen as you're composing. Modern cameras meter with the lens at its widest aperture, and only stop down the lens to its selected aperture at the moment of exposure. The depth-of-field preview function usually allows only a dim and imprecise view. (Disregard any odd patterns in the focusing screen view; they will not appear in the final picture.) What's more, viewfinders on modern digital SLRs and other autofocus cameras don't even show the true wide-open depth of field with a lens faster than f/2.8 or so (it's shallower than it looks; rely on autofocus, not subject to this limitation, when possible). A better option on digital cameras is to simply take the picture, then play it back and zoom in on your LCD to see if the background is adequately sharp (or blurred) enough.

  3. Understand the interaction of aperture and instantaneous lighting (flash). A flash burst is normally so short that the flash component of an exposure is affected only by aperture. (Most 35mm and digital SLRs have a maximum "flash-sync" flash-compatible shutter speed; above that only a fraction of the frame would be exposed due to the way in which their "focal-plane" shutter works. Special high-speed-sync flash modes use a rapid burst of weak flashes, each exposing a fraction of the frame; they greatly reduce flash range and so are rarely helpful.) A wide aperture increases maximum flash range. It also increases effective fill-flash range by increasing the proportionate exposure from a flash and reducing the time during which ambient light is allowed in. A small aperture may be needed to prevent overexposure in close-ups due to a minimum output below which a flash cannot be reduced (indirect flash, which is inherently less efficient, can help in this situation). Many cameras can adjust the balance of flash and ambient lighting with "flash exposure compensation". A digital camera is best for complex flash setups because the results of instantaneous bursts of light are inherently non-intuitive, even though some studio flashes have "modeling lights" and some fancy portable flashes have modeling-light-like preview modes.
  4. Test your lenses for optimal sharpness. All lenses are different and are better shot at different apertures for optimal performance. Get out and shoot something with lots of fine texture at different apertures and compare the shots to figure out how your lens behaves at various apertures. The object should be all essentially at "infinity" (30 feet or more with wide-angles to hundreds of feet with tele-lenses; a distant stand of trees is generally good) to avoid confusing defocus with aberrations. Here's some hints as to what to look for:
    • Nearly all lenses have lower contrast and are less sharp at their widest aperture, especially towards the corners of your image. This is especially true on point-and-shoot and cheaper lenses. Consequently, if you're going to have detail in the corners of your pictures that you want to keep sharp, then you'll want to use a smaller aperture. For flat subjects, f/8 is typically the sharpest aperture. For objects at varying distances a smaller aperture may be better for more depth of field.
    • Most lenses will have some noticeable amount of light fall-off wide open.good thing for many photographs, especially portraits; it draws attention towards the centre of the photograph, which is why many people add falloff in post. But it's still good to know what you're getting. Falloff is usually invisible after about f/8.
      Light fall-off is where the edges of the picture are slightly darker than the centre of the picture. This can be a
    • Zoom lenses can vary depending on how far in or out they are zoomed. Test for the above things at a few different zoom settings.
    • Diffraction makes almost every lens's images softer at f/16 and smaller apertures, and conspicuously softer at f/22 and smaller.
    • All of this is just something to think about for optimum clarity of a picture that already has as good a composition--including depth of field – as possible, and which will not be much more grossly marred by insufficient shutter speed causing camera-shake or subject blur or noise from excessive "sensitivity" (amplification).
    • Don't waste film investigating this – check your lenses on a digital camera, check reviews, and in a pinch assume expensive or prime (non-zoom) lenses are best at f/8, cheap simple ones such as kit lenses are best at f/11, and cheap exotic ones such as superwides or lenses with wide or tele adapters are best at f/16. (With an adapter lens on a point and shoot, stop down as much as possible, perhaps by using the camera's aperture-priority mode – look in its menus.)

  5. Understand aperture-related special effects.
    • Bokeh, a Japanese word often used to refer to the appearance of out-of-focus areas, especially highlights because those appear as bright blobs. Much has been written about the details of those out-of-focus blobs, which are sometimes brighter in the middle and sometimes a little brighter at the edges, like donuts, or some combination of the two, but at least one author rarely notices it except in bokeh articles. Most importantly, out-of-focus blurs are:
      • Much larger and more diffuse at wider apertures.
      • Soft-edged at the widest aperture, due to the perfectly round hole (the edge of a lens, rather than an iris blade).
      • The shape of the diaphragm opening, when not at the widest aperture. This is most noticeable at wide apertures because they are large. This might be considered unattractive with a lens whose opening does not closely approximate a circle, such as a cheap lens with a five- or six-bladed diaphragm.
      • Sometimes half-moons rather than circular toward the sides of images at very wide apertures, probably due to one of the lens elements not being as huge as it would have to be to fully illuminate all parts of the image at that aperture, or weirdly extended due to "coma" at very wide apertures (which is pretty much only an issue when taking pictures of lights at night).
      • Prominently donut-like with mirror-type tele lenses, due to a central obstruction.

    • Diffraction spikes forming sunstars. Very bright highlights, such as light bulbs at night or small specular reflections of sunlight, will be surrounded by "diffraction spikes" making "sunstars" at small apertures (they are formed by increased diffraction at the points of the polygonal hole formed by the iris). These will either have the same number of points as your lens has aperture blades (if you have an even number of them), due to overlapping of opposite-sides' spikes, or twice as many (if you have an odd number of aperture blades). They are fainter and less noticeable with lenses with many, many aperture blades (generally odd lenses such as old Leicas).

  6. Get out and shoot. Most importantly (in terms of aperture at least), Control your depth of field. It's as simple as this: a smaller aperture means more depth of field, a larger aperture means less. A larger aperture also means more background blur. Here's some examples:
    • Use a small aperture to force more depth of field.
    • Remember that depth of field becomes shallower the closer you get.If you're doing macro photography, for example, you might want to stop down far more than you would for a landscape. Insect photographers often go way down to f/16 or smaller, and have to nuke their subjects with lots of artificial lighting.
    • Use a large aperture to force a shallow depth of field. This is great for portraits (much better than the silly automatic portrait scene modes), for example; use the largest aperture you have, lock your focus on the eyes, recompose and you'll find the background is thrown out of focus and is, consequently, made less distracting.Remember that opening the aperture like this will cause faster shutter speeds to be chosen. In bright daylight, make sure you aren't causing your camera to max out its fastest shutter speed (typically 1/4000 on digital SLRs). Keep your ISO low to avoid this.

  7. Shoot for special effects. If you're photographing lights at night, have adequate camera support, and want sunstars, use a small aperture. If you want large, perfectly rounded bokeh spots (albeit with some incomplete circles), use a wide-open aperture.
  8. Shoot for fill-flash. Use a relatively large aperture and fast shutter speed if necessary to mix flash with daylight so the flash isn't overwhelmed.
  9. Shoot for optimum technical image quality. If depth of field is not of primary importance (which would generally be the case when pretty much everything in the picture is relatively far from the lens and will be in focus anyway), the shutter speed will be high enough to avoid blur from camera shake and the ISO setting will be low enough to avoid severe noise or other quality loss (which would generally be the case in daytime), you don't need any aperture-related gimmicks, and any flash is powerful enough to balance with ambient light adequately, set the aperture that gives the best detail with the particular lens being used.
  10. Once you've chosen the lens aperture, try making the most of it with aperture-priority mode.

Tips

  • If careful aperture selection will be very important to your picture and you have an automated camera, aperture-priority mode or program-shift (scrolling through the combinations of apertures and shutter speeds automatically determined to give proper exposure) are convenient ways to set it.
  • Sometimes you have to compromise your choice of aperture to allow an adequate shutter speed or acceptable film speed or "sensitivity" (amplification) setting, or just let your camera choose something for you to get the shot. Do it.
  • There's plenty of wisdom embodied in the old saying: f/8 and don't be late. f/8 typically gives sufficient depth of field for most still subjects and it's where 35mm and digital SLR lenses are typically at their sharpest (or close to it). Don't be afraid to use it – or program mode (a good mode to leave your camera on for whatever might pop up) – for interesting subjects that won't necessarily stand still for you to adjust your camera.
  • Softness from diffraction and, to a lesser extent, defocus (which can create odd patterns rather than softness alone) can sometimes be mitigated by processing such as the "unsharp mask" function in the GIMP and Photoshop. This will strengthen soft edges though it cannot create fine detail that was not captured, and creates harsh erroneous detail if overused.

Warnings

  • Make "sunstars" with bright points of light not so bright as the sun.
    • Don't point a tele-lens, especially a very fast or long tele-lens, at the sun attempting to make "sunstars" or for any other reason. You may damage your eye, or the camera.
    • Don't point a cloth-shutter non-SLR camera, such as a Leica, toward the sun except perhaps briefly to take a picture handheld, and even then only with a small aperture set. You may burn a hole in the shutter, which would require a somewhat expensive repair.

Article provided by wikiHow, a wiki how-to manual. Please edit this article and find author credits at the original wikiHow article on How to Choose a Lens Aperture (F Stop). All content on wikiHow can be shared under a Creative Commons license.

Sunday, January 23, 2011

February's Classes

We have some exciting classes in February.

Feb. 5th - To blog or not to blog.

Feb. 15 or 16th - A Photoshop Elements (Photoshop) class on the dodge and burn tool.

Feb. 19th - A Creative Photography class with John Holtman.

To see our latest newsletter, click here.

Sunday, December 5, 2010

A Journey of Healing


One Photograph, One Workshop, One Day at a Time

In February of this year (2010) we teamed up with Charles Needle and produced a workshop ‘Creative Macro Photography’. Attending this workshop was this extraordinary person who recently lost her husband. She was taking up photography to help her through her grief. This was her first workshop and the beginning of her journey to heal.


Since this workshop her journey into photography has taken her to different parts of the country, she has been exposed to a variety of instructors and has met some wonderful people. She has found some comfort during this time, but it was her photography that helped her the most while on this journey, it has given her a reason to live and carry on.


In September we did a workshop on ‘Creating a Photo Book’ using Blurb and other programs. Sally, again attended one of our workshops. With her, she brought some of the stunning photographs she had been taking during this journey. It was fun and exciting to she her growth as a photographer and to see happiness in her experience.


Her new book is an accumulation of her photographs - and maybe a touch of a memoir to her healing process and her husband. http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/1618332


Thank you Sally, for sharing this journey with us. You are a beautiful person and a wonderful photographer. We wish you all the best as you continue your photography and your life.


It is because of people, and photographers, like you that we enjoy having these workshops. We get a chance to live vicariously through your lens, and then watch you grow as a photographer.



From Sally:

I was with my husband for 18 years. He was my best friend, my husband, my cheerleader and my backbone. He was my rock and my sunshine. He was diagnosed with Cancer that had spread to his spine and after a yearlong battle with extreme pain and unimaginable hurdles he passed away.


When I say he was my sunshine, he was. He smiled everyday that he was here. It did not matter how much pain he was in - he smiled.


I loved him so much and miss him terribly, but I know that we must go on. It would have been so easy to just curl up in a ball and just let it all go. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. I still had a desire, a desire to live, as hard as it was and at times it still is I really did want to live.


I joined photography groups; they got me out of the house and kept me out of the malls. I needed to be around people that had my passion for photography. I needed to get out and make some friends, and I did. I can’t express enough how much this helped me. I can only tell you that through my photography I met some fantastic people, I reconnected with others and I’m living.


My first workshop was with “That Photo Shoppe” doing Macro Photography. I did another workshop with them that dealt with building books, books like this one. This book is a result of all the workshops I did, it was a way for me to get back to living again and to make something beautiful out of all the pain.


The journey of healing will never end, but I’m doing it the only way I know, “Through the lens”.

Thanks for being part of my journey...Hope this is not too long :)

Monday, August 23, 2010

Is learning photography no longer needed?

Is learning photography no longer needed?

I recently read an article by a Pro Photographer stating that the author believes that people don’t want to learn photography anymore, thanks to digital photography. The author basically said that with today’s cameras being so good that people can just keep shooting until they get some images they like. And with products like Photoshop you can fix most images that might need it. So why learn the principles of photography, or how to use the camera correctly?

As a Producer of photography workshops, I am not sure if I agree with this or not. Sure there are people who think they don’t need to learn. Pixels are free and you can shoot as much as you want, and if you get some goods ones great. And that’s ok, if that is the kind of photographer you want to be, mediocre or ok at best, that is just fine. But I find that there are still a lot of people who want to learn, even if it’s just the basics. It is not because they want to go pro, or become famous. They just have a strong passion for it and want to learn to do it better.

Taking a class or workshop on photography or camera basics, is not just about learning though. It is a great way to form friendships and explore this visual world with others who share your passion. It’s about growth, exploration, creativeness and fun.

There are 1000’s of websites and workshops on the subject. So that should tell us that people do want to learn photography. If anything, there are more of them because of digital. It has made it more accessible, in some ways more affordable and easier and a lot more fun.

Karla Locke




By instructor Matt Brown

I have had the same feeling for some time., Many don't want to learn photography. Their attitude is "trial and error" is just fine. The same people often brag, "you should see the shot I got the other day", and then go on to say they have no idea what happened, but one came out really good.

I have many conversations (when I'm on a shoot) with people that ask, "do you teach" or more to the point, "just what are you trying to do here", and I will take a few seconds to explain and they go, "oh yeah, I get it now".

The truth is that most people want to learn. They have learned that being frustrated, in not knowing why one came out, is indeed frustrating and learning is still fun. And cheaper in the long run.


By instructor Vince Streano

Here are my thoughts on the subject:

You are no more a photographer because you own a digital camera than you would be
an artist if you owned a paintbrush and some oils. The creative process happens in
your mind, not in the tools you use. The digital camera, as good as it is, cannot
compose your image, create your lighting, or snap the picture at the optimum moment
for the greatest impact. These skills are learned over many years of practice.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Getting comfortable with getting close

I sat down with photography instructor, Matt Brown, to plan out a photography workshop on Macro photography. As we were discussing the details and a list of equipment, the question that came to my mind was - what is the real definition of Macro photography? How does this differ from just getting close? Should we really be calling this a class on ‘Macro Photography’? After doing some research on the ‘definition’ of macro, I came to the conclusion that this was a workshop on both – macro and getting close.

The dictionary definition of macro photography - mac·ro·pho·tog·ra·phy / ˌmakrōfəˈtägrəfē/ • n. photography producing photographs of small items larger than life size.

This definition seems to imply that any close-up photograph, no matter how it was taken, is considered macro. After all, even close-up photographs seem larger than life size.

I found various ideas of what defines macro vs close-up photography. The common definition of macro photography is - photographing an object with an enlargement ratio of 1:1 or larger. It involves using equipment such as a Macro Lens, extension tubes, close up filters and teleconverters to produce a ‘true’ macro image.

Close-up photography on the other hand means just that – getting close to an object. Usually using standard equipment. Some point-n-shoots have a macro program on it, but doe that mean it is really doing macro photography, or is it just getting close to the object?

The confusion for me was that everyone was using the term macro no matter what equipment was used, or how it was done. It covered any photographic situation where the subject/object was photographed close up. The line of “true macro photography” has become blurred, and I am not really sure how important it is to really have a ‘”true definition” anymore?

To some I am sure it is very important, but for the purpose of this workshop I am going to just call it, “Getting comfortable with getting close”, no matter how you do it. Whether it is a true macro, or just a close-up photograph.

Monday, March 1, 2010

Flashes of Inspiration

Ideas for workshops hit me at odd times, in short or long flashes of inspiration and excitement. Sometimes it is without question an instinct I know I must follow. Sometimes it is more like bits of information that needs to be assembled into a well-thought out plan. Sometimes it is a snippet of an idea given to me by someone else that then needs to be developed and produced into a full idea. All of these are creative energies that are bursting into my little universe and sending me spiraling into a direction of pure excitement and drive.

For someone who is a planner and organizer, this is a great calling. The creative juices and energy flowing out of me is liberating and thrilling. I get such a rush when these flashes of inspiration hit me. And the more I think them through and then plan them out, the more exciting the adrenaline rush gets. I am in my own little planning and organizing heaven.

The real rush comes from when a workshop is completed and successful. When the energy generated from the group attending is at such a high level that it takes days to come down from the high. The cumulative effect of which produces another “Flash of Inspiration”.

A perfect example of this is the workshop I produced over the weekend. The workshop was 'Creative Macro Photography' with Charles Needle. Last year I just knew I had to have a workshop on macro photography, and I just knew that it had to be held out at La Conner Flats in La Conner. And I knew that it had to be something unusual, not your typical macro class. I met Charles Needle at a conference, saw his work, and just knew that he was what I was looking for.

And it worked. Those bits of inspiration flashed through me and paid off heavenly.