Bobby’s Travel Photography Workshop will help move beyond the snapshot and into the world of storytelling with your photography, and will cover everything from the technical aspects of photography, to what gears you need (or don’t), and some tips and tricks of the pros to create compelling images. This workshop is open to the snapper and serious amateur alike.
Learning “to see” and telling a story are two most important parts of any photographic assignment. When it comes to the subject of travel this is paramount. No matter whether you are considering working in the field or just want to have better pictures than your friends, this workshop will cover the technical steps and practical applications to do just that. Get ready for a weekend of exploring the world of travel photography. To accomplish this, the workshop is broken up into segments of lecture/discussion and hands-on practice/shooting.
Date: January 18 & 19, 9:30 – 17:00
Cost: 880 RMB; 800 RMB for members
STREET TEAMS
The core of this workshop is getting out and shooting. Shooting solo is great, but with a creative partner the inspiration and spirit of competition really pushes the creativity further. Groups of two photographers will be paired together with the goal of telling a visual story. Through the first day’s training, we can assess each others’ strong points from gear to attitude to creative abilities. This will help determine how the team works and creates together. The final images will be worked on with instructor advice, and each group will present their best images.
TRAVEL PHOTOGRAPHY DISCUSSION
Travel photography is a large subject to cover as it can mean many things to different people: recording your travels, photo-journalism, recording cultural anthropology, or just taking pictures to prove you went somewhere. All of these will de discussed with examples to help you determine what style you want to develop and how to create images that will tell your story.
We will review images and we will deconstruct and analyze them to understand what it took to make these images from the technical to the attitude. We will discuss the issues of being a traveller and photographer and how to deal the with people, places and things we want to capture images of.
TECHNICAL TRAINING
As a group we will go through the basic technical aspects of your cameras so we know what we are capable of and new areas to explore.
Technical Discussion
- Rundown of the camera buttons, dials and menus
- Choosing RAW vs. JPEG
- Exposure Modes: From Auto to Manual
- ISO, shutter speed and aperture
- Preparing for post-production
Choosing A Lens
- Zooms vs. Primes
- Seeing in Millimeters – 50mm and Beyond
- Minimum Distance and Focus Range – How to make a lens do what you want it to
- Full frame vs. cropped and 4/3 sensors
The Art of Photography
- Rule of Thirds
- Depth of Field
- Horizontal vs. Vertical
- Point of View
- Leading Lines
- Natural Frames
- Pattern and Symmetry
Understanding and Creating the Right Light
- Available Light
- Basics of Flash
- Artificial Light
- Magic Hour
WORKSHOP SCHEDULE (May change due to weather and number of students)
Day 1-Morning Session (9:30am-noon)
- Introduction to the course (10 mins)
- Travel photography image review and history (20 mins)
- Get up and shoot! Warm-up and photography practice on location (30 min)
- Ingest of images and critique (45mins)
- Technical Training (45 mins)
- Creative Training (45 mins)
BREAK
- Get up and shoot! Deliberate practice of what was just covered (1 hr)
Day 1-Afternoon Session (1:30pm – 5pm)
- Quick review of any technical issues (30 mins)
- Short critique / Feedback / Post-production intro (1 hr)
- Homework Assignments and Questions (30 mins)
- Group shoot – Preparation for Street Teams (1.5 hrs)
Day 2-Morning Session (decided by class)
- Ingest and review/critique of homework images (1 hr)
- Basic workflow and editing techniques using Photoshop/Lightroom (1 hr)
- Break up into teams for Photography Street Teams and set story lines (1 hr)
Day 2-Afternoon Session (1pm-5pm)
- Street Teams Photography Session – Teams of 2 (2 hrs)
- Ingest and organize images
- Storyboard images
- Review and critique
- Travel Photography Tools Demo/Gear Review (30 hr)
- Q/A
Photo Equipment
A digital SLR with interchangeable lenses is a plus, but not a necessity. Much of the topics discussed apply to more manual settings and require more in depth functionality beyond a point-and-shoot camera. Additional lenses, a tripod, and flash are helpful but not required.
A camera manual is required since the instructor cannot know the details of every make and model camera out there in order to troubleshoot technical problems. If participants don’t have manuals (or they are in Chinese), you should be able to download one from the manufactures’ website.
Participants are encouraged to bring their own laptops. It is understood that some will not have one, but it will speed up class time if those that do have it, can edit, view, and work on their own images. A minimum of a flash or hard drive will be required to get images off the instructor’s computer after editing and viewing.
Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop are optional, but will be used and demonstrated during the workshop for basic workflow and possible demos. You can visit this link and download a 30 day free trial.
Instructor’s Bio
Bobby Brill is an internationally published photographer and author working in Beijing. Growing up in the Los Angeles, CA, Bobby divided his time between television camera assignments and still photography before coming to China in 2003. For the past 10 years, Bobby has focused on creating images in Asia and his work has been published in magazines and newspapers in the US, Europe and China. Currently Bobby has authored three travel books for China-based publishers and contributed to another three photo-essays on China. His work can be found at http://www.bobbybrillphotography.com
