Trash the Dress Workshop

The end or our Creative Photo Workshops Summer Series has arrived. Our theme for the evening was a Trash the Dress session and so we knew it would present some challenges. Thus, last night saw a faithful group braving the wind and water for the fun and fine art of photography.  Even braver still were our models, Natasha Humble and Taisen Blackwolf. Natasha is also a photographer and one of our regular tutors and as such she is well known for being a little crazy, so we knew she would don the wedding dress and go into the water. Not having had the pleasure of working with Taisen myself, I wasn't sure what his level of craziness was. However, he proved to be equally insane and it worked to the advantage of our wonderful and faithful customers.

A Trash the Dress session has to be planned out in order to maximise the images, especially when there is a group of photographers who all have different ideas and hopes for the images. So, we started slowly, all the time restraining Natasha whose sole aim was to get into the water! We told you she was crazy, didn't we?

Our sunset was magnificent and gave us an opportunity to mix it with some off camera flash. This ensured that we could expose for the sunset without having our models silhouetted against it. A dozen Pocket Wizards come in handy too!

The photographic part of the evening ended with a combination of time exposures using flash, El Wires, sparklers and roving flashlights. We had Natasha standing in ankle deep water holding sparklers and winding her arms in a very Pete Townsend kind of guitar circle. We even asked her to run through the scene while firing the flash at her several times in a ten second exposure. Nothing was too much trouble for her. Now, that's the kind of model we like!

So, now its time to begin planning our Winter Series. Glynn and I have some great ideas, so watch this space....

Behind the Scenes at our Creative Flash Photography Workshop...

March Creative Flash Workshop from Creative Photo Workshops on Vimeo.

Saturday the 6th of March - a date that will live in infamy! Why? Well, because it was the day we decided to run a Creative Flash Photography workshop and the weather gods decided to hail us for it....or, should we say, hail upon us for it. However, being the easy going guys and gals that we are, we were not flummoxed in the slightest. We simply took our off camera flash gear, our lovely model, Sophie, the attendees and ourselves inside and continued there.

Abbottsford Convent is not exactly the most waterproof building in the world, but it sure was better than being outside. It hailed! But even prior to that, the skies darkened to a near nightfall exposure and so we were at the mercy of the clouds anyway. Nevertheless, the workshop was a roaring success and all in the class enjoyed and learned.

Our model, Sophie Van Den Akker, of Emerging Nymph fame, was wonderful to work with and her near perfect features were a joy to photograph. Glynn, Natasha and I assisted the dozen or so of our friends in achieving images from their flashguns that they did not think possible at first. By the end of the day, flash was everyone's new best friend. Even our interstate guests - ladies who had flown from Coffs Harbour and Adelaide, were absolutely delighted. Mission accomplished. Now, on to planning some more of these workshops during the cloudy days of our approaching winter....

Creative Flash Photography Workshop

Running a workshop is a very rewarding task. Its not an easy one, what with a dozen or so people to assist on both a group and personal level. Of course, I work with a great team and so I am not alone. But its still a challenge. And....I love it.

Saturday saw us at Abbottsford Convent once again running our Creative Flash Photography workshop. Glynn and I particularly enjoy this workshop because it is a very creative one, and it is also very rewarding in terms of what it achieves for our customers. In our morning introductions, most of our attendees express either fear, disdain or frustration when it comes to flash. By the end of the day, they are excited about the creative potential and without exception they all leave with a new found respect for this little piece of pocket sunlight. 

Our model for Saturday was Sophie Van Den Akker. Sophie was our "Emerging Nymph" workshop model and she proved herself a real trooper for that shoot. But more than that, she has one of the most geometrically perfect faces I have ever seen. She is exquisitely lovely to photograph and I believe that there is much ahead for her in terms of her modelling career if she so chooses. Watch this space. That's all I can say...

Our Creative Flash Photography workshop begins with simple on camera flash lessons that prove that you can still take beautiful portraits of people with your flash actually on the camera, as this portrait of Sophie proves. After a few on camera flash lessons are completed, our off camera flash lessons begin. 

Saturday started out perfect in terms of weather for a flash photography workshop. Its was a pleasant temperature with a lining of cloud. But in the early afternoon, that all changed suddenly when  the clouds darkened the sky to near nightfall and then began to pour down hail upon us, the size of which was not pleasant at all! So, we quickly dashed inside and had to come up with an entirely new set up for teaching off camera flash.  As a result, some very interesting challenges were accepted and some wonderful photographs were achieved. All in all, the day was a roaring success. Melbourne - you can try, but your weather cannot overwhelm the passion of the hungry photographer in a quest to learn! 

The Five Minute Photographer.

My tutorial website, the Five Minute Photographer, has been going from strength to strength these past two years. The videos are growing in number, with a new one added only today! But many have wondered what the nature of the tutorials is like. So I have uploaded a teaser to Youtube so that you can get an idea.

Heck, its the cheapest photography tutorial website to join and the forum is the friendliest around.

Here is the teaser, for those who are curious....

Love in a Parking Lot

My final day in LA was spent running a workshop with my friend and fellow loonie, Glynn Lavender. Glynn had organised this workshop with Mark Comon, a well known photo retailer and fellow photographer in Torrance, California. Mark is the owner of Paul's Photo - a well known photographic retail outlet. He himself runs a mean workshop and they are very popular. That being the case, we were honoured to have been invited to run one ourselves for his customers. For him, it was a matter of trust. And the gesture was certainly appreciated. It was our first workshop on foreign soil. But it won't be our last. Not by a long shot.

Now, I have to admit to being somewhat concerned when I was informed that the afternoon session of the workshop - the part where everyone actually takes photographs - was going to be run entirely in the parking lot at the back of Mark's store. Paul's Photo is one of those wonderful camera stores in which you can find anything and everything, but its parking lot is no Garden of Eden. However, I remembered that much of what we teach is the irrefutable truth that great photographs can be made anywhere, provided you understand light, perspective, composition and posing. Glynn and I are used to the rather diverse opportunities offered our customers at our usual venue in Melbourne - the Abbottsford Convent. A parking lot was going to provide a challenge to the very mantras we teach.

So, with a couple of slight thematic alterations to our morning lecture, we went ahead. Not that we had a choice! I mean, we had travelled to the United States to introduce the concept of our business to an American audience. No one said it was going to be easy. But I have to tell you, it sure was fun. Two Australian photographers addressing 14 American ones makes for an interesting morning. But all went well. Mark even brought out a couple of bottles of Fosters to make us feel more at home. Little did he know that Glynn and I are not big drinkers. Especially Fosters! But we sure did appreciate the gesture!

The afternoon light in the parking lot was harsh, but that was the very quality of light we needed to prove our point. Finding and utilising shadows, shade, overhead sunlight and reflected light gave our American friends a chance to see that even in their harsh Californian light, great photographs can be made if you know how. Our afternoon session was about the 'knowing how'. For many in attendance it was a complete revelation. Like so many other photographers we encounter in our workshops, location is their priority. Beautiful images can only be made if there are beautiful subjects in beautiful surroundings. Our LA workshop at Paul's Photo proved that to be an erroneous notion. Some of the most beautiful portraits our customers had ever taken were images established at the back door of Paul's Photo, the parking lot and against the wall of the shop next door. After this had been well and truly established, we went inside to the initial lecture area to work with some window light, once again proving that great photographs are available - everywhere. All in all, the workshop was a great success. So much so that we are invited back to run more of our Creative Photo Workshops. 

A Shoot on Venice Beach....

Yesterday after some rather successful meetings with Paul's Photo and our new product partners, Hoodman Inc, Glynn and I headed for Venice Beach where we had decided we were going to do a shoot with a young model named Jacqueline Grey. Jacqueline was a delight to work with and if you are a Californian photographer I would recommend her highly. Not all models are as willing to brave the cold as she was yesterday. I had to smooth over the goosebumps in PhotoShop!
We were later joined by our new friend and fellow photographer, Erin Manning. Erin's friend and video producer, Mike Welch also came along to capture the madness as it happened. So, look out for some video footage popping up somewhere that is highly incriminating and worthy of my best efforts to remove from the web.

Venice Beach has a rich diversity of potential images. There is, of course, the beach, but there are so many interesting buildings and their colourful facades. The people who inhabit this place are an eclectic mix, that's for sure. There are musicians, artists, shopkeepers, tourists, skaters, and even some everyday people. All we knew was that we were going to have a great shoot. We were a creative group on an interesting location with a lovely model. 

California was unusually cloudy yesterday, so the light was easy to work with and it offered us some different available light opportunities as well as off camera flash images. (Image right: Glynn Lavender) We started walking through the streets behind the beachfront shops, looking for colours and textures, as well as the most important thing - light. We found our share of colours and textures and the light was pretty much unchanging for most of the afternoon. It had set before we even noticed it warming up...which it didn't. That was ok. Glynn and I used some gels to create our own lighting effects with off camera flash.

After the shoot we all met at Erin's place for Mexican food, beer and an interview on video for Erin's ongoing video presentation on the net. It was all rather impromptu but we managed. Somehow. After all, Glynn and I aren't exactly known for our silence or inability to speak...We finally made it out alive at about 1 am. Hence the sleep in this morning. After going through our images from yesterday, we finally hit the hay around 3 am, and we aren't as young as we used to be.
This morning found us Lightrooming our shoots and loading images to our Facebook pages ad infinitum. It was a great day yesterday. It was Glynn's first international shoot, although he has been here many times. It was my first California Girl on Venice Beach shoot. Now there's a great box to tick if ever there was one! 

In California...

In case you have been wondering where on earth I am, I apologise for not having posted earlier. The fact is, I am in California, and I have been very, very busy. I am here with my friend and colleague in crime, Glynn Lavender and together we have rocked the PMA Convention in Anaheim. Our aim was to get Creative Photo Workshops up and running at an international level, and I gotta tell ya, we did! As a result of our efforts, we have photo retailers throughout the United States and Canada inviting us to return and run workshops for their customers. Yes, it goes without saying that we are quite excited. For some videos about PMA and the fun we are having, click here.  

This is just a taste...

Tomorrow, Glynn and I are being joined by renowned American photographer and TV photo celebrity, Erin Manning. Together, the three of us are combining our talents for a shoot with a lovely young Californian local, Jacqueline Grey. (In case you are wondering, Erin is the better looking one of the three of us in this photograph). Glynn and I caught up with Erin at the Expo and had a laugh. We even sang acapella on the bus on the way home from the PMA Dinner. So, after all of that it only stood to reason that we should actually do some photography together, right? Well, that's tomorrow. So, I better get my batteries for my D700 charged, and my Compact Flash cards all formatted and ready for plenty of images. 

Look out for images from the shoot with Jacqueline on the blog and of course, on the Creative Photo Workshops fan page.  Ok....excuse me. Its time to get things done. See ya soon!

Ok.... A couple more images...

I had so much fun at our Summer Series Emerging Nymph workshop that I just had to add some more images. Forgive my indulgence, but its my blog, after all!

Summer Series Workshops - The Emerging Nymph

Last Wednesday evening, the Creative Photo Workshops crew was joined by a dozen crazy customers at Ricketts Point along Melbourne's Beach Road. We were joined by model, Sophie Van Den Akker (our emerging nymph) and Fire Spinner, Chris Carlos. Our old friend, Richard Connon also came along, his mission being to stand in the ocean wearing a suit and reading the newspaper. Yes. Craziness abounded...but so did the images.

Sophie was a perfect choice for our Emerging Nymph. Her face is exquisite, and each feature of her face is perfect. Her blonde hair and swimsuit figure rounded out the look. My sister, Christina Hatchley was our makeup artist and she did a great job of using Sophie's beautiful face as her creative canvas. Christina is my sister, true, but I have worked with her a few times now and I would say that she is the best make up artist I have ever worked with. She doesn't assume a 'batch process' approach to her makeup, even when she is busy doing brides and bridesmaids. To her, each face is its own unique canvas. I love her work.

Sophie was just fabulous to photograph. She was a real trooper, getting in to the rock pools and staying there while she was photographed over and over again by our excited workshopees. Combinations of perspective, composition, exposure balances and poses were all explored by our excited enthusiast photographers. For me, it was a little frustrating because I wanted the shoot all to myself! Its hard when you only have time to take a few establishing images and then get out of the way to instruct others. The photographer in me wants to just keep perfecting the shot!

Richard was also a real trooper, standing in one of my old suits up to his knees in water, motionless and poised for each photograph. Richard is not a model as such, but since his fluke introduction to these workshops in that role he has wanted to come to each one and be a part of the proceedings. I wonder why, considering our mistreatment of him!

Chris Carlos, our Fire Spinner, worked tirelessly to provide plenty of opportunities for our photographers. He stood on the edge of that rocky reef and performed for some time as the sun set behind him. The time exposures of his performances that were taken by our customers that night were fantastic. Silly me left his tripod in the car!

We worked on past sunset, being careful of the rising tides and our equipment getting caught up in it. Trudging back along the beach towards our cars in the dark left us wondering what it was that we may have left on the beach behind in our excitement to capture these images. However, I think we and all our equipment is present and accounted for.

I have to admit that I have thoroughly enjoyed the opportunities for creative expression that this Summer Series has granted me. I can only imagine how it must feel for our customers who would not have had the same creative opportunities that being a professional photographer has granted me for many years. I suppose that is what our Summer Series of workshops has been about - providing creative opportunities for our customers and then helping them to go home with images from the shoot that they would never have thought possible for them to take. And I gotta tell ya - it feels real good to be able to help them in that endeavour.

Damn, I love my work!

A fabulous workshop!

Saturday's workshop at Abbottsford Convent was a huge success. It was lovely to have another great mix of photographers attend our workshop and learn some of the essential principles behind Natural light portraiture, which is essentially what the Creative People Photography workshop is all about.

What Glynn and I find interesting is the loss of understanding and an almost palpable belief that with the advent of digital photography, no real learning needs to be undertaken. The hope is that the technology will take care of the science while the person behind the camera takes care of the creative. However, the two processes are inextricably linked. You cannot have the creative process come to fruition without the deliberate execution and understanding of the technical. In fact, the application of the very sciences that govern photography are at the core of the creative process. Our workshop teaches the principles that link the two.

Working with two lovely models and accessing the various lighting situations that Abbottsford Convent offers, our attendees are introduced to photographic situations that teach them that with just a little understanding, any situation can be manipulated within the camera or outside of it to create a beautiful image. Open doorways, corridors, staircases, colonnades and even the grassy courtyard itself are all used as learning platforms and contexts for different photographs. At the end of our 'hands on' afternoon shoot, each student goes home with a new set of tools to use and a handful of wonderful images.

As one customer put it after seeing the images appear on the camera's screen, "I am jumping on the inside!" When a customer of ours makes these kinds of exclamations at a workshop, we know that things are going well! Further to this, she added "After attending Creative Photo Workshops' Natural Light workshop in Melbourne this weekend, I am buzzing! What an amazing day!!! I was blown away with what I learned in the workshop. Shelton and Glynn are not just fantastic photographers but wonderful teachers, fun and so approachable. I left the workshop on a high, filled with excitement and wonder at what I managed to capture on my camera. Shelton, Glynn and their team were patient and keen to help and teach. With two wonderful models to photograph and the individual coaching, I was able to achieve skills I have been striving for. I am already trying to work out how I can get to another workshop this year. This CPW workshop made the trip from Coffs Harbour to Melbourne thoroughly worthwhile. I can't thank Glynn and Shelton enough for sharing their knowledge and pasion for photography. I left excited, inspired, blown away and feeling like I have just been added to their extended family. Thank you so much to the CPW team."

 For Glynn and I, that is reward enough. Being paid is a side bonus.

Prints for Haiti

The devastation of Haiti and the human loss is incomprehensible. Looking on from this distance, you wonder what you can do. It is for this reason that I am proud to have been invited to be a part of Prints for Haiti, a project in which photographers can submit images to be sold and the proceeds go to Haiti. My friend and business partner, Glynn Lavender has also been invited. It is a Creative Photo Workshops combined effort.

So, if this project interests you, have a look at their website. And if you are interested in looking at the few images I submitted, click here.

I am indeed honoured to have been invited. I hope we can make a little bit of difference. Go to the site, and tell your friends about it....

Bound for South Australia

I have just returned from my third wedding in the South Australian town of Mt Gambier. Emma and Cameron's wedding was a referral from Jayde and Leigh, which resulted from the wedding of Patrick and Kellie. And how did Patrick know of me? Well, Patrick is a Mt Gambier photographer who enjoyed reading Better Pictures, the magazine I served as editor of for 13 years. Its funny how things work out some times.

I cannot tell you how welcome I was made to feel. Both families welcomed me to the wedding in a very personal and hospitable way, and I was also invited to stay at Emma and Cameron's reception. They could very well have said that I was there to do a job and was being well paid to do so, but they preferred to include some good ole South Oz country hospitality. So, any time you guys want me to come back and photograph something else, I'm there, ok?

Thank you so much for the honour to be there for your wedding, Emma and Cam! And thanks for making it so much fun. I hope we get to catch up again soon!