Written by stuestler on June 12th, 2010
After a delayed flight leg from Houston, Eric and I arrived in Guatemala City at about 10:00pm Monday. Checked into our hotel (the Barcelo – quite nice) at about 11:00pm, checked out at 4:00am to get to the bus station – making our stay about $20 an hour!
Tuesday was an all-day bus ride from Guatemala City to La Ceiba, Honduras. Fourteen hours, with a bus change and layover of 2 hours in San Pedro, Honduras. Met our cab driver in La Ceiba and took the 45-minute ride up the dirt road to Las Mangas.
After disembarking in San Pedro my iphone was “disappeared” – slipped out of my pocket in the seat, and I was off the bus before I realized it. A “search” by the bus service personnel turned up nothing. Mysteriously I was not allowed back on to look for myself.
So much for keeping in touch by email – all of my contacts were on the phone, not yet in this new computer. Hopefully I’ll be able to restore everything from the backup when I return and get a replacement.
The next two days were spent teaching photo classes to the students at Guaruma, the school project here. Originally started as a photography school for the children in Las Mangas, the project now has expanded to include environmental awareness studies and English, and has a second location about 5 kilometers farther up the mountain in El Pital.
The project we created for the kids was a simulated magazine cover, to teach the students awareness of shooting pictures for a specific format and subject, and then laying out the cover with their photos in Photoshop.
Wednesday we met up with Guaruma’s assistant director, Chris Poliquin and the school’s English teacher, Erin Coutts. That day we worked with the students in Las Mangas, and the theme of their assignment was “form and color in nature”. We took a walk along the nature trails that Guaruma maintains up the road and across the river just outside town.
The kids here are very much into macro photography, and their sensitivity and awareness of their environment is great to see. A few leaves on the jungle floor become a carefully composed still life, often displaying the subtle interplay of muted greens and browns, other times exploding in the vibrant colors of jungle flowers.
And insects – Oui! They have a critical eye for the smallest creature resting on a leaf or poised on the end of a branch, and work their subjects like a fashion photographer working with their model. Incredible shots of what others might think of as mundane and perhaps something to be dismissed and avoided.
After shooting their photos, we returned to the school where they loaded them onto the computers and learned how to combine the images in Photoshop into a template Eric created as the cover layout.
Then they played with changing type colors and fonts, moving type around the page, and learned how working with layers simplifies so many things. The students were excited to discover what they could do in the program and quickly realized how these techniques could be used with other projects.
Thursday we went up the road to El Pital and worked with the students up there. Neither of these “towns” are even wide spots in the road, but El Pital is a bit more “rustic”. There’s no nature trail there and the focus of their shoot was portraiture of the townspeople.
After some pointers on the do’s – and don’ts – of taking people pictures along with an explanation of how to shoot for a specific format, we unleashed this gaggle of paparazzi on the town.
While a few held back and preferred the comfort of using each other as subjects, most were quick to engage people they met (of course in this town, everyone knows each other) and ask to take their picture. Most were willing subjects and enjoyed working with the kids.
After corralling everyone and herding them back to the classroom, the kids went through the same process of putting their photos into the “cover” template. This group was a bit less computer-savvy than the Las Mangas kids, but nonetheless picked up the concepts and techniques pretty quickly.
This project gives the students an opportunity to learn practice skills that they’ll be able to apply to all of their photography as they move forward in developing their skills.
Posted in Cameras, Candids, Composition, Creativity, Digital Photography, Learning Photography, Photoshop, Portrait, Travel, photography workshops | No Responses »
Tags: Cameras, candid photography, Digital Photography, helping young people, kids, learn photography, people photography, photography workshops, Photoshop, portraits, teach photography, travel photography, volunteer
Written by stuestler on May 30th, 2010
The fourth Design4Kids workshop begins June 17th in Santiago de Atitlan, Guatemala. This one has been dubbed “The Master Class” and will be made up of the senior students of previous workshops. In addition to classes in photography and graphic design, we’ll have a stronger emphasis on marketing and small business practices ready to be applied to Jakaramba, the design studio born of the workshops and our parent group, FotoKids.
All of the members of the Jakaramba studio will be participating in the workshop. Up to now their clients have been primarily local and regional non-profit organizations, and they’ve worked on smaller projects. We hope they’ll come away from the workshop with a clear direction for the studio and a solid marketing plan, ready to take their business to the next level.
The client for this workshop will be FotoKids itself, and the project a self-published book to be used for promotion and fund-raising. Plans for the he book are to include an overview of the Fotokids project, feature photographs by FotoKids students, and to touch on the beauty and challenges of Guatemala.
Additional customizable chapters will include bios on individual students, coverage of the Design4Kids project and a look at Jakaramba.
Instructors for this workshop will be Design4Kids director Jeff Speigner, teaching graphic design, Cathy Shea teaching marketing, and Eric Lollkema and myself teaching photography. I’ll also be working with Cathy to interject the small business, target marketing approach with her big business marketing skills and experience.
Eric and I will be arriving a week early and making a side trip to Honduras, where we’ll be teaching photo classes for several days at Guaruma, the Honduras branch of Fotokids.
An interesting side note I’ve recently learned is that while it is currently the rainy season in Guatemala, with moderate temperatures and daily storms, Honduras, right next door but on the Caribbean coast, is in their dry season, with hot sunny days and temps near 100! Quite a climate variance in a area the size of the Carolinas!
Check in regularly – I’ll be providing periodic updates during the trip – internet connections permitting.
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Tags: Cameras, candid photography, Digital Photography, helping young people, kids, landscape photography, learn photography, people photography, photography workshops, Photoshop, travel photography, volunteer
Written by stuestler on April 12th, 2010
One of the number of blogs and newsletters I follow is Robert Genn’s Twice-Weekly Letter, available from his site, www.painterskeys.com . I find his quotes, comments and insights easily translate from painting to photography. In addition to his newsletter, his site is a great source of inspirational and enlightening quotes from the art world.
His recent post was a letter from Robert Philip Brooks, a painter and teacher in North Carolina. I found it equally appropriate for the developing photographer, and felt that it was worth sharing. I’ve reprinted it here with his permission.
“Painter Charles Philip Brooks runs a teaching studio in North Carolina. He focuses on the American Tonalist and Impressionist schools of painting. Recently he sent me a letter he’d written for his student Laurie Gayle. I soon realized his letter was a classic, so I asked him if we could give it a wider reading. I think you’ll find it worthwhile.”
“Letter to the Student of Painting”
“Your day contains a great measure of freedom. Your responsibility as a painter is here within the walls of the studio and in the setting of the landscape. You have the opportunity to exercise genuine mastery at every step, and it is in this spirit of grand possibility that I hope you will reflect on the advice made plain here.
Do not grieve too long for the troubles of the outside world. There is important work to be done here. We can best express our care for all others by attending to our work well.
Allow yourself the peace of purpose and the knowledge that to make another attempt with the brush is a noble thing. If you accept the discipline of the truest principles of art, then yours is the reward of an unbroken line of tradition.
Therefore, you may earnestly free your mind of all heartaches, sadness, and transitory despairs. Creation is above these things.
Your vocation is as real and as true as any other. Those who denounce the artist as idle manifest a deep ignorance of the nature of art. Have faith that the civilized will somewhere, at some time, value your well-wrought works. It is a miracle that the world keeps its havens for art and yet it does. Know that to create art is to do a necessary piece of work. The most noble pleasures and measureless joys result from such endeavors. True art is undeniable and it is a gift for all humanity.
The threefold responsibility of the artist is: to creation, to individual talent, and to humanity. For creation – the whole of nature – we must cultivate prayerful awe. This is our source of work and our refuge as well. We should seek harmony with nature. For the individual talent – long hours and years of steady industry hope to find our abilities fulfilled, our minds, hearts, and hands put to valuable service. In this way, we maintain the sanctity of art. Lastly, we make to humanity a willing gift of all we do. Our control over the material world lasts only a lingering moment and it takes a generous soul to build the ambition of a lifetime and then to hand it over in trust to the future.
Painting requires the bravery of solitude. Painting requires disciplined labor. To be a painter is to search the world with a benevolent eye for every subtle beauty that the infinite world offers.
Here is the opportunity to give your honest effort and to add in any small way to the legacy of art. Cultivate patience in your heart and you will improve. Learn to see well and your hand will become sure.
No pain or doubt can invade the honest soul engaged in the communion of creation. We artists must love the world with our deepest selves and forgive it at every turn.
To paint even a little passage with a measure of quality is to achieve a life’s triumph.
Spend your days wisely with the best thoughts and works of those who have walked the road before you. Search their paths, their timeless inspirations, and the lineage of their genius. Learn your craft well and your talent will mature into its full possibility. Keep an obedient heart before nature. She is the master above all other masters. Nature is the concrete manifestation of all that remains true and sublime. Let us always be thankful for her abundance and hopeful that we might approach her in our art. Nature will renew every generation of painters, ready to illuminate the minds of those who practice the art with what is calm, rational, beautiful, sublime, and eternal.
Such is the purity of your vocation. Treat every moment before the easel as a quick and tender opportunity. Invest your most noble self. Give your most noble self. To be a painter is to enjoy a precious state of life.” (Charles Philip Brooks)
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Tags: Digital Photography, helping young people, learn photography, photography workshops, teach photography
Written by stuestler on April 5th, 2010
We’ve just completed the first six-week session of e-mail classes. The students enjoy the flexibility of doing the work on their own schedule, and the results have been quite dramatic.
We had two classes going during the winter session. “Master Your SLR” is a beginner class for people who are just starting to learn about photography beyond pointing, pressing the button and letting the camera do the rest. We cover the basics of taking control of your pictures and getting the kind of results you want, consistently and predictably.
“Develop Your Creativity” moves beyond the basics, and takes a more in-depth look at the fundamentals of light, composition and design. The concepts we cover in this class are applicable to shooting with any type of camera, as long as you understand how to use it. Most of the students at this level tend to have moved up to an SLR to take maximum advantage of being in complete control of their photos.
One of the early lessons looked at how the direction of light falling on your subject – front lighting, side lighting or back lighting – affects your image.
While shot as an example of front lighting, one photo stood out because of its apparent simplicity revealing quite a few layers of complexity in our response to it. The photo was taken by Kathy Ma, and she’s allowed me to use it here to share with you.
There’s great use of negative space and color contrast. By framing so that there’s more room behind him than in front, the feel is that he’s moving out of the image rather than into it. With his face turned away from the camera, there is a sense of aloofness, of disassociation from the photographer or viewer. It actually creates quite a few possible responses, layered on each other and each revealed as you look at it more.
Probably more than any other subject, when we photograph people the subject itself becomes the dominant element in the image. With most other subject – landscapes, architecture, “things” – the viewer is more aware, either consciously or subconsciously, of how light and design elements affect the image.
When we – people – see photos of other people, we tend to focus on the person, because this is a subject we instinctively feel we understand and want to know more about. All of the other aspects of the photograph – light, design – are just as meaningful and important in creating and directing the viewer’s response, but they tend to become secondary to the subject, at least at a conscious level.
Yet when given appropriate attention, the design and light elements create that “a-ah” response that sets a people image above the rest. The really great portrait/people shooters like Annie Leibowitz and Arnold Newman know this and use it.
A classic is Newman’s portrait of Igor Stravinsky at his piano. The shape of the piano dominates the area of the image, augmented by the contrast of the white background, yet Stravinsky, just in the corner of the image, is clearly what the photo is all about. If you’re not familiar with Arnold Newman’s work you definitely owe it to yourself to look some up.
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Tags: candid photography, Creativity, learn photography, people photography, portraits, teach photography
Written by stuestler on February 7th, 2010
Some of the advantages of living in the Mid-Atlantic region are the tremendous variety of recreational opportunities, from mountains to beaches and rivers and everything in between, the beautiful bounty of spring and fall, warm sultry summers.
And oh yeah – fairly short and relatively mild winters . . .
The day after our record-breaking second top-ten snowstorms in the same year, my own little corner of the world is doing pretty well.
Spent Saturday during the storm tackling the shoveling an hour at a time so that by the end of the day when the snow stopped everything was cleared out to the road. Then, about 7:00pm, much to my surprise the plow came through and cleared our street! (I was expecting it today, maybe tomorrow.)
A planned 15 minute photo walk around the block turned into an hour long meet all the neighbors you never know walk, as everyone says “hi” and welcomes the opportunity to take a break from shoveling. Events like this tend to bring people together.
Meanwhile my cleared driveway is now wet as the sun, even at 25 degrees or so, melts all the ice from the surface. And it was only 11:30. By 2:00 it’s dry pavement!
Streets are still covered in a thin sheet of snow, will probably take another day to dry up. Tomorrow’s forecast for above freezing temps, so that should speed things up. But these head-high snow banks are going to be around for a while.
Called my client in Virginia Beach hoping they had just gotten rain out of all this, but they got a couple of inches of snow. Not a lot, but enough that they don’t want their big beach-front home photographed in it. Maybe by the end of the week.
A rare event like this gives an opportunity to get photos that are otherwise simply unavailable. This will give me a little extra for the classes starting this week!
Wherever you’re reading this from, remember, you typically want to over-expose from what your meter tells you by about one stop in snow. And think about your white balance – deep shadows and overcast light tend to make things go blue pretty quickly. You can either adjust for it, or let it go and use it creatively.
Get out there and shoot now. You can’t get these shots in the middle of summer!
Posted in Architecture, Cameras, Composition, Creativity, Digital Photography, Landscape, Learning Photography | No Responses »
Tags: architectural photography, Cameras, Creativity, Digital Photography, landscape photography, learn photography, Photography in Snow, teach photography
Written by stuestler on February 4th, 2010
Just finished a week of photography covering the Washington Auto Show. This assignment is for the client who produces the show itself, and is largely public relations oriented. We shoot the special events that go on during the show, as well as the day-to-day activities, the public enjoying the auto displays, checking out the new cars.
In some ways PR photography can be one of the most challenging to make interesting, as the subject is often someone speaking at a podium in front of a group. Sometimes the speaker is the shot – a notable who’s presence is the newsworthy event. Other times having the speaker in context with a display showing the topic of his talk helps provide creative elements for a photo.
In one of the more interesting displays at this show, one of the auto makers had a cut-away car with the body shell split down the middle. The two halves spread open revealing the interior, frame, engine and all the insides of the car. The show attendees could get in the car, with a product specialist, and the body closed, all while the specialist described the many features of the vehicle.
It looked great, and would have been an easy capture in video, but getting still photos that described the process provided a bit of a challenge. Open, the body halves and interior looked like a static display, and closed it just looked like a car. A single shot of the vehicle closing still looked like a static display.
I used post processing in Photoshop to help solve this one. I set up the camera on a steady tripod, and did a series of shots. The first was the display open, with the people inside. I then shot several exposures of the car closing, until it was completely closed. Each individual shot looked like this:
I first tried using the PhotoMerge tool to see what happened, but as I suspected it would, it just ended up with the open and closed frames merged together.
I then opened each photo in Photoshop, and one at a time dragged each successive shot onto the next. I created a Layer Mask and with a low opacity brush erased some of the area where the car was closing in the underlying frame. That was flattened and dragged onto the next closing frame, and the process repeated. The final image looks like this:
This is a process very similar to the one I use when combining exposures of architectural interiors, and with a little practice it’s actually quite simple. The students who take my classes discover that it’s simpler and quicker to do this than to describe it!
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Tags: architectural photography, Cameras, Digital Photography, event photography, interior photography, learn photography, people photography, photography workshops, Photoshop, teach photography
Written by stuestler on January 17th, 2010
Wow, it’s been a busy week, with another coming right along.
Last Saturday started it off with the Kids & Parents Photo Class. The introductory class was geared toward the kids – 11 to 15 year olds – and the parents came along to share the experience and learn alongside each other. Of course, with today’s tech-savvy kids, it’s likely that they were explaining it again to the parents that evening!
We went over the basics of using their cameras – point & shoots – and a little on light and composition. Next we all went outside and practiced what they learned. Then we came back in the classroom and looked at some photo editing techniques, using software like Google’s Picasa.
The parents told me that the kids went home and took photos all afternoon!
That was followed up during the week with the first of two Home Photography Clinics, this one held in Potomac, Maryland, aimed at professionals in the real estate industry who take their own photos for their listings.
While I still make my living as an architectural photographer, it’s obvious that every photo of every home on the market doesn’t justify a budget of hiring a professional like myself. Many clients over the years have asked about how to take better photos themselves, so I’ve put together a two-day workshop to teach some tips and techniques for improving their photos, without all the expensive and complex equipment that I use.
We started with camera basics – many people at this level are using their cameras on the totally automatic settings, and just taking the camera off “the green” and learning how to control it yourself goes a long way towards improving your results.
We talked a bit about equipment – at least an entry-level SLR is really best – plus adding a wide angle lens and a hot shoe flash to allow bouncing and diffusing light.
And of course using a tripod! I’m a big proponent of using a tripod for just about any photo situation you can. It makes it much easier to get sharp pictures in any condition, and frees you up from worrying about too-slow shutter speeds and too-high and noisy ISO’s.
Then we talked about the qualities and colors of light, and how they all play a key role in the success of a photo. Light should always be the first consideration, not an afterthought.
We followed that up with a look at some basics of composition and design elements, like the Rule of Thirds and using lines – especially the power of diagonal lines – to move the eye through the picture and capture the viewer’s attention.
The first day finished up with some considerations and techniques especially useful for architectural-type shooting. We talked about perspective distortion and parallel lines. And about how to tame the typical ultra-high contrast lighting situations found when photographing interiors.
The second day began with the participants practicing the techniques learned on day one. I hold the workshops in a house to give the students an opportunity to try these techniques right away and ask questions.
Finally we went over some very useful post processing methods that make life in the digital age so much easier.
Shooting in RAW is the first thing to consider to make the process of adjusting images on the computer easier and more efficient. This is another reason for choosing an SLR – even most of the entry level models have RAW capture, while only some advanced digital and few point & shoots allow this.
White balancing an interior space illuminated by mixed light sources can be a time-consuming and complicated task with film and even when shooting JPEGS in camera. With Raw processing it becomes a one-click process, with maybe a little slider adjustment to fine tune things. True, some RAW processing software like Adobe Camera Raw allows white balance adjustments on JPEGS, but this feature is often not found on the more economical entry-level programs.
While critical perspective control is still best done with specialty PC lenses (or a view camera), the ability to quickly adjust for keystoning in programs like Photoshop will instantly take photos of both exteriors and interiors up to a level far above the average real estate listing snapshots.
And the ability to bracket exposures and combine them in post-processing is a tremendously useful means of overcoming too-contrasty lighting conditions. With a bit of practice it soon becomes a quick and simple method of taming extreme highlights and shadows, without the greater learning curve and specialty software required for true HDR images.
Everyone who participated was truly excited to start using their new-found skills, and this week we’ll repeat the workshop with another group in Northern Virginia. Those students are already calling with eager questions and requests!
Posted in Architecture, Cameras, Composition, Creativity, Digital Photography, Learning Photography, Photoshop, Technology, photography workshops | No Responses »
Tags: architectural photography, Cameras, Digital Photography, Fill Flash, Flash, helping young people, interior photography, kids, learn photography, photography workshops, real estate photography, travel photography
Written by stuestler on December 21st, 2009
The workshop pace picked up on Friday and into Saturday, culminating in the presentation of the project designs to the client, Hospitalito Atitlan. The client was blown away! The group came up with five different potential designs, and the hospital is trying to decide which one to use. They are all outstanding works.
After the client presentation just about everyone relaxed at a party along the lakefront. Unfortunately, it was about that time that some evil bug got hold of me. I won’t go into details on the chills and my other experiences of the afternoon and evening – let’s just say the bug had me confined to quarters for the duration, and I missed the party and the final dinner that evening.
What a great group though – after the dinner everyone came up to my room to check on me and say goodbye. We really come together like a family at these workshops, and the last day is an emotional mix of elation over the success of the week and the sadness that it’s over.
After a long day of travel on Sunday I arrived back home in Maryland, and picked right up on Monday where I had left off on shooting an annual report for one of my clients. Then, just to really make the point that I wasn’t in Guatemala anymore. The now famous “Blizzard of 2009” embraced us this weekend here in the Mid-Atlantic.
What a dichotomy – one Saturday walking through Santiago as Christmas festivities were in full swing, complete with a palm-leaf tree in the town square. The next, just a week later, buried in 20” of snow!
It makes the prospect of the next Design4Kids workshop in June that much more inviting. We’re considering a “Master Class” for the more advanced, experienced Fotokids. Keep tuned here and at www.Design4Kids for more to come on this workshop. And if you have the talents and experience to share – in photography, graphic design, marketing, entrepreneurship – seriously consider in joining us as a volunteer mentor. There’s no way I can fully describe the incredible fulfillment and richness of emotion that comes from working with these kids.
Feel free to contact me for more info.
Posted in Candids, Composition, Creativity, Digital Photography, Learning Photography, Travel, photography workshops | No Responses »
Tags: candid photography, Creativity, Digital Photography, helping young people, kids, learn photography, people photography, photography workshops, teach photography, travel photography, volunteer
Written by stuestler on December 10th, 2009
Back in the classroom this morning with an explanation of depth of field and using the aperture for creative control. We worked with “the girls” today on the photography side – it just happens that the girls in the group have less photo training, while the boys are more experienced, and we’ve divided the class into beginners and advanced.
After a short in-class presentation and a few examples, we went outside and practiced the techniques – definitely the best way to really learn and understand how to do it. Everyone loves the opportunity to play and experiment with the camera.
Then back inside for the next lesson – fill flash. We did double photo sessions with the same group today while the other group was doing screen printing on the graphic design side, and will do the same tomorrow with the boys working with us on photography.
It was a natural segue from aperture to understanding the use of fill flash both indoors and outside. It’s natural for beginners to simply use flash as the primary light source and blast away. Once you see the subtle natural results from balancing flash with available light, you really begin to get excited about the possibilities for creative control.
The kids really got into shooting photos of each other with the flash – they played like paparazzi and stars! This group is an amazingly talented bunch of kids, and they devour every new concept we present them.
The afternoon was project work. The concepts are set and the posters are really coming along. Only a day and a half before they present the final designs to the client.
Tomorrow we’ll see how the boys do with depth of field and fill flash. The girls have set the bar!
Posted in Cameras, Composition, Creativity, Digital Photography, Learning Photography, Portrait, Technology, Travel, photography workshops | No Responses »
Tags: Cameras, Creativity, Digital Photography, Fill Flash, Flash, helping young people, kids, learn photography, people photography, photography workshops, teach photography, travel photography
Written by stuestler on December 9th, 2009
Today the group took a break from the teaching and project work and went for a day trip across the lake to Panajachel. The largest town on Lago Atitlan, Pana, as its often known, is the tourist and ex-pat mecca of the Atitlan area. This makes for a busy and photo-op rich environment.
One on Pana’a attributes is that all three of Atitlan’s volcanos – Vuncans Atitlan, San Pedro and Toliman are all visible from the town’s harbor. Heading up into town and all streets are predictably lined with shops offering local clothing, jewelry and all manner of souvenirs. It’s a colorful gauntlet, and if the shops don’t entice you the street vendors are always there with their offerings.
But we weren’t there to shop. Bree Hankinson, who runs the Fotokids program in Santiago, created The Amazing Photo Race for the kids (and the mentors). We teamed up in teams of three and went out into the town to solve a cryptic list of photo assignments. It made for some very creative thinking and rewarding inter-cultural teamwork between the kids and mentors. Not to mention some interesting interpretations and translations of the photo list!
Tomorrow its back to class and work on the project.
Posted in Cameras, Candids, Creativity, Digital Photography, Portrait, Travel, photography workshops | No Responses »
Tags: Cameras, candid photography, Creativity, Digital Photography, helping young people, kids, landscape photography, learn photography, people photography, photography workshops, teach photography, travel photography, volunteer
