Carolyn B – Fine Art Photography

I’ve posted about my newly discovered business purpose here.   It’s about sharing everyday gratitude for life and love one frame at a time.  It’s about capturing those moments in life we are so grateful for and freezing them to enjoy and remember them forever.

At the beginning of this week, I facilitated my first ever photography workshop for mums.   Teaching them to use their cameras away from the ‘safe’ haven of auto mode, giving them confidence in using the manual setting with a little knowledge and a bit of play, I believe every mum can capture stunning everyday moments beautifully.   Digital cameras are amazing.   They take fantastic photos with the click of a button, straight out of the box … but they take amazing photos when the operator knows how to use the menu and has a little understanding about exposure and light and colour and composition.   A photographer needs a camera for sure.  The camera however needs a photographer more.

So, in the lead up to the photography workshop I spoke to the participants informally and worked out there was a selection of mums who had not taken a photo in nearly two years to mums who had a great camera and safely used the auto mode sometimes happily, sometimes not and other mums who had ventured away from auto and avidly took images of their children.   We began at the beginning with information about exposure.   There’s more on that here.

Together we experimented with using light in the outdoors and searching for great light in the indoors.   We spoke about looking for light and searching for light angles to get the right colour.   We talked about white balance and poured over capturing details.  I gave away tips like  …

- check the white balance setting.

- when taking photos indoors, your subject should face the light which means in most cases the photographer should have their back to the door or the window as much as possible.

- try to be a little higher than the subject so their eyes will catch the light as they look up at the camera.   It doesn’t have to be much higher, just enough to catch the light.

- light can bounce off light coloured surfaces.  If there’s too much glare and your subject is squinting, face them towards the white wall or your white shirt and let the sunlight bounce off this surface to light up their faces or eyes.

- if you’re photographing with backlight, over exposing the image will lighten the subject and eliminate the silhouette factor.   Some aspects of the background may become over exposed or ‘blown out’ but that’s okay if the subject is correctly exposed.

- don’t be afraid to break the rules.

All the while gorgeous little ‘J’ posed and played and smiled and laughed, a little like this ….

Isn’t ‘J’ just the most adorable little girl?!!

There wasn’t nearly enough time to cover all the information I wanted to and no where near enough time to answer everyone’s questions but at the end of the day there were mums who were excited about buying a camera to take photos … excited about using their new found knowledge and confidence in using settings on the camera they had always feared and excited about experimenting with different aspects of exposure one step at a time.  There will be follow up workshops I’m sure but for the time being if you’re wanting to ask a question about putting the {m} in mum or photographing your children, don’t be afraid to use the comments section or email me.   I’m sure if I don’t know the answer, someone will.

Until next time .. enjoy.

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