Sep 12, 2012, 08:16
Most people are naturally inclined to take photos, but are discouraged by the steep and highly technical learning curve. Most courses on photography start by teaching about exposure, aperture, shutter speed, ISO, depth of field and focal length. Wow, what an ordeal when all you want to do is to take photos!!! This is a hold over from days when cameras were totally mechanical manual beasts and photographer had to do everything. This is not the case today, when even the lowliest cell phones can take of all that. So, why start with it?
1) I think that most important is to start with showing that cramming aunt Mary in the photo with Eiffel Tower is not the ultimate photo achievement, although it could be a great memento of the trip you both enjoyed together. Show your "students" that photography could be their tool for self-expression. Tell them to look around them and photograph what interests them. Tell them that the image should also tell the viewers why the photo was taken and to make it interesting to them. I would talk about nature and how it makes me feel and how I try to capture that in my photos. You may talk of something else. I would show them what I photograph, why and how and have them go at it with their cell phone or compact or whatever. It really does not matter. I would not comment on technical issues much and focus on these ideas and share the joy of (partial) successes.
2) Eventually, some will find this fun and get quite good at that. But technical issues would detract from perfection as the brains of the camera would struggle with the artistic ambitions of the budding photographer. Now you can introduce the use histogram and exposure compensation to make the burned highlights go away etc. Suddenly you are teaching peace meal theory, but now to hooked photographers who understand why they need to know and they actually want to know.
This is based on my experience with 2 "students". Perhaps this may be useful to you if you end up teaching somebody or if you design courses.
1) I think that most important is to start with showing that cramming aunt Mary in the photo with Eiffel Tower is not the ultimate photo achievement, although it could be a great memento of the trip you both enjoyed together. Show your "students" that photography could be their tool for self-expression. Tell them to look around them and photograph what interests them. Tell them that the image should also tell the viewers why the photo was taken and to make it interesting to them. I would talk about nature and how it makes me feel and how I try to capture that in my photos. You may talk of something else. I would show them what I photograph, why and how and have them go at it with their cell phone or compact or whatever. It really does not matter. I would not comment on technical issues much and focus on these ideas and share the joy of (partial) successes.
2) Eventually, some will find this fun and get quite good at that. But technical issues would detract from perfection as the brains of the camera would struggle with the artistic ambitions of the budding photographer. Now you can introduce the use histogram and exposure compensation to make the burned highlights go away etc. Suddenly you are teaching peace meal theory, but now to hooked photographers who understand why they need to know and they actually want to know.
This is based on my experience with 2 "students". Perhaps this may be useful to you if you end up teaching somebody or if you design courses.
Please see my photos at http://mullerpavel.smugmug.com (fewer, better image quality, not updated lately)
or at http://www.flickr.com/photos/pavel_photophile2008/ (all photos)
