From conception through post-processing
Join us for a photography workshop near our newest National Park, White Sands, in Alamogordo, New Mexico.
William and Katherine Horton, along with Rocky Mountain Outdoor Writers and Photographers (RMOWP), will offer a 1 1/2 day photography workshop. Called Take Control of your Photographs, this workshop will make you more proficient, more artistic, and more confident.
Availability
When: October 4-5, 2020 – just prior to conference
Where: Holiday Inn Express & Suites, Alamogordo, NM
RMOWP Member Rate: $250 including lunch both days
Non-Member Rate: $300 including lunch both days
Register at: Rocky Mountain Outdoor Writers and Photographers
About the workshop
Instructors: William & Katherine Horton
Length: 1.5 days
Take Control of Your Photography is a 1 1/2 day workshop that will make you a better photographer: more proficient, more artistic, and more confident.
Starting with a photo critique to identify specific needs, this fast-paced and focussed workshop will not waste your time on things you already know. You will not fritter away instruction time driving from one location to another. Nor, will you be subjected to endless slides of the instructors’ photographs. Instead, you will engage in hands-on classroom activities and practical demonstrations targeting areas of improvement identified in photo critiques.
In addition to activities that will enhance your camera technique, you will also learn how to develop your images to bring out their potential. Working solo or in a team, you will practice editing photographs to meet various criteria, such as for use in a textbook or displayed in an art gallery.
Objectives:
You will learn to:
- Find the picture in the scene.
- Capture what you see in your mind’s eye.
- Develop the potential of a captured scene.
- Fix common problems.
- Identify ways to improve your own work.
Topics:
The topics we cover will be based upon our initial photo-critique session, because there is no value to teaching you what you already know. However, some of the big issues we will discuss include:
- Identify ways to improve your photography.
- Set meaningful goals for your photography.
- Shoot with editing in mind.
- Juggle aperture, shutter speed, and ISO for perfect exposure.
- Make the subject pop.
- Add depth and drama to your images.
- Deal with high-contrast scenes.
- Take control of your camera with features such as back-button focus, and auto-ISO.
- Get tack-sharp images.
- Use blur creatively.
- Establish a sleek, non-destructive workflow.
- Automate tedious editing tasks.
- Fix noise, dust spots, and other unavoidable flaws.
- Continue learning from readily-available online resources.
Who should attend:
This workshop is designed to help you recognize and capture good photographs, regardless of your current skill level. Participants should be able to operate their DSLR or mirrorless camera in other than fully automatic mode. And, they need to be comfortable using a computer and editing software. For this workshop we will be using Adobe Lightroom Classic. If you do not have it, you can download a free trial ahead of the workshop.
Agenda
The workshop will be broken into three 3.5-hour units.
Day one:
Morning Session – 8:30 AM to 12:00 PM
Lunch – 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM
Afternoon Session – 1:00 PM to 4:30 PM
Day two:
Morning Session – 8:30 AM to 12:00 PM
Lunch – 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM
There will be no homework. We will end at a reasonable time so that participants can take advantage of the golden and blue hours—and perhaps practice techniques they have learned.
Requirements:
- DSLR or mirrorless camera.
- Tripod.
- Whatever lenses you have.
- Laptop with Adobe Lightroom Classic installed.
- Instruction manual for your camera (paper or PDF).
- Minimal pre-work completed prior to workshop.
About your instructors
William Horton
A photographer since childhood, William (Bill) Horton takes pictures of landscapes, animals, and plants for fun. For money, he photographs cars, buildings, and scientific subjects. He has won awards for his photography, including a first-place Denver Audubon Society award and an Epson International Pano Silver award. He has also won numerous Rocky Mountain Outdoor Writers and Photographers awards, including two best-of-shows and 14 best-of-category. Additionally, Bill’s images have been used for posters, album covers, scientific papers, book covers, and movies. And, he has participated in many gallery shows and art journals.
Bill is an experienced instructor. Over the past 30 years, he has conducted training in fifteen countries on four continents. He has taught classes in person and online. And he has written thirteen books dedicated to communicating visual and textual information effectively. Bill shares that his proudest achievement is having his words published as fortune-cookie fortunes.
Katherine Horton
Artist and computer-wrangler, Katherine (Kit) Horton has a proven record of making images beautiful. She has illustrated, edited, and produced camera-ready copy for award-winning books. Kit has also won awards for her own photographic work.
Currently, Kit is responsible for editing and preparing photos for gallery shows, competitions, and publications. With over 20 years of Photoshop experience and twelve years of Lightroom experience, Kit fears no software.
Outside the studio, Kit has conducted training classes ranging from Saudi Arabia to inside a nuclear power plant.
