I went to my photography class tonight and it was quite a learning experience. I shared some of my photos and my instructor critiqued them and gave me some pointers. I love constructive feedback. It’s hard when I’m just taking photos and no one will tell me objectively what works and what doesn’t work. It’s also nice to hear feedback from someone who knows what makes a good photo. I also learned more about exposure and composition, which made me realize that some of my favorite photos can be much better. He also taught me how to use a gray card…sweet. I got one with one of my photography books but never knew how to use it properly.

The assignments have been really fun and helpful yet challenging. It’s harder when things are forced upon me. I’m finding myself to be sort of a selfish photographer…my best shots seem to be of people that are interesting and/or important to me. That’s why I’m wondering about how I’ll do on Saturday with the charity walk. I’ve volunteered to take photos of people I don’t know doing something not very interesting for a cause that I don’t know much about. I’m looking forward to the challenge.

If you’re interested in practicing some skills, here are the assignments given out so far…give it a try:

• take a photo of something front-lit, side-lit, and back-lit
• take a photo at the correct exposure, then over-expose 2 f-stops and under-expose 2 f-stops
• take a photo of the color red (not a red shoe or red flower)…just the color
• take a photo of motion
• take a photo using the “Rule of Thirds”…basically, have the object off-center
• take an entire roll of film of one subject (something interesting to you) and work on your composition/lighting to make the subject more interesting – my subject will be Koa. haha.
• take an entire roll of one type of thing (walls, car parts, etc.), then rewind the roll and reload the same roll, take the entire roll again of something else (completely different from the first)