I’ve been kicking around the idea of doing a hands-on photography workshop, and I’m curious about how much interest there would be.
When athletes study a sport, they don’t just go out and play. They also do drills to improve some technical aspect of their game. Running through tires improves agility. Batting practice improves, well, batting. (If I was the least bit athletic, I would fill this paragraph with a few more examples to support my point and engage your interest. I’m not, so just imagine I did.)
Similarly, I want to do a workshop of technical photography exercises. This wouldn’t be a class of going to the beach and taking pretty pictures, but rather going somewhere and spending some time working on focused exercises. I make these up for myself and do them, and I find them very helpful in helping me become more technically competent, or in helping me see things in a different way.
Logistics: The workshop would be held on a weekend day somewhere near San Francisco– currently, I’m thinking that either the Alameda Naval Air Station or Treasure Island might be interesting venues, but I’m open to suggestions. My timeframe is sometime in January, 2009. Participants should have some sort of digital camera, for quick review of photos, and a dSLR would be best. The target audience would be beginning and intermediate photographers, those who have gained basic competence with their camera and want to work on improving their skills.
As this would be an experimental class on my part, the fee would be a small donation to the charity of your choice, and maybe a dollar or two to cover my expenses if I do printed materials to go with it.
Would you be interested? If so, what would you like to get out of such a class? Do you have a suggestion for a location? Is there anything that would make you more or less likely to attend?
Stop Shooting Auto! 
I would do it if it weren’t a full day and it weren’t too expensive and if I thought I’d remember enough to use it a month later / received a cheat sheet.
Dunno… 3 hours, $20?
I would be interested if you held such a thing. Please keep me posted.
I’d be interested, especially if it happened somewhere reasonably accessible by BART or public transit and happened sometime before 18 January.
Interested… but VERY busy, seldom able to fit
things in, given as little as 3-4 weeks’ notice.
Yes, I usually am scheduled full-up up to 2-3
months in advance (was once appalled to discover
I had ZERO free days in the coming 23 weeks).
:(
I would love to do this! I’ve been wanting to do something like this, get some semi-personal real-time instruction from someone more knowledgable than I, but most of the instructional photography expeditions I read about are either too focused on a specific subject I’m not particularly interested in (landscape photography) or more expensive than this student can afford. This sounds perfect.
As for logistics: I’d prefer somewhere reasonably accessible via public transit, but would make arrangements to get there even if it was held somewhere local that wasn’t. 3-6 hours sounds like a reasonable length–less than that and there’s not enough time, more than that and my brain would get fatigued, and most people would be unlikely to be able to fit that into their schedules anyway.
I’d be interested depending on time, etc. I would be willing to help another few get there or pick them up from the BART station.
I agree about time frames – 3-6 hours seems like a good length, all depending on content and how experienced the presenter is.
Marc, UCPhotog
Oh yes! Would love to! I’m in the San Joaquin Valley and have an 8 month old I can’t leave. What about an online class?
Michele, the first half of this blog is an online class! And there are lots of exercises in between lessons.
I’ll probably put more exercises online in the future.
I have been impressed with your site. I would love more competitions/critiques of certain subjects. I would very interested in coming to the city for a workshop–the whole question would be timing.
Thank you
i love the idea but i can’t get to sf. could we do something like this online?
I like the idea also. And also can’t get to SF. Hoping you will put something on the website for those of us who can’t get to the class.