A photography trip...

The old adage that ‘you get out of life what you put into it,’ doesn’t even begin to hint at the pleasure that accrues from helping others. Last week I took three teenagers on a photography trip to the local animal park. Instead of having them simply wandering around just snapping in the hope they might get a good photograph, I gave them a detailed list of what I expected. Being given a clear brief is often very efficacious when it comes to taking photographs. The amateur who is free to take photos of anything, often gets lost in what to do and usually spends more time deciding than actually photographing.

It was gloomy, cold day with little colour and the light was bad. Instead of walking around snapping everything I asked them to choose one or two birds or animals and to spend at least half an hour getting to know them and observing their mannerisms and habits. Once they had done that and they felt they had got to know their subject I asked them to try and capture the essence of their particular bird or animal – just like a portrait photographer would.

As it was gloomy I asked them to try and capture some colour to liven things up and I gave each one of them a flash gun to experiment with, explaining how it could be ‘throttled back’ and used to assist the natural light as opposed to swamping it and also to provide a nice catch-light in the eyes of their subjects. I also stressed the importance of getting their focussing point over the eye.

Here are some of the images they captured.

I know Allison and Caprice are budding photographers so in my mind’s eye I took you along too. I hope this trip gives you some ideas.