Wonderful Friends, Wonderful Workshops

Been back on the streets of NYC with a camera! Never could have dreamed of a hiatus such as we all have just experienced. Thankfully, optimistically, the worst seems behind us, and the streets are starting to bubble with life and light again.

We just did two workshops this past month. Hard at this point to call them workshops, even though there’s a lot of photography, critiquing, banter, advice, discussions of technique and lighting lessons. But really what they were was a gathering of friends and family. It was so good to see everyone!

We’ve grown close as a group over time, but also keep adding wonderful new members to the family. Fancy Girl Street Boy Productions, led by Liza Politi and Ari Espay is simply the most congenial, well run, tried and true workshop production house I know about in all my years of shooting and teaching. This time out, to celebrate the start of our “in-person” workshops again, we had raffles and discounts from a few affiliates! Gitzo, Tether Tools, and Maha Energy all stepped up to support all of us as we are getting back to doing what we love–shooting pictures–with renewed energy and a determination to make up for time lost.

Happy winners of the Maha Energy kit (David and Jose) which included the MH-C980 charger, Powerex batteries and the slick rechargeable LED lantern. Tether Tools provided terrific support with winners (Cindy and Mac) getting a Tether Tools Starter Kit – pretty cool! Attendees also got access to discount codes which are always great perks. Gitzo provided our workshop photogs with unique coupon codes, which are definitely appreciated! Had a bunch of different tripods in play and ball heads so it’s the perfect way to test things out “realtime” before buying during the course of a workshop.

We’ve grown so close, as a group, I’ve occasionally tailored a custom critiques such as you see here in this video. My dear friend, Ashley Garrett is a wonderfully talented professional photog living and working around NYC. We share a special bond in that she shoots a lot of theater and dance, two long time favorite subjects for me as well. Ashley and I were walking together at Coney Island, see, and we came upon this bubble making unicorn.

Truth be told, I don’t think I told Ashley not to shoot it. She did. I hoped she wouldn’t put it in her offerings for critiques. She did. I mean, ok, she displayed typical energy in pursuit of this thing, getting down low, managing the background. But, let’s just say it wasn’t my favorite image of hers. I let her know. But, I have to admit my part in this. I was with her when she shot it. I did not stop her. Do I share guilt here? To have witnessed this photographic crime and not reported it? To make amends, I went out and got my own bubble unicorn. Hence this video critique, especially designed for you, Ashley…

More tk….