jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

I'm posting this as a caution about signing on with Andrea Magri for a photo course.

I've signed up for a several online photo courses - lynda.com, etc., and they've been great. On June 24, I accepted an offer of a GoPro course from Andrea Magri - "The GoPro Handbook was written by Andrea Magri, an Italian filmmaker, longterm GoPro user, and head writer at Project GoPro" - for $37. It seemed to offer a lot, the price was good, and I could get a "no questions asked" refund if I wasn't satisfied.

Unfortunately, I wasn't satisfied. I received a 138-page PDF and a lot of links. Some of the links didn't work, and others required a subscription to use them. The processing tutorials were limited to Adobe Premiere and Apple's Final Cut, neither of which I use. I didn't want to spend $37.50 for a PDF, so I requested a refund. It took a while, but PayPal said I was getting a refund. A few days later, the refund was canceled. I contacted Andrea, and he apologized and said the refund was sent again. It didn't even make an appearance on PayPal. After waiting a week or more, I posted on his YouTube pages that I hadn't received the refund. Yesterday, he sent me an email saying the refund was sent, and it appears on PayPal. I'm hoping it goes through this time.

Maybe my experience was unique but think twice before sending him your money.

gmontjr2350 Loc: Southern NJ

Thanks for the heads-up!
I take photography and programming courses using Udemy, sale prices only. I've had no issues with them and recommend them highly.

George

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

More importantly: never spend money on photography 'training' until you've exhausted all the freely available training on utube and elsewhere. There's more free training available than you can ever watch in the rest of your lifetime. Don't pay money for what is available free via advising support of the author.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Right. However, Lynda.com, Kelby, Kent Weakly, and others offer good, well-organized courses covering specific topics.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Yes, Udemy is good. Sales are good, too. : )

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

It might seem like it's worth paying for, but did you exhaust all the freely available material first?

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Yes, I did. I watched every video on YouTube - not just photography - everything. As a matter of fact, I recorded all the YouTube videos so I can watch them again.

"Free" is often okay, but it's usually hit or miss. I've done searches for specific topics, but for an organized series, paying is often required. I've gotten several courses for LR and PS, and they were worth the minor cost. They would move logically from beginning to end.

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

Your Adobe subscription enables access to numerous 'free' training videos behind their pay (subscription) wall.

Stephan G

The drawback is the same as it is for the general searches on Google, et al. One has to be very specific as to what one is needing. The more distinctions in the search questions, the better chance of latching on something that will provide the searched for information.

There was a time that search engines worked on the subject titles. Now, the prioritization is based on the number of times a site is hit. This pushes the sites with fewer hits to the back of the bus. And it is in the thousands of hits. Doing searches can eat up a lot of time, usually ending in frustrations. One search, for example, provided only links to other search engines for the first fifteen pages.(!)

"Networking" does improve on the odds in regards to Photography, hence this web site's one of the many benefits.

"Tally Ho!" is still a viable phrase.

Try to put in as much as possible in the search subject header, using the percentage of relevant words in the results to fine tune the search further.

It is, FWIW, a bit easier than when doing scientific research.

bsprague Loc: Lacey, WA, USA

Lynda.com can be free. But, it is no longer Lynda's company.

Lynda.com was bought by LinkedIn, which in turn, was bought by Microsoft! Now Lynda.com is called "LinkedIn Learning". The content has changed, but the photography and videography courses are still there. A lot of business and career skill courses have been added.

How is it free? Many, if not most, public libraries offer it as part of their online training systems. Get a library card!

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

Learning to be successful in google search is an important skill to develop too.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Here's a very good site for free and paid courses. Anything that is running live is free. You can watch and/or record them.
https://www.creativelive.com/onair/photography/

You can also buy the programs that have already been shown. I've paid $20 - $30 for videos in the past.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

One nice thing about CreativeLive is their series on specific camera models.

Here's a good one for $14.00. I wonder how similar the controls are on the other Z cameras.

https://www.creativelive.com/class/nikon-z7-z6-fast-start-john-greengo?via=autocomplete

And more Nikon -

https://www.creativelive.com/catalog/photography/nikon-tutorials?via=navpath_8314

pithydoug Loc: Catskill Mountains, NY

I'm a big fan of free and have been lucky to find all I need. That said, free often comes with degrees of difficulty. If your flitting around different posters you often get confusing answers. My suggestion from the free bucket, choose one person and follow. At least you get some type consistency especially workflow. Each author has their workflow and unless you are well versed in the topic, not the newbie, there is confusion from the start.

traderjohn Loc: New York City

He doesn't have to agree with you.