After years of refusing, I've caved to the request of a local arts organization to teach a beginners course on photography; it's about a month away. I have plenty of time to prepare but I'm sure it won't be necessary to reinvent the wheel. Have any of you taught such a course and if so can you steer me to a pre-prepared lesson plan and perhaps some training aids that focus on fundamentals (light, subject, composition, etc.)? I'll be teaching the course outside because of COVID and I plan on keeping the class at or under 2 hours.
Start with asking what your students want to learn. If you try teach DSLRs and exposure triangles to iPhone photographers, you students will glaze over and disengage. For what it's worth, I moved into a 'retirement resort' full of old people. The most active class is the iPhone photography class. Those folks take great pictures!
In 2018 we hosted a four-part series on light in the For Your Consideration section of UHH. Here is #4 with links to the earlier 3:
https://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-534411-1.htmlI was host, but the project was a collaboration of 7 people plus all those who contributed after we created the threads. Possibly you can use some of the organization when covering the importance of light.
Have a great time!
Thank you Linda. MUCH information here to draw from.
Thanks. Good tips for sure but I won't have time to query the students' learning desires. I've already identified the subjects to be covered so they generally understand the scope of the lesson - very basic. My course will be for Point 'n Shoot and entry level DSLR ops who understand little if anything about photography.
One thing I would include is a list of web sites. From those that I know, I would include UHH, DpMag, Digital Photography School, Ken Rockwell, Dp Review, Thom Hogan, DxOMark. I’m certain there are many more great ones people can recommend, but those were good ones off the top of my head. I would also give them a list of famous photographers with a link to Getty Images. Many of your students will explore no farther, but someone will get inspired and want more.
Ansel Adams
Dorothea Lange
Robert Capa
Richard Avedon
Andre Kertesz
Diane Arbus
Alfred Steiglitz
Edward Weston
Steven McCurry
Joel Meyerowitz
Mary Ellen Mark
Are some I would include. Good luck.
Shellback
Loc: North of Cheyenne Bottoms Wetlands - Kansas
Excellent suggestion. Thanks.
Any ideas for an easy-to-use (for novices) and free editing tool? I use LR with the old Picasa as a secondary tool (especially for cloning, etc.) but I know there are tons of others out there that I've never investigated because I'm very satisfied with what I have.
"easy-to-use (for novices) and free editing tool?"
The ones that come with current Windows and current iOS seem very good to me! Maybe a little more might be Adobe Photoshop Express.
Don't make the lessons anymore complicated than they need to be. For example, some photography instructors who eager to be as accurate as possible, try to point out every exception to the rule, no matter how insignificant. But this will likely only overwhelm and confuse many beginners, and they will then fail to grasp the basics due to information overload. And keep diagrams and flow charts as simple as possible. Don't treat photography as if it were rocket science. A beginner doesn't need that.
Cryppy wrote:
Any ideas for an easy-to-use (for novices) and free editing tool?
For Windows users:
https://www.faststone.org/I haven't explored all the editing options, but it wouldn't take you long to get acquainted.
Is this a single two-hour course? If not, how many meetings?
btw, the exquisite photos on your website make me homesick for my home state!
If you want to reply, then
register here. Registration is free and your account is created instantly, so you can post right away.