Taller de Fotografía (Photography Workshop)

Since I'm only registered in 2 classes here in Chile, I wanted to find some things that I could do to fill up my time that were interesting to me. For a while now I'd been telling Kyle about how I wanted to take a photography class. Ever since Scott gave me his old Canon AE-1, free! I actually thought these were offered only for foreign students so when I showed up last week for the first meeting, I was pretty surprised to be one of only 2 foreign people in a group of 20ish participants.

Canon AE-1

I've been dying to take a film class where I could learn great techniques and maybe even how to process my own film. I actually found a place in Calgary that offers what I'm looking for, so I will save it for when I get back. In the meantime, the PUCV (my uni here) offers a series of free workshops for students, one of which is digital photography! Some of the others were: theatre, choir, beginner guitar, magic and illusions, cooking, public speaking, circus art, etc. etc. The variety was great and they are

My baby camera

The first thing Augusto (the profesor of the workshop) had us do was take out our cameras. Looking around, everyone had amazing Nikon or Canon SLR cameras (which cost a fortune here in Chile). I bashfully took out my little mini Canon Powershot and set it on my desk. I have one of the smallest cameras in the workshop but it does have manual mode which makes it possible for me to use it to do the activities. Obviously I would just love to have a beautiful SLR camera but this is the one I have here, so I'm working with it.

The first class we spent most of the time introducing ourselves, explaining why we were interested in photography, what we wanted to learn, etc. I shared the story of getting the camera from Scott and him giving me this used hardcover book of photography basics to get me started. Once I figured how to change basic settings I really started to enjoy the way my photos were turning out. Augusto explained that the homework was going to be extensive for the first week. It was. The homework was to take 100 photos in 1 week that were grouped into 10 "themes". From each theme we had to choose the best and worst photo to send to him (20 photos in total). I ended up taking 60 for the class. Even though 100 photos really isn't that many.. I found the assignment challenging because I felt forced to take photos that I otherwise would not have taken and did not necessarily want. Up until this workshop I've only taken pictures when I've felt like it, for my own pleasure. In the end I sent him 12 photos, which I was proud of.

In the second class (yesterday), everyone that sent their photos to Augusto, got them displayed up on the screen for the whole class to see. I was actually pretty nervous to have mine up there since it was the first time I had ever displayed my photography skills. Of course people have looked at my photos, but just for pleasure. The results were really gratifying. Augusto made very nice comments about many of them, noting the exposure, focus, composition, etc. Of course there were a couple (the ones I had labeled the "bad" ones) that were really quite bad! He actually said, "Ok this one is ugly" about one of them, which, in all honesty, was quite ugly. Haha!

All in all I am really loving the class. Even though it is from 6:30-8 after a long school day, I find myself so pumped up with energy after I leave that it is definitely worth it. In my next post I would love to write about this week's "salida a terreno", which is more or less like a field trip, where we visited a questionable plaza and market area at night (something I would never do on my own here).

Here are a few of the photos I sent in as part of the homework: