I’ve been working as a full time freelance photographer for many years now and like many other self employed creatives I’ve experienced ups as well as downs. When the work is steadily flowing in, it’s easy to believe that it won’t ever slow down, but when the weeks go by with little or no work, it’s hard to believe that it will ever pick up again.
I learned early on that in order to bridge those gaps, I needed to supplement my income during those quiet times. So I decided to start teaching photography. And it wasn’t long before I found I really enjoyed sharing my knowledge and passion and also that I was actually quite good at it.
Alongside my regular work as a photographer, I now teach through a few well known and established photography schools in London as well as under my own name, and I’m proud of the many positive reviews I receive, you can read some of them here.
I’m lucky to meet many different people through the various workshops I offer, but I’m often struck by how many people working as photographers, often in a part time or semi professional capacity still don’t fully understand some of the most fundamental principles of photographic technique, especially when it comes to manual exposure. There must come a time in people’s career progression when they feel embarrassed to admit they don’t understand something they should have learned a long time ago and as a result end up relying on the semi, or even fully automatic modes of their cameras more often than not.
It’s astonishing how many people are charging for their work, even earning a fairly decent income from it, without knowing some of the most basic stuff! I don’t hold that against them and when I’m teaching I remind people there’s no such thing as a stupid question; after all, if you don’t know something, it’s better to ask than to carry on fumbling around in the dark, pretending to know what you’re doing. I certainly don’t know everything and don’t claim to. Nobody does, we’re all learning and there’s always something new to be discovered. However, I firmly believe that anyone working as a photographer should know the fundamental techniques of how to achieve accurate exposures!
With this in mind, and after being encouraged by a few of my students to share some of my teaching online, here’s a quick section of voiced over video from one of my Keynote presentations, explaining the exposure triangle (when teaching in person, I go through it much more slowly while also explaining the controls on the camera).
If you’ve ever struggled with the exposure triangle, I hope you find this helpful.
If you’re interested in learning exposure or any other elements of photography in greater depth, have a look at the workshops I offer or or if you want 1-2-1 personal tuition on any specific area of photography, get in touch to see how I can help you become a better photographer.
