Lessons

Each year the Mountaineers offer a basic photo class. For the month of March dozens of photo volunteers with the Mountaineers help students understand the workings of their cameras and begin to see composition and light and to explore their creativity. It's a lot jam-packed into 4 weeks of class lectures and outdoor workshops.


But if you are at all interested in taking a photo class, it's one of the best for the time and money. You learn as much in one month as I did my 1st quarter taking college photography classes. Often the workshops have an exceptional student to volunteer ratio - often 3 students to one instructor so students can get individual instruction on their cameras and technique.

It's always a joy to me to volunteer for these classes. In the first few workshops after a couple of tough lectures on exposure, they look at the camera in their hands with confusion and at times dread. We actually expect them to take the camera off the safe setting of Auto and figure out exposure on their own.

With a little coaching most students begin to play and explore what their cameras can do. It's the light in their eyes as they begin to understand exposure and how their camera captures light that brings me back every year.

This year, for the 1st outdoor workshop at the Washington Park Arboretum, I was able to tag along with one gentleman (we had enough volunteers to give the students a 1 to 1 1/2 ratio) who knew his camera pretty well. He was taking the class to work on his composition. So that is what we did.

We'd look for compositions, large & small, throughout the park. At one point, we ended up under the bridge and I just stopped to look at the lines and textures. He had gone on, and I hurried to catch up with him. On our way back he stopped to make a few images of what I saw. But after we parted ways I grabbed my camera to make my own image.

When we later compared images we were able to compare how each of us interpreted the scene differently. I liked the drama of his version emphasizing the drama of the arch. But I also like my version above emphasizing the textures.

Splash!

Ever head out to photograph a place you have never been to before? You may have done a little research - looked at a map, maybe checked the tide tables, or looked at images others had made of the area. But really, did you feel prepared to start photographing when you arrived? Then what did you do?

Did you arrive early and meander around? Explore the area a bit? Evaluate the angle of the sun and approximate where the light will be best as it sets? Did you meander and take detail images of rocks and foliage while waiting for the light to be right?

On a recent trip exploring Washington State Parks, I stopped by Larrabee State Park near Bellingham. I had been wanting to visit Larrabee for some time after seeing a couple of images taken at the park. Crashing waves, quiet trails - that sort of thing. A little research also showed a vein of sandstone running through the park and the beach would have some fun shaped rock formations to play with.

True to my plans, I arrived early and meandered around a bit. Checked the arc of the sun. Looked for a few spots that might be possibilities for sunset. Composed a few intimate landscape images. Then became fascinated with the incoming waves sweeping over the rounded sandstone rocks jutting out into the bay. I was having fun with the waves as they swept over the rocks when I realized the wind and tide driven waves were crashing into the boulder off to my side. It looked fun, so I quickly repositioned my camera and started to capture the action.

Not long after the crashing waves died down on that boulder but were highly active on the next one. I recomposed and started snapping away as the light became more robust edging toward evening.

Then I saw it. The waves picked up again on the other boulder. One wave would crash on one boulder then right after another would crash onto the other boulder. My mind began processing - how cool would it be if waves crashed on both boulders at the same time and curled into each other?

Very cool!

So, although it is a good thing to plan ahead you don't always need a plan to go photo-ing. You just need to be open to what's presented for you.

Lessons in Organization

Last week I received a text from a good friend of mine - Call Chad @ #, he needs a show hung in his wine bar this week. So I called Chad and left a message. I still had not heard from him by the time I got home late that evening, I figured he had found someone else to hang a show. They sounded desperate so I thought he had several feelers out for artists. Nope.

At 9:30, after I was tucked away in bed, the phone rings. "This is Chad." cmae the voice through the phone. "Can you get me some framed images tomorrow mid-day?" Not knowing how I'd do that, I said "Sure, no problem."

I spent the next 2 hours combing through prints, mats, and frames looking for something, anything to hang in his shop. In the end, I had 10 images ready to hang and went back to bed for a fitful night of sleep. The worries had started.

What if he hates the images?
What if someone else hates the images?
What if I don't have enough?
Can you tell if the show was slapped together?
And if so, will they think I'm a hack?

While hanging my images the next day, I had to restrain myself from pointing out every flaw to the employee helping me. Oh this was horrifying, my show was going to go over like a lead balloon. As I related my horror to my co-workers the next day, several of them artists themselves, they shared that they too had those fears and obsessions.

And this brought up the question - why is it artists who are supposed to be free and breezy and adventurous so uptight, stale and fearful?

I'm sure the answer is different for everyone. As I started looking at my fears, I realized that I begin to exchange the words "my art" with the word "me". So as I asked these questions I was really asking, deep down, what if they hate me? And there's nothing I can really do about their thought on my images, but I can remember that my images will be liked or not and it has nothing to do with me. It has everything to do with the viewer and their personal tastes.

Oh, and as I was hanging my images, the one posted above got a couple of exclamations of "wicked!" from my assistant. The opening went well. If you're interested in seeing the show yourself, it is going through April 7th at In the Red Wine Bar in Seattle.

Letting down your Guard to find your way

I am a volunteer instructor for a navigation class with the Mountaineers.

What does that statement bring to your mind? I am an instructor for a navigation class. I must know my stuff. I always know where I am in the wilderness. I can read a map like a novel and manipulate a compass like a tearful toddler manipulates his mother in the candy aisle.

But that is not true and just a few short years ago although I took a map & compass with me on hikes, I usually left them in my pack. Both spoke a foreign language to me. A language where I wasn't even sure if I could ask for the bathroom.

I had taken navigation when I climbed Mt St Helens the 1st time. But it never seemed to sink in, it was just so weird looking. Words like topography, declination, bearing, UTM, northing, and easting made my eyes glaze over. And besides (as I justified my ignorance) I wasn't a leader - I was a follower.

Then I became a leader and navigation still seemed beyond my comprehension. After taking navigation seminars through different organizations, the compass still seemed like a mystical talisman. I even misled a hiking group in the steppe around Yakima, WA. How do you get lost on your way to the biggest hill in the middle of a plain? I mean really!

I decided to try one more time at a navigation class. I needed to take the Mountaineers navigation course, not to lead but to take the scramble course. I walked out of the workshop with mostly the right answers - something had stuck. But I was positive that my skills were so shaky, I was going to get lost out in the woods. But then something clicked. Halfway down the hill on my final exercise, I learned to trust not only my compass, but myself. I could do this. And then I realized, I could help other do this too.

So why am I telling you this story? Especially in relation to my first statement?

Because we all expect our teachers to be smarter than we are and that can sometimes be intimidating. And I learned a valuable lesson about vulnerability, relationships, and education in class recently.

I was busily helping navigation students with their exercises in the workshop portion of the class. The section of the course where we routinely throw around all those bizarre and foreign sounding words. One of my student went to the bathroom and when she came back I looked onto her tear filled eyes and saw the same apprehension I had felt just a few years before.

I decided to slow down my instruction and focused on her and another student that was struggling while my partner worked with the other students at the table (one of which was an orienteer and should have teaching the class herself). She was flustered and I let her slow down even more. At the end of the class, I related to her the same story I just told you. She looked up at me, smiled and thanked me. My story made her feel a little better. But better than that, she was ready to head to the field trip portion of the class to build her skills more.

As I write this, she is on her field trip portion. I envision a young woman gaining confidence with each step through the woods knowing that she can do this. That she can stay found.