These are the classes I currently teach
Beginning 35mm Digital Photography
Perhaps you own and shoot with a 35mm digital camera but are ending up with less than satisfactory photos. Or maybe you’re tired of shooting on AUTO, having realized you’d like a better understanding of how your camera works. This, then, is the course for you. All the basic photography concepts will be covered in depth, including:
Following that, we’ll discuss and critique each other’s pictures. This will be done both as a way to understand photographic composition and aesthetics, as well as to explore specific shooting issues you may be having with your own images.
Time will be spent in class taking pictures. This will help solidify what you’ve learned about both photographic theory and the camera controls. In addition, it will be your chance to experiment with your own composition ideas.
A very complete handout will be distributed when you arrive. It contains much information and many diagrams, and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. In addition, the handout will allow you to spend less time taking notes and more time listening and participating in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Be sure to bring your 35mm digital camera (with its battery charged), battery charger, and instruction booklet. If you have them, also bring your other lenses and an extra camera battery and camera card. IMPORTANT: Please be sure your camera can operate in non-Automatic modes, such as Manual or Shutter Priority – if it does not and you still want to take the class, that certainly is fine too.
Intermediate 35mm Digital Photography
So, you:
In this class, the major thrust will be integrating both old and new photographic information and skills. We will start with a thorough review of the beginning photography course. We’ll then move on to some new and exciting topics, including:
In addition, you’ll have plenty of time in class to practice shooting with your camera. This will help solidify what you’ve learned about photographic theory and the operation of your camera. And it will be your chance to experiment with your own composition ideas.
Be sure to bring your 35mm digital camera (with its battery charged), battery charger, and instruction booklet. If you have them, also bring your other lenses and an extra camera battery and camera card. In addition, bring photos you’ve taken, saved as JPGs or in the RAW format, on a flash drive.
Prerequisite: my Digital Photography 1 class (or its equivalent) or an understanding of basic photographic theory and some familiarity with the operation of your camera.
A very complete handout will be distributed when you arrive. It contains much information and many diagrams and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. In addition, the handout will allow you to spend less time taking notes and more time listening and participating in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Fast Track from AUTO to MANUAL on your 35mm Digital Camera
In 3 hours or less, learn everything necessary to get your 35mm digital camera off AUTO or PROGRAM and onto MANUAL, a mode that puts YOU in charge of your camera.
The MANUAL mode allows you to take command of the camera’s important functions. The advantage is that you and not the camera set the specific controls for the photos you take. That is critical, since the settings coming from you, the photographer, are going to be far more accurate and relative to your vision than the settings coming from the camera when it’s in an automatic mode.
These are some of the topics we’ll address:
This seminar is designed to get you up and shooting quickly and effectively – WITHOUT having to resort to the AUTO or PROGRAM mode.
A very complete handout will be distributed when you arrive. It contains lots of information and diagrams, and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. In addition, the handout will allow you to spend less time taking notes and more time listening and participating in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
VERY IMPORTANT …
Take Great Photos with your Smartphone
The quality of smartphone cameras is improving rapidly. In many situations, they work quite well as stand-ins for 35mm cameras. Therefore, dragging around a heavy camera, hoping not to miss that great picture opportunity, is no longer necessary. A good quality smartphone camera may work almost as well.
This class is for those interested in producing high-quality images with their smartphone cameras. That means learning and understanding the camera controls as well as when and how to use them. Doing so will put the photographer in better control of their camera. And that will mean significantly improved photographs.
Please note: This class will not cover the taking of selfies.
Everything necessary for taking great smartphone pictures will be addressed, including:
You’ll have an opportunity in class to practice taking pictures with your camera. This will help solidify what you’ve learned about photographic theory and the operation of your camera. And it will be your chance to experiment with you own composition ideas.
Finally, please take some of your current smartphone pictures – the good ones and the problematic ones – and save them to a thumb drive so they can be viewed in class. This will be helpful when we discuss composition and aesthetics. And, just as important, it will allow you to show images you like and to get help with images where problems exist.
A very complete handout will be distributed on arrival. It contains lots of information and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Don’t forget to bring your fully charged smartphone, the smartphone’s charger, any accessories you have, and the thumb drive with your pictures.
Take Great Videos with your Smartphone
Unlock the full potential of your smartphone and transform your ideas into captivating videos for personal projects, social media, documenting events, or even small business marketing. This hands-on course is designed for those eager to learn the essentials of shooting high-quality videos using just their smartphone. Whether you're a beginner or looking to sharpen your skills, this class will guide you through the entire process – from learning the basics of your smartphone’s video camera to working with a high quality (and free!) editing program to produce your final, polished video.
Everything necessary for creating wonderful smartphone videos will be addressed, including:
Don’t forget to bring your fully charged smartphone, the smartphone’s charger, and any accessories you have.
Whatever you're interested in shooting, this class will help you make the most of the powerful tool already in your pocket!
Edit Your Pictures in Photoshop's Adobe Camera Raw
Photoshop, made by Adobe, is probably the most well-known and, arguably, the best digital imaging program on the market today. However, accompanying Photoshop is another very powerful program called Adobe Camera Raw (ACR). It originally was designed for processing RAW images (most SLR cameras save an image either in the JPG or RAW format – a RAW image is a much more robust entity than a JPG image, and it’s the format to use for serious digital editing). There are three reasons Adobe Camera Raw may be preferable to Photoshop for digital editing:
What most people don’t realize is that editing is almost mandatory for making a picture look the same as what the naked eye originally saw. Therefore, all images can benefit from at least some editing. At the very least, dark areas should be lightened and light areas darkened, colors should be improved, sharpness and contrast should be added, and distracting elements removed.
Further, editing can be used to transform photographs into something entirely different and unique. That’s usually my goal. I create images in ACR that I think are a vast improvement over what my camera captures (you can view some of my edited pictures at www.peterglass.com/portfolio).
A very complete handout will be distributed in class. It contains lots of information and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught. In addition, the handout will allow you to spend less time taking notes and more time listening and participating in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
The current version of Photoshop (which includes ACR) is available through Adobe on a subscription basis only. The cost is about $10 per month. Please note that owning Photoshop is not a requirement for taking this seminar. By the way, ACR is the program I use for almost 90% of my digital editing.
Composing the Photograph (Learn the rules, then break the rules)
Specific rules of picture composition can be immensely helpful when setting up a shot. But despite what’s often written and taught, these rules aren’t set in stone. Not following them does not mean your photograph will turn out badly. In fact, blindly adhering to even the most accepted of these rules can keep you from creating truly interesting and inventive images.
The various rules of picture composition will be demonstrated and discussed in class. This will be done using images made by me, the instructor, a professional commercial and editorial photographer, as well as those of other photographers. Further, we will explore how and when to apply these rules to our photographs. It will be emphasized that specific rules are useful only when they improve a picture. Otherwise, they should be ignored.
In addition, we’ll be discussing and critiquing each other’s pictures. This will be done both as a way to further understand photographic composition and aesthetics, as well as to explore specific shooting issues you may be having with your own images. So, please bring to class ten to twenty of your photographs (as JPGs or in the RAW format), saved to a flash drive. Include both the great images and the problematic ones.
I’ll be distributing a series of printed notes I’ve compiled from several photographic and art composition books. These notes will be used for our exploration of the topic. By the way, one of the more intriguing books is The Simple Secret to Better Painting by Greg Albert (books dealing with painting and drawing often apply just as well to photography, as does this one). He professes to solving the problem of creating interesting compositions by simply following his mantra: “Never make any two intervals the same.” That’s definitely a topic we’ll investigate!
Finally, we’ll put some of our pictures through one or more digital editing programs. You’ll learn how your photographs can be improved and even transformed through the use of these remarkable software packages.
Please don’t forget to bring your JPG or RAW photos to class.
Make Money as a Stock Photographer
If you are an amateur or professional digital photographer who loves taking pictures, you might want to consider stock photography as a possible source of additional income. A stock photographer shoots a variety of images and then sends them off to their stock photo agencies for them to display on their web sites. When magazines, businesses, ad agencies, textbook companies, etc. need photos, they often will purchase existing images from one of these stock agencies, thereby saving the expense of having to hire a photographer to shoot new images. When the stock agency sells a photo, the payment for that sale is shared between the photographer and the stock agency.
All aspects of the stock photography business will be presented. Topics will include:
Build Your Own Website
Many years ago, when I decided to design and build my first website, I knew that doing so would not be easy. I began by purchasing a few books (thick books!!) on the subject. I poured through them, trying to make sense of what I was reading and taking copious notes along the way. Luckily, knowing code was not required. But there was still lots to learn. Finally, after much studying, worrying, and procrastination, I began the construction of my new website.
Putting it all together was challenging. Back then, there was little automation within the web-building software. Everything had to be done manually. And because of the software’s complexity, I was constantly referring back to my reference books and notes.
Luckily, this knottiness is a thing of the past. There currently are many companies online that let you quickly design and set-up a website without needing to be too technically proficient. This is possible due to the availability of professionally produced templates, lots of design elements that can be added by simple dragging and dropping, and the ability to easily add and modify both text and pictures.
We will be working with Weebly (www.weebly.com) in this class – a highly rated and very popular website creation company. As of this writing, it has four pricing plans that range from $0 to $30 per month. Weebly is what I’ve used to build and maintain my four websites: www.peterglass.com, www.stockpeterglass.com, www.lifecoachpeterglass.com, and www.ministerpeterglass.com.
A very complete handout will be distributed in class. It contains lots of information and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
I am no graphic designer. However, the quality of Weebly’s templates and other features are more than enough for producing inexpensive, high quality, and highly professional looking websites.
Create Photographs that will Knock Your Socks Off
Making photographs can be so much more than just pointing your camera at a subject and quickly pressing the shutter button. As a photographer, you have many options available for creating interesting and unusual images.
With the help of a handout that’ll be distributed in class, we’ll begin with a review of how to operate your camera in the Manual mode. Topics to be covered will include:
From there, images similar to what you’ll be photographing in class will be shown. We’ll discuss the various methods used to create them.
Next, I’ll open some of them in Adobe Camera Raw – a program that’s part of Adobe Photoshop (the premier digital image-editing program), but much easier to learn and use. You’ll see its almost unlimited possibilities for fixing and strikingly improving even the bleakest of photographs.
You’ll then begin taking pictures. We’ll be doing two types of photography. The first will be photographing a variety of objects and props that I’ll be bringing to class. Included will be rubber ducks, a toy airplane, a crystal ball, ribbons, and a human skull (a fake one!). Second, we’ll spend time wandering and photographing in areas around our location. For both types of photography, I’ll be with you every step of the way – offering camera operation tips, shooting ideas and techniques, as well as feedback on the photos you’ve taken.
Finally, we’ll edit some of your images in Adobe Camera Raw. This is where you’ll get to see some pretty amazing image transformations.
A great deal of shooting will be done during class. Bring your digital camera, with instruction booklet, and a fully charged battery. If you own one, a tripod is recommended, along with a cable release or a remote control. It also would be a good idea to bring your battery charger and an extra battery and camera card.
Prerequisite: A basic understanding of how your camera works and feeling fairly comfortable photographing with it.
The Portable, On-Camera Flash - Empowering Your Camera
Stated simply, a portable, on-camera flash adds light to a subject when shooting in areas of low illumination.
But that’s only part of it. Light also should be used for enhancing your subject – making it more dynamic and appealing. A photographer does that by taking the light from the flash and shaping it, softening it, coloring it, adding it to other flash units, and much more. All sorts of possibilities exist, and many will be demonstrated during this class. Specific topics to be addressed include:
The operation of my non-expensive portable, on-camera flash will be thoroughly explained and demonstrated. If you own a portable, on-camera flash and have a camera you’re comfortable operating on Manual, feel free to bring them, along with the camera manual and flash manual. BUT PLEASE NOTE: This course is not designed for learning the operation of your specific flash. It’s aimed instead at giving you a clear understanding of what can be done with a portable, on-camera flash to greatly improve your photography. However, if time permits, l will answer questions regarding your own flash.
A very complete handout will be distributed to each student. It contains lots of information and diagrams, and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Macro and Close-up Photography Done Inexpensively
Have you ever thought about being able to photograph very small objects so that all their details are thoroughly visible? And to do it as inexpensively as possible? If so, this class is for you. The few pieces of equipment necessary to accomplish that will be demonstrated and discussed in the class.
We’ll begin by going over a few fundamental photography concepts, including aperture, shutter speed, ISO, and depth-of-field. In addition, we'll review the basics of shooting in the camera's Manual Mode.
We’ll then move on to discussing the basics of macro and close-up photography. I’ll cover how wide-angle vs telephoto vs mid-range lens settings help determine the overall look of the image. Most importantly, I’ll explain all the steps necessary for creating strong macro and close-up photos.
After that will be "show and tell" time. I’ll break out my equipment – camera, tripod, reflectors, photographer’s wax, clamps, and some small objects to photograph. The objects will be set up on a table. I’ll then introduce you to a close-up filter, extension tube, bellows, reversal ring, and focusing rail – all items for converting normal lenses into macro lenses. Finally, and in detail, I'll walk you through their use in photographing the small objects. And, if you want, you can try taking some shots yourself with my camera.
A very complete handout will be distributed to each student. It contains lots of information and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Create Great Effects in your Photos without using an Editing Program
Digital imaging editing programs such as Photoshop, Adobe Camera Raw, Lightroom, and others, allow for the refinement and altering of images in an almost infinite number of ways. There’s little these programs can’t do to improve and even drastically change the look of your pictures.
Though not an alternative to editing programs, a simpler and sometimes more satisfying method for adding certain effects is available. It involves placing various filters and other objects in front of or around the camera’s lens.
One purpose of this class is to design and create filters that you can try out and then take home afterwards. I’ll be bringing all the necessary supplies. This will include optically clear, square, hard-plastic filter blanks. Using paint, color markers, nail polish, and/or a knife, you’ll be able to transform the blanks into very useful filters. They can then be held or taped to the front of your lens. In addition, the filter will fit into a Cokin Filters filter holder, which can be attached to the front of most lenses.
The other purpose is to experiment with some additional objects I’ll also be bringing. When placed individually in front of or around the lens, they can create some interestingly oddball effects. The objects include pieces of lace, colored yarn, aluminum foil, a food strainer, a pair of reading glasses, and some metal ductwork. You’ll also see what can be done with sheets of translucent plastic, transparent plastic, and black construction paper.
Don’t forget to bring your camera and lenses – a telephoto lens or a zoom lens with a telephoto setting is best. Be sure the camera battery is well charged. You also should bring your battery charger and, if you have them, an extra battery and camera card. The price for this class includes the cost for all materials.
This will be a very low key, very non-technical, very good group-type project. So, come have fun making some useful and interesting camera accessories.
The Photo Essay (Making a Picture Story)
It’s exciting when you can tell a story primarily through photographs (and, perhaps, with a little bit of text). Viewing a documentary project consisting of well shot images is immensely satisfying. The impact often is far greater than anything a writer can write. And it takes little more than a 35mm camera or even a smartphone camera to create a very professional looking photo essay.
The class will teach you everything necessary for producing your own photo essay. This includes:
Here are a few websites for viewing a selection of photo essays:
http://www.lenscratch.com
http://www.lensculture.com
http://www.motherjones.com/photoessays
http://www.lifeforcemagazine.com
http://ransomriggs.com/photos
Prerequisite: A basic understanding of how your camera (35mm or smartphone) works and feeling comfortable photographing with it.
The Art of the Portrait (A look into the work of photographer Peter Glass)
Background
As a professional photographer, I’ve created hundreds of portraits for commercial, corporate, editorial, and magazine clients. However, it’s the magazines – mostly the business ones – that are often most open to unusual and offbeat images… the type I like to shoot. A typical assignment from them is to create an “environmental portrait” of the person being featured in a particular magazine article.
My definition of an environmental portrait is a picture where the background and foreground are just as important (or maybe even more important) than the subject. Whatever is needed to create an arresting portrait is fair game. Making the subject look attractive is not the photographer’s main intent. Instead, the goal is to create a truly inventive and compelling photograph where the subject, though certainly important, is just one element of the final product. The magazine requests this sort of portrait because it wants something to make readers pause and actually read the article the picture accompanies. The job of the photographer, therefore, is to take often ordinary faces and locations and transform them into something wonderful.
For many years, I shot these portraits using a medium-format film camera (it produces 2¼” x 2¼” images, a size considerably larger than the standard 35mm film format). I primarily shot transparency film, which is made from the same material used for 35mm slides, but larger and without plastic or cardboard frames to encase it. The photo shoots usually took place where the subject worked. My assistant and I would arrive with bags of strobes, light stands, and supporting equipment. After finding a shooting location, we’d often spend up to four hours composing the shot and precisely lighting the location and the area where the subject was going to be placed, taking test Polaroids along the way to check our progress. When finished, we’d call in our subject and spend thirty to sixty minutes taking pictures. When done, we’d bag up our equipment, drop the exposed film at a photo lab to be processed, and head home. Since we were using transparency film, that was the end of our work. Retouching to enhance or improve the images required the services of a professional photo retoucher and, due to their high fees, was rarely an option.
During the photo shoot, we’d use from one to six strobes (flash units). Providing enough illumination for a proper exposure was certainly one of our goals. But just as important was creating lighting that was dynamic and interesting. For almost any portrait, I think it’s the lighting that ultimately determines how successful it is.
The lighting process was the primary reason for the lengthy setup time. We’d experiment with various strobe placements, strobe heights, and strobe intensities. In addition, we’d try out all manner of light modifiers on the strobes. It was an arduous task, but one that allowed me to begin the photo shoot with a well thought out lighting design.
There was another issue as well. The lights usually were aimed at very specific areas of the subject, foreground, and background. The subject moving around even slightly could throw off the entire lighting scheme. This meant that he/she was pretty much locked into that one position. Changing it required repositioning the lights, at least somewhat.
My shooting methods changed considerably after moving from film to digital, and especially when editing programs such as Photoshop became available. The lighting that took so long to set up using up to six strobes can now be done much faster in postproduction – and with almost unlimited possibilities! Further, since it’s postproduction, I can spend all the time I want experimenting with various lighting arrangements without inconveniencing the subject. So now, for a portrait shoot, I’ll quickly set up two or three strobes and simply bounce their beams off bright colored walls and ceilings. This creates soft and even illumination on the subject. It’s flat and uninteresting, but allows for a greater area of coverage. This means the subject has a larger area to move around in while still remaining well lit. It’s then in postproduction that the images can be edited and relit to my heart’s content. The added benefit is that specific shot setups and modifications during the photo shoot are much faster now. We can do many more setups in the same amount of time it took to do a single setup using my half-dozen strobes.
This new shooting method also led me to stock photography. A stock photographer shoots a variety of images and then sends them to their stock photo agencies for display on their web sites. When magazines, businesses, ad agencies, textbook companies, etc. need photos, they often will purchase existing images from one of these stock photo agencies, thereby saving the expense of having to hire a photographer to shoot new images. When the stock photo agency sells a picture, the payment for that sale is shared between the photographer and the stock photo agency.
Most of my portrait work these days is done for my stock photo agencies. I love doing this because no photo editor is telling me what to shoot, how to shoot it, and how to edit the results. Every part of the photography process is now almost completely under my control (“almost” meaning that my stock photo agencies have some minor shooting parameters I must follow).
I’m also having fun working with an assortment of models – the subjects for my portraits. Most are not professionals, but rather friends, students, and others who answer modeling ads I post online. With my updated way of working, I can set up and shoot quickly. Over the three or four hours we’ll spend together on a photo shoot, I’ll often finish with up to fifty different shot set-ups and a few hundred pictures. Of course it’s then hours upon hours in post-production!!
The Class
My extensive portraiture work, dating back 30 years and to the present, will be the basis for this class. Images I’ve shot for corporations, magazines, stock, and art galleries will be used to discuss a variety of topics including:
Perhaps you own and shoot with a 35mm digital camera but are ending up with less than satisfactory photos. Or maybe you’re tired of shooting on AUTO, having realized you’d like a better understanding of how your camera works. This, then, is the course for you. All the basic photography concepts will be covered in depth, including:
- Hand-holding the camera
- What aperture, shutter speed, and ISO do, and how to make them work for you
- Methods for avoiding blurry and out-of-focus pictures
- How to make sure your photographs are properly exposed
- The advantages of shooting in Shutter Priority and Aperture Priority
- Digital image editing basics
Following that, we’ll discuss and critique each other’s pictures. This will be done both as a way to understand photographic composition and aesthetics, as well as to explore specific shooting issues you may be having with your own images.
Time will be spent in class taking pictures. This will help solidify what you’ve learned about both photographic theory and the camera controls. In addition, it will be your chance to experiment with your own composition ideas.
A very complete handout will be distributed when you arrive. It contains much information and many diagrams, and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. In addition, the handout will allow you to spend less time taking notes and more time listening and participating in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Be sure to bring your 35mm digital camera (with its battery charged), battery charger, and instruction booklet. If you have them, also bring your other lenses and an extra camera battery and camera card. IMPORTANT: Please be sure your camera can operate in non-Automatic modes, such as Manual or Shutter Priority – if it does not and you still want to take the class, that certainly is fine too.
Intermediate 35mm Digital Photography
So, you:
- Have taken a beginning 35mm digital photography course or its equivalent
- Have done a bit of shooting… hopefully applying the information you’ve learned
- Maybe feel somewhat overwhelmed from the beginning course!!
- Want to review both the beginning course material and learn even more about photography
In this class, the major thrust will be integrating both old and new photographic information and skills. We will start with a thorough review of the beginning photography course. We’ll then move on to some new and exciting topics, including:
- Live View settings. For certain photographic setups, these can make the picture taking process much easier.
- Introduction to Photoshop’s Adobe Camera Raw. This is the digital editing program I use to fix-up, enhance, or completely alter my photos.
- Advanced depth-of-field and hyperfocal distance concepts. An understanding of these allows for more precise and controlled focusing.
- Composition and aesthetics. Using a selection of photos, I’ll demonstrate various types of compositions that can make your pictures more interesting and dynamic.
- Discussing and critiquing each other’s pictures. This will be done to further understand photographic composition and aesthetics and to explore specific shooting issues you may be having with your own picture taking.
In addition, you’ll have plenty of time in class to practice shooting with your camera. This will help solidify what you’ve learned about photographic theory and the operation of your camera. And it will be your chance to experiment with your own composition ideas.
Be sure to bring your 35mm digital camera (with its battery charged), battery charger, and instruction booklet. If you have them, also bring your other lenses and an extra camera battery and camera card. In addition, bring photos you’ve taken, saved as JPGs or in the RAW format, on a flash drive.
Prerequisite: my Digital Photography 1 class (or its equivalent) or an understanding of basic photographic theory and some familiarity with the operation of your camera.
A very complete handout will be distributed when you arrive. It contains much information and many diagrams and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. In addition, the handout will allow you to spend less time taking notes and more time listening and participating in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Fast Track from AUTO to MANUAL on your 35mm Digital Camera
In 3 hours or less, learn everything necessary to get your 35mm digital camera off AUTO or PROGRAM and onto MANUAL, a mode that puts YOU in charge of your camera.
The MANUAL mode allows you to take command of the camera’s important functions. The advantage is that you and not the camera set the specific controls for the photos you take. That is critical, since the settings coming from you, the photographer, are going to be far more accurate and relative to your vision than the settings coming from the camera when it’s in an automatic mode.
These are some of the topics we’ll address:
- Techniques for handholding your camera
- The workings and interactions of the aperture, shutter speed, and ISO
- Finding and using specific camera controls
This seminar is designed to get you up and shooting quickly and effectively – WITHOUT having to resort to the AUTO or PROGRAM mode.
A very complete handout will be distributed when you arrive. It contains lots of information and diagrams, and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. In addition, the handout will allow you to spend less time taking notes and more time listening and participating in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
VERY IMPORTANT …
- Be sure your camera’s aperture, shutter speed, and ISO can be adjusted manually.
- Bring your battery charger.
- If you have them, bring an extra battery, camera card, and other camera lenses.
- Bring your camera manual.
Take Great Photos with your Smartphone
The quality of smartphone cameras is improving rapidly. In many situations, they work quite well as stand-ins for 35mm cameras. Therefore, dragging around a heavy camera, hoping not to miss that great picture opportunity, is no longer necessary. A good quality smartphone camera may work almost as well.
This class is for those interested in producing high-quality images with their smartphone cameras. That means learning and understanding the camera controls as well as when and how to use them. Doing so will put the photographer in better control of their camera. And that will mean significantly improved photographs.
Please note: This class will not cover the taking of selfies.
Everything necessary for taking great smartphone pictures will be addressed, including:
- Learning how to use the camera controls on your specific smartphone
- Basic photographic theory
- Discussing and, if desired, installing other smartphone camera apps
- Suggestions for hand-holding your camera
- Specific steps to follow when taking a picture
- Useful accessories for your smartphone camera
- And, how to compose your photographs to produce truly wonderful results
You’ll have an opportunity in class to practice taking pictures with your camera. This will help solidify what you’ve learned about photographic theory and the operation of your camera. And it will be your chance to experiment with you own composition ideas.
Finally, please take some of your current smartphone pictures – the good ones and the problematic ones – and save them to a thumb drive so they can be viewed in class. This will be helpful when we discuss composition and aesthetics. And, just as important, it will allow you to show images you like and to get help with images where problems exist.
A very complete handout will be distributed on arrival. It contains lots of information and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Don’t forget to bring your fully charged smartphone, the smartphone’s charger, any accessories you have, and the thumb drive with your pictures.
Take Great Videos with your Smartphone
Unlock the full potential of your smartphone and transform your ideas into captivating videos for personal projects, social media, documenting events, or even small business marketing. This hands-on course is designed for those eager to learn the essentials of shooting high-quality videos using just their smartphone. Whether you're a beginner or looking to sharpen your skills, this class will guide you through the entire process – from learning the basics of your smartphone’s video camera to working with a high quality (and free!) editing program to produce your final, polished video.
Everything necessary for creating wonderful smartphone videos will be addressed, including:
- Locating and learning about the various video camera controls on your smartphone
- Discussing the best settings for those video camera controls
- How specific camera accessories can greatly improve the quality of your videos
- Specific steps to follow when getting ready to shoot
- Specific steps to follow while shooting your video
- The art of composition – how to frame your shots and manipulate your camera for more visually engaging videos
- AND, an introduction to a great editing program for turning your raw footage into a polished video production
Don’t forget to bring your fully charged smartphone, the smartphone’s charger, and any accessories you have.
Whatever you're interested in shooting, this class will help you make the most of the powerful tool already in your pocket!
Edit Your Pictures in Photoshop's Adobe Camera Raw
Photoshop, made by Adobe, is probably the most well-known and, arguably, the best digital imaging program on the market today. However, accompanying Photoshop is another very powerful program called Adobe Camera Raw (ACR). It originally was designed for processing RAW images (most SLR cameras save an image either in the JPG or RAW format – a RAW image is a much more robust entity than a JPG image, and it’s the format to use for serious digital editing). There are three reasons Adobe Camera Raw may be preferable to Photoshop for digital editing:
- As wonderful as Photoshop is, its complexity makes mastering it a long-term challenge. Adobe Camera Raw, though still demanding, is considerably easier to learn and use.
- ACR is a muscular program, with an extensive variety of editing tools. It has more than enough resources to meet the requirements of many amateur and professional photographers.
- ACR is designed to edit not only RAW images, but also JPG, TIF, and other image formats.
What most people don’t realize is that editing is almost mandatory for making a picture look the same as what the naked eye originally saw. Therefore, all images can benefit from at least some editing. At the very least, dark areas should be lightened and light areas darkened, colors should be improved, sharpness and contrast should be added, and distracting elements removed.
Further, editing can be used to transform photographs into something entirely different and unique. That’s usually my goal. I create images in ACR that I think are a vast improvement over what my camera captures (you can view some of my edited pictures at www.peterglass.com/portfolio).
A very complete handout will be distributed in class. It contains lots of information and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught. In addition, the handout will allow you to spend less time taking notes and more time listening and participating in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
The current version of Photoshop (which includes ACR) is available through Adobe on a subscription basis only. The cost is about $10 per month. Please note that owning Photoshop is not a requirement for taking this seminar. By the way, ACR is the program I use for almost 90% of my digital editing.
Composing the Photograph (Learn the rules, then break the rules)
Specific rules of picture composition can be immensely helpful when setting up a shot. But despite what’s often written and taught, these rules aren’t set in stone. Not following them does not mean your photograph will turn out badly. In fact, blindly adhering to even the most accepted of these rules can keep you from creating truly interesting and inventive images.
The various rules of picture composition will be demonstrated and discussed in class. This will be done using images made by me, the instructor, a professional commercial and editorial photographer, as well as those of other photographers. Further, we will explore how and when to apply these rules to our photographs. It will be emphasized that specific rules are useful only when they improve a picture. Otherwise, they should be ignored.
In addition, we’ll be discussing and critiquing each other’s pictures. This will be done both as a way to further understand photographic composition and aesthetics, as well as to explore specific shooting issues you may be having with your own images. So, please bring to class ten to twenty of your photographs (as JPGs or in the RAW format), saved to a flash drive. Include both the great images and the problematic ones.
I’ll be distributing a series of printed notes I’ve compiled from several photographic and art composition books. These notes will be used for our exploration of the topic. By the way, one of the more intriguing books is The Simple Secret to Better Painting by Greg Albert (books dealing with painting and drawing often apply just as well to photography, as does this one). He professes to solving the problem of creating interesting compositions by simply following his mantra: “Never make any two intervals the same.” That’s definitely a topic we’ll investigate!
Finally, we’ll put some of our pictures through one or more digital editing programs. You’ll learn how your photographs can be improved and even transformed through the use of these remarkable software packages.
Please don’t forget to bring your JPG or RAW photos to class.
Make Money as a Stock Photographer
If you are an amateur or professional digital photographer who loves taking pictures, you might want to consider stock photography as a possible source of additional income. A stock photographer shoots a variety of images and then sends them off to their stock photo agencies for them to display on their web sites. When magazines, businesses, ad agencies, textbook companies, etc. need photos, they often will purchase existing images from one of these stock agencies, thereby saving the expense of having to hire a photographer to shoot new images. When the stock agency sells a photo, the payment for that sale is shared between the photographer and the stock agency.
All aspects of the stock photography business will be presented. Topics will include:
- determining what kind of images will sell
- the equipment needed to shoot them
- adding metadata to your pictures
- the keywording process
- using a digital asset management program
- types of stock agencies
- everything else necessary to set-up and run your own stock photography business
Build Your Own Website
Many years ago, when I decided to design and build my first website, I knew that doing so would not be easy. I began by purchasing a few books (thick books!!) on the subject. I poured through them, trying to make sense of what I was reading and taking copious notes along the way. Luckily, knowing code was not required. But there was still lots to learn. Finally, after much studying, worrying, and procrastination, I began the construction of my new website.
Putting it all together was challenging. Back then, there was little automation within the web-building software. Everything had to be done manually. And because of the software’s complexity, I was constantly referring back to my reference books and notes.
Luckily, this knottiness is a thing of the past. There currently are many companies online that let you quickly design and set-up a website without needing to be too technically proficient. This is possible due to the availability of professionally produced templates, lots of design elements that can be added by simple dragging and dropping, and the ability to easily add and modify both text and pictures.
We will be working with Weebly (www.weebly.com) in this class – a highly rated and very popular website creation company. As of this writing, it has four pricing plans that range from $0 to $30 per month. Weebly is what I’ve used to build and maintain my four websites: www.peterglass.com, www.stockpeterglass.com, www.lifecoachpeterglass.com, and www.ministerpeterglass.com.
A very complete handout will be distributed in class. It contains lots of information and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
I am no graphic designer. However, the quality of Weebly’s templates and other features are more than enough for producing inexpensive, high quality, and highly professional looking websites.
Create Photographs that will Knock Your Socks Off
Making photographs can be so much more than just pointing your camera at a subject and quickly pressing the shutter button. As a photographer, you have many options available for creating interesting and unusual images.
With the help of a handout that’ll be distributed in class, we’ll begin with a review of how to operate your camera in the Manual mode. Topics to be covered will include:
- working with aperture, shutter speed, and ISO
- obtaining the proper exposure
- setting the white balance
- focusing where you want to focus
- creatively using depth-of-field
From there, images similar to what you’ll be photographing in class will be shown. We’ll discuss the various methods used to create them.
Next, I’ll open some of them in Adobe Camera Raw – a program that’s part of Adobe Photoshop (the premier digital image-editing program), but much easier to learn and use. You’ll see its almost unlimited possibilities for fixing and strikingly improving even the bleakest of photographs.
You’ll then begin taking pictures. We’ll be doing two types of photography. The first will be photographing a variety of objects and props that I’ll be bringing to class. Included will be rubber ducks, a toy airplane, a crystal ball, ribbons, and a human skull (a fake one!). Second, we’ll spend time wandering and photographing in areas around our location. For both types of photography, I’ll be with you every step of the way – offering camera operation tips, shooting ideas and techniques, as well as feedback on the photos you’ve taken.
Finally, we’ll edit some of your images in Adobe Camera Raw. This is where you’ll get to see some pretty amazing image transformations.
A great deal of shooting will be done during class. Bring your digital camera, with instruction booklet, and a fully charged battery. If you own one, a tripod is recommended, along with a cable release or a remote control. It also would be a good idea to bring your battery charger and an extra battery and camera card.
Prerequisite: A basic understanding of how your camera works and feeling fairly comfortable photographing with it.
The Portable, On-Camera Flash - Empowering Your Camera
Stated simply, a portable, on-camera flash adds light to a subject when shooting in areas of low illumination.
But that’s only part of it. Light also should be used for enhancing your subject – making it more dynamic and appealing. A photographer does that by taking the light from the flash and shaping it, softening it, coloring it, adding it to other flash units, and much more. All sorts of possibilities exist, and many will be demonstrated during this class. Specific topics to be addressed include:
- Aiming the flash directly at the subject versus bouncing the flash off an umbrella or ceiling versus covering the flash with a diffuser or softbox
- Reducing the flash output to create “fill” light
- Producing a background behind the subject that is decently exposed
- Controlling light from the flash and ambient light separately
- Creating wild and cool pictures using the Blurred-Sharp Shot technique
- Using the flash off-camera
- Slaving multiple flash units together
The operation of my non-expensive portable, on-camera flash will be thoroughly explained and demonstrated. If you own a portable, on-camera flash and have a camera you’re comfortable operating on Manual, feel free to bring them, along with the camera manual and flash manual. BUT PLEASE NOTE: This course is not designed for learning the operation of your specific flash. It’s aimed instead at giving you a clear understanding of what can be done with a portable, on-camera flash to greatly improve your photography. However, if time permits, l will answer questions regarding your own flash.
A very complete handout will be distributed to each student. It contains lots of information and diagrams, and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Macro and Close-up Photography Done Inexpensively
Have you ever thought about being able to photograph very small objects so that all their details are thoroughly visible? And to do it as inexpensively as possible? If so, this class is for you. The few pieces of equipment necessary to accomplish that will be demonstrated and discussed in the class.
We’ll begin by going over a few fundamental photography concepts, including aperture, shutter speed, ISO, and depth-of-field. In addition, we'll review the basics of shooting in the camera's Manual Mode.
We’ll then move on to discussing the basics of macro and close-up photography. I’ll cover how wide-angle vs telephoto vs mid-range lens settings help determine the overall look of the image. Most importantly, I’ll explain all the steps necessary for creating strong macro and close-up photos.
After that will be "show and tell" time. I’ll break out my equipment – camera, tripod, reflectors, photographer’s wax, clamps, and some small objects to photograph. The objects will be set up on a table. I’ll then introduce you to a close-up filter, extension tube, bellows, reversal ring, and focusing rail – all items for converting normal lenses into macro lenses. Finally, and in detail, I'll walk you through their use in photographing the small objects. And, if you want, you can try taking some shots yourself with my camera.
A very complete handout will be distributed to each student. It contains lots of information and will greatly simplify the process of understanding what’s being taught in class. You’ll also find it quite useful for review after the class ends.
Create Great Effects in your Photos without using an Editing Program
Digital imaging editing programs such as Photoshop, Adobe Camera Raw, Lightroom, and others, allow for the refinement and altering of images in an almost infinite number of ways. There’s little these programs can’t do to improve and even drastically change the look of your pictures.
Though not an alternative to editing programs, a simpler and sometimes more satisfying method for adding certain effects is available. It involves placing various filters and other objects in front of or around the camera’s lens.
One purpose of this class is to design and create filters that you can try out and then take home afterwards. I’ll be bringing all the necessary supplies. This will include optically clear, square, hard-plastic filter blanks. Using paint, color markers, nail polish, and/or a knife, you’ll be able to transform the blanks into very useful filters. They can then be held or taped to the front of your lens. In addition, the filter will fit into a Cokin Filters filter holder, which can be attached to the front of most lenses.
The other purpose is to experiment with some additional objects I’ll also be bringing. When placed individually in front of or around the lens, they can create some interestingly oddball effects. The objects include pieces of lace, colored yarn, aluminum foil, a food strainer, a pair of reading glasses, and some metal ductwork. You’ll also see what can be done with sheets of translucent plastic, transparent plastic, and black construction paper.
Don’t forget to bring your camera and lenses – a telephoto lens or a zoom lens with a telephoto setting is best. Be sure the camera battery is well charged. You also should bring your battery charger and, if you have them, an extra battery and camera card. The price for this class includes the cost for all materials.
This will be a very low key, very non-technical, very good group-type project. So, come have fun making some useful and interesting camera accessories.
The Photo Essay (Making a Picture Story)
It’s exciting when you can tell a story primarily through photographs (and, perhaps, with a little bit of text). Viewing a documentary project consisting of well shot images is immensely satisfying. The impact often is far greater than anything a writer can write. And it takes little more than a 35mm camera or even a smartphone camera to create a very professional looking photo essay.
The class will teach you everything necessary for producing your own photo essay. This includes:
- How to decide who or what your subject for the photo essay will be
- Determining the type of pictures to shoot and how to compose them
- Learning the necessary camera skills for making quality images
- How to fix and enhance your photographs in a digital editing program (you won’t have to actually digitally edit your images for this class)
- How to arrange your pictures into the final photo essay
Here are a few websites for viewing a selection of photo essays:
http://www.lenscratch.com
http://www.lensculture.com
http://www.motherjones.com/photoessays
http://www.lifeforcemagazine.com
http://ransomriggs.com/photos
Prerequisite: A basic understanding of how your camera (35mm or smartphone) works and feeling comfortable photographing with it.
The Art of the Portrait (A look into the work of photographer Peter Glass)
Background
As a professional photographer, I’ve created hundreds of portraits for commercial, corporate, editorial, and magazine clients. However, it’s the magazines – mostly the business ones – that are often most open to unusual and offbeat images… the type I like to shoot. A typical assignment from them is to create an “environmental portrait” of the person being featured in a particular magazine article.
My definition of an environmental portrait is a picture where the background and foreground are just as important (or maybe even more important) than the subject. Whatever is needed to create an arresting portrait is fair game. Making the subject look attractive is not the photographer’s main intent. Instead, the goal is to create a truly inventive and compelling photograph where the subject, though certainly important, is just one element of the final product. The magazine requests this sort of portrait because it wants something to make readers pause and actually read the article the picture accompanies. The job of the photographer, therefore, is to take often ordinary faces and locations and transform them into something wonderful.
For many years, I shot these portraits using a medium-format film camera (it produces 2¼” x 2¼” images, a size considerably larger than the standard 35mm film format). I primarily shot transparency film, which is made from the same material used for 35mm slides, but larger and without plastic or cardboard frames to encase it. The photo shoots usually took place where the subject worked. My assistant and I would arrive with bags of strobes, light stands, and supporting equipment. After finding a shooting location, we’d often spend up to four hours composing the shot and precisely lighting the location and the area where the subject was going to be placed, taking test Polaroids along the way to check our progress. When finished, we’d call in our subject and spend thirty to sixty minutes taking pictures. When done, we’d bag up our equipment, drop the exposed film at a photo lab to be processed, and head home. Since we were using transparency film, that was the end of our work. Retouching to enhance or improve the images required the services of a professional photo retoucher and, due to their high fees, was rarely an option.
During the photo shoot, we’d use from one to six strobes (flash units). Providing enough illumination for a proper exposure was certainly one of our goals. But just as important was creating lighting that was dynamic and interesting. For almost any portrait, I think it’s the lighting that ultimately determines how successful it is.
The lighting process was the primary reason for the lengthy setup time. We’d experiment with various strobe placements, strobe heights, and strobe intensities. In addition, we’d try out all manner of light modifiers on the strobes. It was an arduous task, but one that allowed me to begin the photo shoot with a well thought out lighting design.
There was another issue as well. The lights usually were aimed at very specific areas of the subject, foreground, and background. The subject moving around even slightly could throw off the entire lighting scheme. This meant that he/she was pretty much locked into that one position. Changing it required repositioning the lights, at least somewhat.
My shooting methods changed considerably after moving from film to digital, and especially when editing programs such as Photoshop became available. The lighting that took so long to set up using up to six strobes can now be done much faster in postproduction – and with almost unlimited possibilities! Further, since it’s postproduction, I can spend all the time I want experimenting with various lighting arrangements without inconveniencing the subject. So now, for a portrait shoot, I’ll quickly set up two or three strobes and simply bounce their beams off bright colored walls and ceilings. This creates soft and even illumination on the subject. It’s flat and uninteresting, but allows for a greater area of coverage. This means the subject has a larger area to move around in while still remaining well lit. It’s then in postproduction that the images can be edited and relit to my heart’s content. The added benefit is that specific shot setups and modifications during the photo shoot are much faster now. We can do many more setups in the same amount of time it took to do a single setup using my half-dozen strobes.
This new shooting method also led me to stock photography. A stock photographer shoots a variety of images and then sends them to their stock photo agencies for display on their web sites. When magazines, businesses, ad agencies, textbook companies, etc. need photos, they often will purchase existing images from one of these stock photo agencies, thereby saving the expense of having to hire a photographer to shoot new images. When the stock photo agency sells a picture, the payment for that sale is shared between the photographer and the stock photo agency.
Most of my portrait work these days is done for my stock photo agencies. I love doing this because no photo editor is telling me what to shoot, how to shoot it, and how to edit the results. Every part of the photography process is now almost completely under my control (“almost” meaning that my stock photo agencies have some minor shooting parameters I must follow).
I’m also having fun working with an assortment of models – the subjects for my portraits. Most are not professionals, but rather friends, students, and others who answer modeling ads I post online. With my updated way of working, I can set up and shoot quickly. Over the three or four hours we’ll spend together on a photo shoot, I’ll often finish with up to fifty different shot set-ups and a few hundred pictures. Of course it’s then hours upon hours in post-production!!
The Class
My extensive portraiture work, dating back 30 years and to the present, will be the basis for this class. Images I’ve shot for corporations, magazines, stock, and art galleries will be used to discuss a variety of topics including:
- Defining and discussing the types of portraiture being done today
- Ideas for coming up with interesting photographic compositions
- Showing and discussing the work of portrait photographers who have influenced me
- The type of portrait images I create
- My methods for working with the subject
- How I compose the images
- How I light the images
- And, perhaps most importantly, how I edit the images