Travel Photography

I spent pretty much all of this Saturday roaming around Sydney with Sydney Photographic Workshops, doing their Travel & Documentary Workshop. I thought that seeing as we'll be going to Japan on holiday this coming spring, somewhere that Emily and I have long wanted to visit, that I should make an effort to come back with some decent photographs, conveying something more than just, "Here's my in front of a temple. Here's me in front of another temple". Of course, those who know me would realise that it's more, "Here's Lauren in front of a temple. Here's Lauren in front of another temple"! The weather was great for the day, probably the first hint of spring on its way, with perfect clear blue skies and temperatures in the mid-20s. We did various kinds of photography at several locations around Sydney, starting with portrait work down at the fish markets (many thanks to Dallas, Troy and Neil for modelling for us aboard the Tribal Warrior). We then headed round the bay to Blackwattle Bay to work on various techniques on the old incinerator site, which is now a mix of public space and townhousing. After lunch we headed south to La Perouse, for some more compositional work, on both an old World War 2 listening post, and above the cliffs themselves. We also had a small treat in the form of the air rescue helicopter taking for a sortie of some description (training? medical emergency?), and then returning a while later; I got pretty close to it on takeoff, and the downdraft (and noise!) they create even more 20 yards out is pretty impressive. Finally, with the sun dipping down towards the horizon, we crossed over the peninsula to Yarra Bay, first to catch the sun going down over Port Botany, and then to be entertained by the lovely fire-twirling Annabelle. My thanks to Daniel, Ben and Wendy for all they showed us; I think it's a testimony to their teaching abilities that a) roughly half of all the photos I took were worth keeping (at least 50% up on my usual success rate), and b) post-processing took me less than half a day to do them all - usually the source material isn't that good so it needs a fair amount of work done on the computer to bring out the best in the photos. By getting the photos right first time, I save time later on! If you're into digital photography, and want to improve your game from being just a happy snapper, then give these guys a call.