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Come Photograph With Me!

Come Photograph With Me!

As a flower photographer, summer means spending time photographing at local gardens and in my studio. If you love photographing flowers too, please join me at one of my upcoming workshops.


Imagine yourself photographing in a beautiful garden. Smelling the wonderful aromas. Hearing the songbirds in the woods. Learning how to take better photographs from a professional flower photographer. Getting to know other flower photographers. Getting the help you need to improve your photography.

Does this sound like something you’d like to do on a weekday morning in July? Come spend a couple of hours photographing with me at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton, Maryland – , Montgomery County  premier botanical garden. Join me on July 26 for the first of my morning in the gardens workshops where I’ll help you improve your photography skills and take some wonderful photographs. And if you’d like, you can join me for a late breakfast at a local restaurant after we’re done at the gardens. The workshop is limited to 6 students so I can make sure to give each of you the individualized attention you need.

 

Visit  https://beautifulflowerpictures.com/morning-at-brookside-gardens-july-26-2018/  for more information and to register for my July 26 Morning at Brookside Gardens Workshop.

 

 

Would you like to create photographs that show all the wonderful details of a flower the way my photos do? One way I create them is by photographing in the controlled environment of my studio. There I’m able to see and photograph  colors, patterns, textures and shapes that most people never see. I’d love to show you how I create them during my August 25 Flowers in the Studio workshop. The workshop is limited to 4 students so everyone has plenty of time photographing in my studio.

Visit https://beautifulflowerpictures.com/flowers-in-the-studio-workshop-august-2018/  for more information and to register for my August 25 Flowers in the Studio Workshop.

 

 

Are you curious about Lightroom? Have you heard it’s a great program for editing your photos? Is it on your computer and you have no clue how to use it? Or how to edit your photos? Adobe Lightroom was developed by photographers for photographers to make organizing and editing our photos easier. It has very powerful features – even after only a weekend you will be able to make your photos look amazing. By editing your photos you can share your vision of what you photographed – not just what your camera captured. Join me on September 29 – 30 for my Introduction to Lightroom Workshop. The workshop is limited to 4 students so I can make sure you get the assistance you need as you move forward editing your photos.

Visit https://beautifulflowerpictures.com/introduction-to-lightroom-2/ for more information and to register for my September 29-30 Introduction to Lightroom Workshop.

 

If you have any questions about any of my upcoming workshops, or would like information about working individually with me on your photography or your photo editing, drop me a note and we’ll find time to talk.

My Spring 2018 Workshops

My Spring 2018 Workshops

As 2017 comes to a close, I’m busy planning for 2018. Not only am I getting ready for my Petals show in February, but I’m also getting everything set for the workshops Bill and I will be teaching in the spring. I’ll be leading two location-based workshops and Bill and I will be teaching three workshops at our home in Bethesda.

From February 18-23, I’ll be leading my New Orleans Photo Tour. We’ll be photographing in the French Quarter, some historic cemeteries, a plantation and more. We’ll also take time to enjoy the incredible music and food the city has to offer. The photo tour is limited to six participants and there is just one space remaining. Early Bird Registration Fee of $ 1500 ends on December 31.

All the details including registration information for the photo tour are on my website at https://beautifulflowerpictures.com/new-orleans-photo-tour/

On March 17, Bill and I will be teaching our Photographing Flowers in the Studio workshop at our home in Bethesda. Limited to four participants, we’ll cover the basics of studio lighting (both continuous lighting and strobes) and you’ll have the chance to photograph flower under both types of lights. Early Bird Registration Fee of $ $ 199 ends on February 15.

All the details including registration information for this workshop are on my website at https://beautifulflowerpictures.com/photographing-flowers-studio-workshop-2018/

On April 14, Bill and I will be teaching a new workshop – Making Your Photos Look the Way You Want Them To Look Workshop at our home in Bethesda. Rather than a how-to use a specific piece of editing software, we’ll be sharing how we edit our photos, and  give you hands-on practice on both our photos and yours to help you develop the editing workflow that works for your photos. This workshop is limited to four participants. Early Bird Registration of $ 249 ends on March 1.

All the details including registration information for this workshop are on my website at  https://beautifulflowerpictures.com/making-photos-look-way-want-look/

 

From May 6 – 11, I’ll be leading my Photographing the Gardens of Philadelphia workshop. With 30 gardens within 30 miles of the city, Philadelphia is a flower lover’s paradise in the spring. We’ll be photographing at the gardens with the best displays all week. This workshop is limited to six participants. Early Bird Registration of $1000 ends of April 1.

All the details including registration information for this workshop are on my website at  https://beautifulflowerpictures.com/photographing-gardens-philadelphia-2018/

On June 9-10, Bill and I will be teaching our Introduction to Lightroom workshop at our home in Bethesda. We’ll be teaching you the basics of the photo editing software Lightroom Classic from Adobe. By the end of the weekend, you’ll know how to import, organize, and  edit your photos, as well as export them for use on the web or in print, even if you’ve never used Lightroom before. This workshop is limited to four participants. Early Bird Registration of $ 349 ends on May 1

All the details including registration information for this workshop are on my website at  https://beautifulflowerpictures.com/introduction-to-lightroom/

And with all this talk of workshops, if you’re wondering if I’m going to be attending any workshops in 2018. Yes I am! I’ll be taking an Abstract photography workshop with one of my favorite photographers – Art Wolfe – in early April.

If you have any questions about any of my workshops, just drop me a note and we’ll find a time to talk.

My Fall 2017 Workshops

My Fall 2017 Workshops

I wanted to let you know about the workshops Bill and I will be  teaching this fall.

We’ll be teaching our Introduction to Lightroom: From RAW and JPG to Masterpieces in a Weekend on September 16-17 and again on November 18-19. By the end of the workshop, you’ll know how to import, organize, and  edit your photos, as well as export them for use on the web or in print, even if you’ve never used Lightroom before.This workshop is designed for people who are ready to start editing their photos – or are ready to use a program with more options than Picasa or PicMonkey.

The September workshop is full but there is still space in the November workshop. The Lightroom workshops are limited to 4 students so we can make sure you receive any individualized help you need. You can learn more about it at http://beautifulflowerpictures.com/intro-lightroom-raw-jpg-masterpieces-weekend-november-2017/

 

On October 7-8, Bill and I will be teaching our Editing Your Photos with Photoshop’s Layers and Masks. The workshop is designed to help you think about what your vision for a photo is – and how to edit it so that you can share your vision with others. We’ll focus on specific Photoshop tools used for cleaning up your image and adjusting contrast and color. Photoshop layers and masks are powerful tools for both global and local changes to your photo. These tools allow you to establish a workflow that helps you create images that share your vision. We’ll cover a number of tools including curves, levels, hue/saturation, shadow/highlights, cloning, patching, healing and content-aware fill.This workshop is designed for both people who do their entire editing workflow in Photoshop, or those who use Lightroom for some edits but need more powerful tools to complete their workflow.

 

 

My Photoshop Layers and Masks workshop is  limited to 4 students so we can make sure you receive any individualized help you need. You can learn more about our workshop at http://beautifulflowerpictures.com/photoshop-layers-masks-workshop-2017/

And finally on October 14, Bill and I will be teaching our Autumn Morning on the Soleado Lavender Farm workshop. Similar to the workshops we taught earlier this summer at the Soleado Lavender Farm, this workshop gives you a chance to spend a morning photographing with a pair of professional photographers there to answer your questions. We’re happy to help with questions about your gear, about composing your photographs, helpful tools and other photography issues.You can use any type camera from a simple point-and-shoot camera to the latest DSLR or mirrorless camera for this workshop. Our goal for this workshop is to help you take better photographs with the gear you already have. We’ll have a copy of your camera manual with us so we can help you with your gear.

 

 

The Autumn Morning on the Soleado Lavender Farm workshop is limited to 10 students so we can make sure we can help you with what you need help with. Your can learn more about the workshop at http://beautifulflowerpictures.com/autumn-morning-soleado-lavender-farm-photography-workshop/

I’d love to have you join me for one of my fall workshops. Space is limited so register soon if you know you want to join me.

If you have any questions about any of the workshops, drop me a note  and we’ll find a time to talk.

Working the Scene: This Time With Flowers

Working the Scene: This Time With Flowers

A while back,  I shared an article about Working the Scene where I talked about trying different compositions when you’re in the field photographing the landscape. Since then, I’ve gotten a few questions asking if I do the same thing when photographing flowers. And the answer is yes.

I do the same three things photographing a flower at a garden as I do when I’m photographing a landscape.

  • Try different focal lengths. If you’re looking through a telephoto lens, you will get very different compositions then when you are using a wide angle lens.  I often start with a wide angle lens, and then pull out my macro lens. Sometimes I’ll even pull out a longer telephoto lens  if that’s what I need to get the photo I want.
  • Try portrait and landscape compositions. The change from horizontal to vertical orientation of your camera will force you to include and exclude different parts of the scene, and will help you to think about the scene in different ways.
  • Move around and try again. When I first see a flower or group of flowers I want to photograph, I usually see what I think is the perfect image in my mind. So I’ll set up my tripod and grab the lens I need, and create that photo. Then I’ll take a moment and review the image on the back of my camera to see if it’s what I want and more importantly, is it the best image I can create. If not, I’ll take another look at my subject and see if there is composition I like better, move my tripod, reassess my lens choice and take that photo. Re-evaluate and set up another shot if I still don’t have what I want. Most of the time I’ll create 4 or 5 very different compositions of a specific flower or group of flowers before deciding that I’ve what I’m looking for. Moving my tripod up or down, a few inches to the left or to the right can make all the difference in the world.

Here are some of my photos of a bleeding heart plant I took several years ago that illustrate how I work a scene with flowers

One photo I took was of the whole bleeding heart plant in front of a tree trunk and wall. Decided it was too busy and didn’t really show off the heart shaped flowers.

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

So I moved in closer to just included a few of the branches. I also changed my aperture so that the wall and tree trunk were no longer in sharp focus. Still not right.

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

So next I moved my tripod around to another side of the plant, framed up just one branch of blossoms with a very shallow depth of field so only one flower was in sharp focus. Still not right.

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

So I switched to portrait orientation and moved in closer so I only had a few flowers in my photo. I also switched to my macro  lens.  Just didn’t like the light wood background or that the flowers in the upper right were in front of the main subject and out of focus. Still not right.

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

So I moved my tripod again so that the flowers were backed by green leaves instead of the brown wood and that I was further away from the bleeding hearts. This gave me the opportunity for a wider angle photo showing an entire branch of the flowers including the buds at the end. Better – but still not quite what I wanted.

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

So I moved my tripod one more time – this time in a little closer and switched back to landscape orientation knowing I’d crop to a square for the final photo. I focused in on  just a few of the heart shaped blossoms, made sure the water droplets were in sharp focus, and that the branch would act as a leading line to draw your eye through the photo. Finally I had my photo – and this has been one of my best selling photos over the years.

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

And if you are photographing at a botanical garden there’s one more photo you really should take when you are working the scene – a photo of the identification sign so you know what flower you’ve been photographing.

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

Bleeding Hearts © 2008 Patty Hankins

Working the scene is one of the ideas we’ll be talking about and practicing during my May 15-20 workshop – Photographing the Gardens of Philadelphia workshop and during my Morning on the Lavender Farm workshops.

All the details about the workshop and registration information for the workshops is at http://beautifulflowerpictures.com/photographing-gardens-philadelphia/ and http://beautifulflowerpictures.com/morning-lavender-farm-workshops/

Not sure if one of these workshops is right for you? Drop me an email and we can find a time to talk.

Is It Spring Yet?

Is It Spring Yet?

I love spring. For me, it means warmer weather, longer days, blooming flowers and wildflowers and a sense of renewal. And this year, I’m looking forward to spring more than usual.

For many, 2016 ended and 2017 began on a depressing note. And now, here in the United States, many of us are coping with shorter days, gray skies, colder weather and few flowers to photograph.

So now, I’d like to encourage you to plan for a great 2017 full of beauty. For photographers, that can mean planning a trip, taking a workshop, or even just taking time to explore somewhere local with your camera. 

Marmorata Water Lily © 2015 Patty Hankins

Marmorata Water Lily © 2015 Patty Hankins

For those of you in the Washington, DC area, I’d like to invite you to join my Meetup Group the DC Area Flower Safari. We head out photographing at a local garden on a monthly basis. You can find out more info about the DC Area Flower Safari on meetup at https://www.meetup.com/DC-Area-Flower-Safari/

Or if you’d like to come photographing with me, I am teaching three workshops this spring and would love to have you join me.

Graveyard Angel © 2015 Patty Hankins

Graveyard Angel © 2015 Patty Hankins

Springtime in the South
I’ll be leading my Springtime in the South photo tour in late March. We’ll spend a week photographing from Savannah, Georgia to Charleston, South Carolina. So a week of exploring wonderful locations amid the dogwood blossoms, azaleas, and spanish moss. You can read more about my Springtime in the South photo tour at http://beautifulflowerpictures.com/springtime-south-savannah-charleston-south-carolina-low-country-2017/

Song of Norway Iris © 2016 Patty Hankins

Song of Norway Iris © 2016 Patty Hankins

Photographing the Gardens of Philadelphia
I’ll be leading my Photographing the Gardens of Philadelphia workshop in mid May. We’ll spend several days exploring and photographing several of the 30 botanical gardens and arboretums in the Philadelphia area and then head to New Jersey to visit an incredible iris garden. You can read more about my Photographing the Gardens of Philadelphia workshop at http://beautifulflowerpictures.com/photographing-gardens-philadelphia/

Purple Pansies © 2016 Patty Hankins

Purple Pansies © 2016 Patty Hankins

Photographing Flowers (Without Swearing at Your Camera)
And finally,  I’ll be teaching a flower photography weekend workshop in the Washington, DC area in early June. We’ll visit some of my favorite local gardens photographing late spring and early summer blooms. This is the perfect workshop for people just getting started with flower photography or who only have a limited amount of time to take a workshop this spring. You can read more about DC area flower photography workshop at http://beautifulflowerpictures.com/photographing-flowers-without-swearing-2017/

I’d love to have you join me at one of the Flower Safari meetups or in one of my workshops. If you have any questions about any of them, just drop me a note  at patty@hankins.net and we’ll find a time to talk.