A Day With Damien?

[Mike Farley]

Given the positive feedback to Damien Demolder's lecture, I wonder what interest there is in getting a small group of us together for a day of tuition with him? Everyone seems to have learnt something from his talk, which suggests this could be worthwhile. I asked him about this after his talk and he limits groups to a maximum of six and charges £180 per person, although that is negotiable. The cost includes lunch.

Respond here if you are interested, stating what you would expect to get out of the day. Based on his talk and the images he showed us, I am assuming that everyone will be wanting to find out more about street photography rather than a topic which is not his speciality. If there are sufficient numbers, I'll get in contact with his office to find out more.

[davidc]

£180 is much too steep for me, I'd possibly be interested if it were considerably cheaper and he was able to give some info about what would be covered over the day. I've investigated other street photography workshops before and always found the tuition plan to be very "wooly"and it's deterred me from attending unless I know what I'm getting for my money.

I'd contrast that to something like a studio lighting course where it's very clear what I don't know and therefore benefit from tuition - street photography for me is about being there in the moment and using skill to capture the scene. Generally, for street especially, I think anyone can get that skill from practicing which makes me reluctant to spend money on it, especially 20% of a new lens!

[davidc]

On a related note, how about arranging a starting place and time in London, during the day, and then we could do a group photowalk together? For free, essentially

Followed by a cup of coffee and picture comparison session.

[Mike Farley]

On a related note, how about arranging a starting place and time in London, during the day, and then we could do a group photowalk together? For free, essentially

Followed by a cup of coffee and picture comparison session.

I am up for that. We might want to think about waiting five or six months to give winter a chance to get finished and have some decent light........

[davidc]

I've asked this same question to the camera people at work and someone has come back to me saying he's attended the course and liked it a lot!

However when I asked what Damien covered he basically ticked off everything that was mentioned on Wednesday, such as using AE-lock to expose for faces at the expense of surroundings, a drive to go full manual, finding interesting shafts of sunlight and waiting for interesting people to fill them, seeing what was important for a scene and ensuring exposure was perfect for that etc. Unfortunately nothing the chap at work said was new or different to Wednesday. Of course there are likely to be things he covers that weren't mentioned on Wednesday.

Having said that, to me it sounded like ultimately the same material. That said the chap I spoke to enjoyed the course and said it was worth it but advised it was a very long, tiring day with a LOT of walking.

Granted there's a difference between hearing the theory and putting it into practice but I still think I can practice for free so I'm unlikely to want to attend, sorry. Still keen on scheduling some walkabouts though

[Mike Farley]

One of my questions was how much new material would be covered on a day out with the man compared to what was presented on Wednesday. That said, if we make a group booking we can tailor the course to cover what we want rather than getting the standard offering. That was the reason for my question about people expressing what they would want to get out of the day.

Regardless of whether or not we end up doing something with Damien, we should still follow up on your suggestion about doing our own photowalk and get something organised.

[Rose]

I also think £180 is a bit much. I'd definitely be up for a day taking street pics though. I recommend we think about some specific objectives though, as I know from experience that it's all too easy just to wander around pointing the camera at lots of things. Or spend too much time in coffeeshops LOL!

[Ronald Barker]

I have to agree with David and Rose that £180 is to much for me.
I would be up for our own walk about.

[Peter Boughton]

I would be interested, but can't justify the cost at the moment.
(Though to be clear I don't consider it expensive for six-seven hours of tailored hands-on tuition.)

I am certainly up for doing a club photowalk if blue skies ever return...

[toms]

Too rich for me. That said I agree with many of the other posts and would be very interested in joining a group of members to do the same when the weather breaks.