Saturday, July 26, 2008

Last week was the yearly summer Workshop for the Professional Photographers of NYS. It takes place at Hobart and William-Smith colleges at the northern end of Seneca Lake of the Finger Lakes. It's a beautiful location and campus. The school begins on Sunday afternoon and goes through Friday at noon.


The subject of the class I took this year is scenics and nature. We alternated classroom work with outdoor shooting. The weather was exceptionally fickle this year. It definitely fit the saying, "if you don't like the weather, wait a minute." The rain would be pouring down torrentially and 5 minutes later it would stop and 5 more minutes later the sun would be shining like it hadn't rained in three weeks.


We did manage to get outside quite a bit in spite of the weather. Our first early morning shoot was at a winery not too far from the school. There was a sweet flower garden as well as a grape arbor and an area of growing pears.








Another morning we drove down to Watkins Glen at the lower end of the lake. It was very cloudy and overcast, but the light was good, and it made for better shooting than if it had been sunny. With the sun, the contrast in the glen is too intense and it's difficult to get a well exposed image.






Another morning we went to a small commercial lily farm. The flowers were in practically peak condition--it was beautiful.















After dinner one evening we went to the town of Seneca Falls to shoot along the river. Across the river was a beautiful old building that had once been a mill. We drove over and had a blast photographing the building. I tried to find a way to get inside, but couldn't unless I had broken a door or window, and even if I had gotten in, I didn't have a flashlight to find my way around.




Not too far from the college campus there is a row of town houses. The fronts are painted different colors--we nicknamed the area Rainbow Row.




Another evening we went to a marina at the state park, also not too far from campus.





So it was altogether a great week in spite of the weather. The instructor was Tony Sweet and if you'd like to see some of his great work, go to his web site, tonysweet.com


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Mahalo for looking and Aloha for now.

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