Friday, March 14, 2014

Class Review: Frugal Still Life Photography

At the beginning of the year, I was happy to hear about a free photography class offered by Cheryl McCain called Frugal Still Life Photography.  It turned out to be so popular that Cheryl decided to offer it as self-paced paid class available here for $25-$30.
The class ran over eight weeks, with a new prompt posted each Monday morning. The prompts varied - some were subject-related, others composition-related and a few were technical challenges. Each prompt included several examples created by Cheryl. There was also a link-up available for participants to show how they approached the prompt. Cheryl used a lot of textures and made several available for free to workshop participants.
My favorite thing about the class was that it forced me to think about still life photography and gave me the opportunity to spend time considering subject matter and composition. I really enjoyed exploring this aspect of photography, and I think I will continue to do more of it in the future. My only complaint was that the lessons were more inspirational than educational. The one educational one (on metering) was too confusing for me to understand. But, for a free class (or even for one priced as low as $25-30), I felt it was definitely worth my time. Overall, I would give the class  a solid B. To improve it to an A, I would suggest adding a formal critique component. For the rest of you who took the class, what did you think?

8 comments:

sky-blu-pink said...

Nicely styled vignette. Anything that suggests a cup of tea is a winner with me!

Karen said...

This is one of my favorites of your still lifes. I enjoyed the class as well, but still have the last two prompts to complete.

Andy said...

You beautifully captured your still life! It sounds very interesting course! Andy

Melissa said...

Lovely photo with the teacup! I enjoyed the class, although I didn't take photos for the last two weeks. I found the one week about metering confusing, too, but I enjoyed the inspiration to try some still life photography and did learn a little about lighting and setting up with shot. Overall I agree with your grade of B.

Cheri said...

I thoroughly enjoyed the class and did manage to pick up a few technical tips (some from readers of my posts) during the class. But I have to agree with you that I totally didn't GET the week on metering, and still didn't understand it after reading my manual. I'm a "show me" kind of girl, so a video tutorial, or at least screen shots explaining that bit would have been very helpful. In the pay arena, I do think $25 is very fair for this class.

Abi said...

I have loved seeing the photos you shared here Rinda. Thank you for posting your thoughts too. I find them so interesting.

Anonymous said...

I always love your photographic composition and especially like this one.

alexa said...

Not being a photographer, I always enjoy reading about and seeing your work, Rinda - and this one is lovely in its detail and colouring. Hope there's a way of communicating your thoughts to the person who ran it ...