I was recently contacted by Queen Elizabeth Hospital's Head of Art Department, Nicola Dyer, to hold a landscape photography workshop for their students. Having been teaching photography for nearly a year now with The Photo Academy it is nice to expand it with new students of a different age range, these being 11-18 year olds rather than all adults so far.

We met at Tyntesfield House last Tuesday with the aim of capturing some of the picturesque views of this Victorian Gothic masterpiece and learning some principles of landscape photography. Whilst I am not a landscape photographer per se it still plays a huge role in shooting wedding and property which I do frequently so I was able to provide some tips on the best camera settings to use, ideal lighting conditions and composition.

Tyntesfield-House

As every printed image you see has been post processed through Photoshop or Lightroom the actual taking of photos is only one part of modern digital photography.  With this in mind we discussed the benefits of shooting in RAW vs jpeg and the additional editing options is allows, and perhaps returning to the images in a separate Photoshop tutorial.

Nicola kindly provided some photos of us in action as we went around as well as the write up for the school newsletter -

'QEH Photography Workshop at Tyntesfield with Leon Day

Leon introduced us to his work as a professional photographer. He showed us all the different kit he uses from expensive camera lenses to techniques on how to hold the camera more effectively and some suggestions on which gadgets to buy. He also took the time to talk us through his own work and shared his ideas on use of long exposure and rule of thirds.

We then walked around the grounds at Tyntesfield  and Leon taught us how to shoot in Raw and explained the pros when editing an image in RAW. He reinforced our understanding of Light in photography as well as Composition and really helped us to fine tune our use of camera settings when shooting in manual. 

'We picked up loads of new techniques and he also helped us as individuals to develop our ideas for our Y11 GCSE exam project.'  Y11 student  

'He really helped inspire me on how to use Paper( my chosen exam question )  in my work - for example I was shooting with a tube of shiny paper around my lens to create interesting abstract effects.'  Y11 student

'Leon really helped my understanding of ISO and shutter speed.'  Y11 student 

'I now feel way more confident when selecting different modes to shoot in.'  Y12 student

'Leon was able to show me how to make use of viewpoint and angle which is something we are learning in lessons at the moment.'  Y10 student

The weather was dreadful, it was freezing cold and hailing but we all came away with some really successful images for our portfolios! Thanks Leon!'

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I am available for private tuition in a range of photography subjects and will be looking to start these on a regular basis later in the year.  For enquiries and availablility please use the Contact form on my website, email [email protected] or call 07952 993376.

www.leondayimages.com