WOOOO to the freakin' HOOOO!

Yesterday I hosted the first-ever (and first of many!) MINNe-SHOP! The topic was all about Tilt Shift Photography, which I feel is an area of shooting that many photographers want to learn more about and/or are curious about. The thing about using a Tilt Shift lens is that it is quite tricky. It's an all manual lens, but there are many, many more things to think about than simply just the technical function of the lens! When shooting with a T/S lens, you need to take your time and think about a few things:

1)Composition. Where and how am I going to place my images in a setting that is going to benefit from this lens?

2)Exposure. The light changes WAY often when using this lens. How can I nail this exposure?

3) Focus. How is this lens/effect going to benefit my image? How am I going to use this tool to draw in the viewer?

(And this is all before you even take the photo!)

It's super tricky, but absolutely stunning when you nail a good image! This lens takes nothing but time and patience to learn, hence the MINNeSHOP. I wanted to give our attendees an opportunity to use all of the T/S lenses available out there and just have time to play. There is a lot of artistic freedom with using this lens, but I think there is one MAJOR rule that all of us photographers really need to follow:

Every time you pick up your T/S lens, ask yourself, "Is this the right tool for this image? How is this lens benefiting the overall composition? Am I using it to really captivate and draw in the viewer or am I just using it to be trendy and cool?"

I must say, I was very impressed with all of the MINNeSHOP-ers! Some of them had never even picked up this lens and they got some amazing photos! We had an AMAZING turn out (one girl even came all the way from Iowa!) A special thanks to everyone who attended!

Emily Steffen
Jen Schultz
Jessica Newbauer
Emma Freeman
Alicia Struble
Brianna Kopka
Vickey Weiss
Bethany O'Day
Paula Charchenko
Shelly Anderson
Tom DeBruyn




A HUGE Thank-You to our super HOT couples who came out to model for us! Erick, Bri, Emily and Matt, you ROCKED it!

 

Here are some awesome images from the attendees!


The purpose of the MINNeSHOP is to educate photographers in the Midwest about specific topics of the photography world! It's also designed to be a very casual learning environment with some hands-on opportunities and bring people together! I'm hoping to be doing a MINNeSHOP about every 2 months, so please write in with any suggestions on topic that you would like to learn about!

eliesa@photogen-inc.com

Happy Tilting!

LOVEe