Professional Photography Course

Diploma in photography

• Get started - What do you want to shoot?

  An overview of photography in the modern era. Good photography comes from inspiration. Get thinking about what you can do with photography, new areas to explore and get familiar with camera types.

• Camera basics - Start taking control

  Making sense of camera terminology and modes on cameras. Getting familiar with what cameras can do and how to make the most of yours so you can enjoy your photography quickly.

• Your view of the world through your camera

  Exploring different lens types, understanding focal length and getting the most out of your current set up.

• Composition - Start seeing as a photographer

  Improving photos instantly by understanding basic composition and ideas on what to look out for!

• Shutter speeds - Adding dynamic movement to your photography

  What shutter speeds are and how to use them creatively to capture motion. An important step to full control.

• Apertures - Controlling light and depth

  What apertures are and how to use them effectively to create depth and the next step to full control.

• Good Exposure and the Light meter

  What is exposure and how the camera measures light. No more photos that are too dark or too bright! Make sure you get it perfect every time.

• Fully manual mode - Take complete control

  Putting it all together to take full creative and technical control. Getting to fully manual is only the beginning, it will unlock your potential as a photographer.

Intermediate in photography

• Capturing better portraits

  In this lesson we will discuss in detail the cameras histogram and how this is an essential tool for making extremely accurate exposures in any lighting condition. It will also allow you to make critical decisions about your exposure, without relying on the visual image that your camera shows you on screen. The beauty of this knowledge is that you won’t even have to look at the image on the screen to know that you have the right exposure.

• Shooting landscapes, harder than it looks!

  This lesson takes your abilities to refine and control exposure even further. It will look how spot metering can be used to meter different tones within your image, to identify how much light is being reflected from a variety of subject and tones, and create the best exposure in any situation. An advanced knowledge of the tones in your scene will ensure that you will always create accurate and consistent images.

• The importance of colour

  Having the skills and ability to use flash lighting in your photography is as important as being able to work with natural light. In this lesson we will be looking at all of the various uses of flash in photography. Flash is an essential tool to any photographer whether you just want to add a little bit of light to eliminate shadow or you want to light an entire scene. Knowledge on flash allows you to control and shape the light to create stunning images.

• Seeing in Black and White

  In this lesson, we will be looking at how light can be shaped and manipulated to give you much more control over how your subject is represented. We will be looking at different styles of lighting commonly used in studio photography and the set ups to achieve them. This will broaden the range of lighting options you have when you are doing a studio shoot and expand your creative abilities.

• Photography in Low Light and at Night

• Macro Photography - get closer!

• Food Photography - Photos good enough to eat!

• Photographing wildlife

Advanced in photography

• Histograms - Measuring tones and exposure

  The ability to shoot images that are completely unprocessed in camera gives you complete control over image quality. Shooting in Raw gives you greater control over exposure, tone, sharpness and compression. We will be looking at how using the camera raw processing software can give you much more creative capabilities, whilst maintaining the highest quality files possible from your camera.

• Metering modes - change how you see light

  Capturing amazing dramatic Black and White images requires a completely different thought process than shooting in colour. When shooting black and white images you focus much more on light, tone and contrast. In this lesson, you will learn how to develop this new thought process and visual awareness, for seeing and capturing pictures that will make stunning black and white images.

• Lens Filters - a guide

  Converting images from colour, into strong dynamic black and white images is no easy task. You will learn how to manipulate colours in an image, to create stunning tones and contrast when they are converted into Black and White. This will ensure you are producing images that resemble the work of the traditional masters of black and white photography.

• HDR photography

  HDR photography allows the photographer to create images with increased dynamic range. This is a photograph that is created by using multiple exposures, to create a scene that is full of detail, from the deepest blacks to the whitest highlights. The key to capturing successful HDR photos is preparation. In these lessons, you will learn how to properly set up for the HDR photo and then how to bring it together to create a stunning final photo.

• Flash Photography Part 1

• Flash photography part 2

• Studio lighting part 1

• Studio lighting part 2

Proficient in photography

• Basic editing - taking your photography further

  How many times have you captured a photo that you are proud of, only to view it closely afterwards on a monitor and be disappointed that it is not sharp? This is a frequent occurrence for photographers. There are steps that we can take to ensure the sharpest photos in any situation with any lens available to us. This lesson covers this in detail but also looks at other effects that you can achieve with our lenses such as Bokeh.

• Editing for landscapes

  Macro photography is photographing small objects or insects and is a hugely popular area in photography. This lesson explores all things Macro. The two biggest challenges for Macro photographers are getting close enough to the subject and getting enough light in the scene. We look at all the options here for creating stunning Macro photos and take a closer look at the world around you!

• Editing for portraits

  Macro photography is photographing small objects or insects and is a hugely popular area in photography. This lesson explores all things Macro. The two biggest challenges for Macro photographers are getting close enough to the subject and getting enough light in the scene. We look at all the options here for creating stunning Macro photos and take a closer look at the world around you!

• Colour and Black and white editing

  When all the hard work is done and your images are looking amazing, you will want them to look as good in print as they do on screen. This can often be the most frustrating part of the photographic process. You can put in all of that hard work perfecting your images, only to get prints back that are either too bright or too dark. The colours can often be totally different than what you saw on screen. Colour management is essential to ensure you have consistent colour, tone, brightness levels, contrast from camera all the way through the post production stages, right up to the final print.

• Colour and Black and white editing

• HDR and Panoramic creation

• Lowlight Photography editing

• Creating a portfolio - a critical eye on your work