365 2014 Day 41 Mastering your Medium

Today I had the honor and privilege of taking a workshop with Zack Arias.  What a day! My head is swirling with information tonight but before my head hits the pillow I wanted to write out a few thoughts.

I cannot say enough about investing in your craft, whatever it is. It is life-giving and inspiring to go find someone who is a master in your particular medium and learn from them. I have wanted to get into one of Zack’s workshops for years now. He is famous for his One Light Workshop where he teaches light techniques through one light first. I can attribute most of my knowledge about off camera lighting to that very workshop. I have the dvd and I think I have it memorized. (I highly recommend that dvd). However, this time I got in to an actual in person workshop. I was so excited I could hardly think about anything else.

He began by asking us all what we wanted to learn the most. He then took the whole rest of the day to address our different concerns and and conundrums with lighting. It was fantastic being put in these situations and having him right there to answer my questions.  Zack is a natural teacher. He loves to see the light go on in people’s heads when they figure things out. He does not judge, he just teaches. There are no stupid questions. I love that.

My main question for him was concerning the creation of the moody portrait. (Some of you may have read my moody cabbage post.) He helped me with that today and I plan to practice what I learned during this 365 project. I am inspired. I will be calling on a few of my blog readers to be subjects. Just you wait.

I loved this quote that Zack shared by Edward Weston, a photographer from the 1920’s. It resonated with me concerning the short attention span of our age, and yet he said this almost a hundred years ago:

“The fact is that relatively few photographers ever master their medium. Instead they allow the medium to master them and go on an endless squirrel cage chase from new lens to new paper to new developer to new gadget, never staying with one piece of equipment long enough to learn its full capacities, becoming lost in a maze of technical information that is of little or no use since they don’t know what to do with it.” 

I often feel that way. Just when I am starting to get my rhythm in learning something new and feeling some satisfaction in it, I see what someone else has or is doing and hastily leave my current post to chase theirs. I need stay with a skill until I have mastered it, knowing it backwards and forwards.

I am so excited to learn some new things and techniques to practice. It feels like a breath of fresh air.  I am grateful to Zack for teaching us today, and also to his beautiful and generous wife Meg, who made us all a delicious gluten-free meal after our session. Isn’t that a happy thought?!?

Proverbs 22:29 ~”Observe people who are good at their work—skilled workers are always in demand and admired; they don’t take a backseat to anyone.”

Here are a few more images from my day with Zack.