Photography is not as simple as some make it be. Of course, any decent camera can be pointed in any direction and shutter clicked to produce technically proficient images. Some may even be quite good.
For someone who considers photography a personal expression in one of the visual arts, receiving lots of “nice shots” will not help grow one’s art. The element that distinguishes “good” photographers from “mediocre” ones is the consistency with which the former produce good work. It is not because they know all the “quick and dirty” tricks, or “hot tips.” They have learned to look at the world with their own eyes, developed a systematic workflow, and learned their tools very well. There is no easy way to produce a coherent body of work. It requires determination and hard work; just like learning anything. Focused private mentoring may help improve your photographic vision.
Private Sessions, Tutorials, and Mentoring
To this end, I have started offering private sessions and tutorials to anyone who needs a bit of guidance and direction. Mentoring helps people to discover their strengths and weaknesses and guides them in self-learning. These private sessions are tailored to each individual’s needs and interests and scheduled at mutually suitable times. There are plenty of how-to materials on any aspect of photography online. However, hopping from one Photoshop trick to another slow-shutter video will not provide disciplined growth.
The topics may be photography, photographic vision, digital workflow, Lightroom, Photoshop, presentation of your work, etc. The cost of these sessions is $75 per hour. Contact me to discuss your needs and interests, and we will develop a program suitable to your needs.
We can meet at your place or mine depending on the subject matter and how far you live from me. There is no preset program since one size does not fit all. If the meetings will involve digital workflow, I would like to meet at least once at your place to assess your work environment and make suggestions for change if necessary.
I will update this page periodically and may eventually suggest outlines that cover specific areas.
Click on the e-mail address to send me a message: [email protected]
J. Turner
Let me say more than a few words about private tutorials provided by Cemal Ekin. I’ll start by saying I am not a computer geek, learning my way piece by piece over the past years yet realizing I don’t know what I don’t know. I decided to ask for one-to-one tutoring which at this point in time is the best decision I have made in terms of advancing my photography in general.
The first thing Cemal did was to evaluate my equipment, software, etc. After speaking with me he comprised a syllabus of what and how we will cover our agreed-upon four sessions. This is the sequence.
1. I installed another 2T internal hard drive. Cemal set one of the hard drives to hold just my photos. The other has everything else.
2. I purchased and installed an e-SATA card in my computer which would allow me to plug in two external e-SATA hard drives, 2T each. E-SATA cards I have learned speed up the process of saving photos externally at the same speed as the internal hard drive
3. Cemal gave me the link to install the software that would simplify the saving of photos. Once this was done and synchronized by Cemal I now save photos simply by opening the software and clicking on “save”. Just too simple. If I can do it you can do it. I now have the peace of mind that my photos are safe no matter what goes awry.
4. Cemal took me to step by step on how to set up Lightroom 4 to optimize its workings and simplify it for me. I was keeping/saving all my photos by date. Every photo taken on a date was saved by that date resulting in years of photos stored by month, day, year. Cemal showed me how to store all photos under one file, how to store photos by camera used to take the photos, and lastly how to assign “Keywords” to the photos for easy sifting through them by category. Cemal took the time to have me think through how to set up Keywords so that the end result is a planned coordinated filing system with easy access to photos. I now have over 10K photos which I can look up by category and even filter them down to a more concise selection. Not hard however I would not have “ever” gotten to this point of ability if it were not for this type of tutoring.
5. I am now learning how to apply global adjustments to a selected group of photos. How to size photos and print photos in lightroom including page setup, printer settings, and more.
6. There is much more that I am not going to cover as what I mainly wanted to say is this: “if you learn from hands-on tutoring then Cemal Ekin is for you”. No, ifs and or buts, this experience has been #1.
7. My email address is [email protected] should you want to discuss this with me further or have other questions.
Jim Turner