I've been away from the blog for a few days, but I've been thinking about y'all! I've been in Bar Harbor, Maine since last weekend with a group of about 35 other photographers. I've been soaking in the local flavor--the breathtaking scenery, the sound of the ocean hitting the rocky shores, the pungent, salty smells on a fishing dock and the visual texture of old, weatherd New England buildings. I'll be sharing more over the next few weeks as I assimilate all I've learned this week. But, here are some tidbits from an exhausted photographer (we've been up before dawn each morning and not in bed until after midnight each night...I can only go so long on 4 hours of sleep a night!).
One of my photographic heroes was here this week. A long-time editorial photographer for Life, National Geographic and Sports Illustrated, Joe McNally. You can read about his long list of accomplishments and check out his work at his website. He is incredibly gifted and versatile photographer and a damn fun guy. He has a book coming out in the next few weeks that I reccomend for anyone who takes photographs or loves looking at them. We got a sneak peek reading last night! Anyway, one of the parts of this workshop is a critique session with one of the instructors. I signed up for Joe. Imagine having a private session with Frank Sinatra--singing for him and then having him give you feedback. What an opportunity! Poor Joe had just gotten done with a 2 hour lighting demo (more on that later) and he doesn't get along with computers (especially PCs), but it was still amazing to have some images from the week reviewed by him. My last image was a large file and took a while to come up. When it did, Joe looked at me and said, "Wow!" and then some other mumbledy-gook about "Mongo likee" (you have to have met him to understand), but that wow was enough to make my day! He also called it "poetic". Ahhhh, I was a happy chick! So, without further ado, my favorite image from the week (it's all downhill from here, folks!)...