About the event
Join me and talented fungi guru Paula Vigus for a fantastic joint-hosted fungi and forest workshop. Paula has recently published a book A Hidden World which was a Top 25 book over this past summer in New Zealand!
With three sessions over the course of this workshop, you will come away with all the skills you need to prepare for, create and then edit beautiful fungi and forest images.
Session #1 - Getting Ready
Thursday, April 30th from 7:30pm to 9pm
This session will give you all the tools and info to prepare you for our full day out in the field, and is a required part of the workshop. We will be going over gear, settings and giving you some in-the-field challenges for the main event.
A link to sign up to this FREE online preparation event will be provided to all attendees who register for the main event.
Session #2 - The Main Event
Saturday, May 2nd from 9am to 4pm
Today we will be out in the field learning how to create our fantastical images. With a small group size of six we will split into two groups, one in the forest (Meghan) + one shooting fungi (Paula) and then swap over after lunch.
Please note that Sunday, May 3rd is the backup date for this event in case of bad weather. You need to be able to attend both dates to register.
Session #3 - Making the Magic Happen
Tuesday, May 5th from 7:30pm to 9:30pm
With macro fungi photography, learning how to focus stack and properly edit your images is crucial for your end result. And with forest photography, there are so many ways you can take a RAW file and turn it into a thing of beauty so we will teach you how to make the most of enhancing the light in your scene, maximising the colour palettes in your images and creating an image with both depth and dimensionality.
A link to sign up to this FREE post-workshop event will be provided to all registered attendees.
Techniques covered
- Preparation for shooting macro and forest photography
- Creating order from chaos in the forest
- Finding unique forest images using lighting and various composition techniques
- Using a polariser for enhanced forest greens
- Spotting fungi in the field
- Focus stacking fungi and forest shots
- Lighting your macro scene
- Creating magical results with your images with various post-processing techniques
What to bring
- Camera
- Tripod (standard for forest, low for fungi - if your tripod won't go very low also bring a wheatbag or similar to balance camera on)
- Circular polariser (please advise if you don’t have one)
- Landscape lens for forest (e.g. wide-angle 16-35mm or 24-70mm)
- Macro lens for fungi (we hope to have 3-4 Sony macro lenses available for Sony shooters - if you are a Canon shooter and you don’t have a macro lens, you can rent one from Dream Gear Rentals)
- Torch / head torch
- Soft lighting / LED lights to light the fungi with (we will have some available but you are welcome to bring your own)
- Waterproof pants or small sheet to kneel/lie on
- Small brush for removing dirt
- Tweezers might be useful
- Lunch, water and snacks