I’m taking a photography class. It’s been on my list of indulgences for two years now, so it’s about time. The class is an intro to 35mm film done thru the UT Informal program. So far it’s been good, I’m learning a lot. I’m three weeks in, and I have pages of frantically scribbles notes about aperture, shutter speed, metering and converging lines. I can’t imagine any of this will ever become second nature. Being able to look at a scene and just know that it should be shot at F16 and 1/125.

My step-dad is a photographer and can rattle off camera settings, film speeds, lenses as easy as listing what he had for lunch. It’s been nice being able to call him and run thru my assignments for the week, same with Jef. God knows they’ve both tried to go thru all these same lessons with me before and it never sunk in. Composition is one thing, but these intricate manual settings are an entire other animal. I’m hoping six weeks of constant repetition will give me a foundation, but this is definitely something I’ll have to use or lose.

Here are some highlights from my first few classes.

Week 1 - Exposure

Week 2 - Depth of Field using proper aperture

Coming up…
Week 3 - Composition (rule of thirds, framing, viewpoint, etc.)