15/01/2025

100+ courses, learning from new photographers

I did not exactly want to celebrate it, but I did want to know when I completed my hundredth course. I may have gone four or five over that number, since I never kept a perfectly accurate record. Still, after adding up the beginner, lighting, advanced and other courses, I got there.

When I started out as a self-taught photographer, I felt the need to share what I was learning. My first courses began in 2008, and I still enjoy teaching them today, largely because of what students teach me: their first questions and the fears they gradually leave behind. That is why I call my introductory course “First Steps in Photography”. I want to accompany each person through that exciting stage.

I am always looking for new ways to learn and share what I know. Not long ago I found a fascinating book, The Daily Book of Photography, with 365 short readings, one for each day. A statistic in the first reading caught my attention: only 20% of people who own a camera try to improve their skills. It makes me happy to think I may be helping that number grow.

Teaching photography is a great motivation. Photography is an important part of my life. I may take fewer pictures than I used to, but I keep researching and learning. Technology changes constantly; the essence of photography still has a way of staying with us.

It may not have been exactly my hundredth course, but I will approach the next one as if it were and enjoy it as much as the first. I especially want to thank Duke Fotografía, a camera shop with more than fifty years of experience, for trusting and supporting me from the beginning. Thanks to them, I have had the pleasure of helping new photographers find their way.