I just got back from an absolutely stellar weekend in Tulbagh – a small town about a hour’s drive from Cape Town… well worth a visit, if you haven’t been there. Take my word for it! Great wine, good food and breathtaking scenery… BRILLIANT! Now it doesn’t take a helluva lot more than good food and great wine to get me to visit a place, but presenting an introduction-to-photography-and-lighting course was a pretty handy excuse to take a little road trip into the countryside.

We started off with the mandatory theory, which had a couple of people sweating over the formula for calculating the surface area of a circle — just checking if everyone is awake, you know — and then moved on to some more practical exercises. A bit of off-camera-flash, a few lighting setups, a couple of on-camera-flash tips and tricks and then we took the show outside for the real hands on stuff. We capped off a really fun and relaxed day in the perfect way too — a couple shoot on a stunning farm just outside town. Picture this: a field of lush green grass surrounded by snow-capped mountains, trees and the sound of a river not too far off… the setting sun, mother nature and a super cool group of likeminded folk making pretty pictures together! What more could you ask for, eh? Maybe just dinner at the wine estate next door and a bottle of the good stuff to wash down that duck breast on mash… and THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is how we roll! YEAH!

But no post would be complete with some pretty pics, so time for a little show-and-tell. One photography workshop, Tulbagh style!

Demonstrating basic 3 point lighting…

Demonstrating the difference between straight on-camera flash and bounce flash… pic on the right was done with on-camera flash, bounced off of Marike’s (one of the delegates) white shirt! Good job on the pose, Stefan! hehe

Then outside for a bit of fun. Malanie doing a great job as stand in model here. Doing some natural light stuff… getting a bit of backlight going and then shooting in direct sunlight (somewhat reluctantly! hehe)

Time to put everything we learned to good use during our couple shoot… and we had a fantastically spontaneous couple, FC and Anel! loads of fun was had by all.

Here’s the team doing their thing…

a bit of chimping…

And the lovely couple, who I believe will be tying the knot in the not too distant future! Enjoy it guys!

And then I have to give a massive big shout out to Liesl Basson for organising everything and bringing us out to Tulbagh — the biggest, hugest THANK YOU for a great weekend… and to Stefan for the venue… and Malanie for being our model/Guinea Pig… and everyone else for making it so much fun. Thanks, thanks, THANKS! Hope to see you all soon — Keep shooting!