The Power of Positive Thinking

An Expansion Tutorial

Well, it’s been a long time since I’ve posted and an even longer time since I’ve posted a tutorial!  For me, planning tutorials isn’t really the difficult, I have a list of them that I want to post, it’s the actual part of putting them together that I’ve been ignoring. I’m really hoping to grab the reins on this blog and put more energy and effort into making it a one-stop for all sorts of news, information, and resources so this is my attempt at kick-starting it again!

One of the tutorials I’ve been asked for the most is one on expansions, making an image much larger than what is captured in camera. This technique is sometimes referred to as the “Brenizer Effect”. First off let me just say that there are countless tutorials, videos and resources to give you an even better understanding on how to expand your frame. I’ll list a few links I’ve found at the end of  this post.

Let’s get started!

So the first thing to consider when you’re expanding your frame is make sure that you have all the images that you need to do so. You can expand your frame from just a single photo but it’s really tough and takes a considerable amount of time. When you’re shooting your photo, whether it’s a self-portrait, a portrait of someone else or even a landscape or still life photo, take in as much of the surrounding backdrop as you can. Typically what I do when I shoot is I take the “main” image and then I switch over the focus to manual focus and then I take photos of the background, moving in clockwise pattern from right to left. I usually take more photos than I think I’ll need, just to make sure that I have what I need to work with. For the photo below, I actually had 15 images but only ended up using about 8 of them in the final photo.

Once you have your images, the fun starts!

Step 1:

 Open up all your images in Photoshop and then open to your “main” image.  Here is my first image, what we’ll call the “main” image. 

Step 2: 

Expand your canvas size by clicking Image —> Canvas Size.  This part is totally up to you and depends on how big you want your final image to be, if you have a large scene to expand you’ll want to expand your canvas quite large. I typically start with a canvas of 300cm by  300cm (which is pretty big) but then you can always crop or expand wider if you need.

Step 3:

Once your canvas is widened, now you can start to add your new layers. It doesn’t really matter where you start, but I usually start with the images that are closest to the “main” image.

Go to one of your other images (in this case the image that will fill in the immediate left of me) and select/copy it.  In your main image, paste this new image into a new layer over top. Now line up this layer to match where it fits the image below, you might need to lower the opacity a bit to be able to see behind it and line it up.

 

 

Step 4: Masking

In Photoshop, apply a layer mask over this second layer.

Then making sure you have black as your paintbrush colour and a large soft brush, paint over the hard edge of this layer in the mask mode. You should start to see your main image appear. Paint over anything that you want to get rid of and don’t worry if you paint over too much, you can make it reappear by painting it back with a white brush. 

Step 5: 

Repeat steps 3 & 4 with all the other images you need to fill in your background. You can automate Photoshop to stitch your images together but I find that doing it manually helps you to create the image from scratch and see the final image being created. 

As you add in and mask all your layers, you can either expand your canvas again to bring more space into the image or you can crop it. In my photo , I just left it as 300cm by 300cm.  This is 6 layers which only took about 5 minutes to add in and mask.

That’s really all that it takes to expand your frame!  This was a fairly simple image to work with but here are some tips for successful expansions!

- remember your focus! -  always make sure that you lock your focus into manual mode so that all your images have the same focal point, this is key to creating a seamless expansion

- lighting/shadows – If you’re expanding in a space where the lighting is changing or you need shadows, remember to set up your additional images to capture that. In photos where I’ve been in my living room with a wall behind me, I’ve taken the main shot, then moved the camera and taken another shot with me in the same position to make sure that the shadow remains intact

- busy backgrounds -  The more neutral the background the easier your expansion will be, keep in mind that backdrops like  tiled floors, wallpaper, bricks and tiny twigs and branches can be difficult to line up when you’re adding them to your main image, it’s doable but will take a bit more time.

- gaps - sometimes even if you take a lot of photos you might end up with a few gaps in your stitching, if this happens you can just clone in some of the nearby background into these gaps. In the photo above, I had a few spots in the grass that I had missed while taking my photos so I just cloned in some surrounding grass and this helped to cover up any white space.

Here are a few links including a vide on how to automate this effect:

http://blog.buiphotos.com/2009/07/the-brenizer-method-explained-with-directions/
http://www.ryanbrenizer.com/2011/05/brenizer-method-instructions/
I hope that this tutorial helps explain this technique and that if you haven’t already tried expanding you frame, that you’ll try it out! 

See you again soon!

It’s All About Staying Focussed

Okay, the title is pretty heavy on the photography pun but really this blog post is all about how to stay focussed on what you love and how I (try) to stay organized and in touch with what I want to achieve in photography and in the rest of the areas in my life.

Now, if you know me in ‘real life’ you’re probably laughing at the fact that I, Joel Robison, the one with the messy desk drawers and the one who is perpetually losing his keys, remote, phone, etc….is writing a blog post on being organized. I would say that for me, it’s one of the goals that I’ve been working on the longest. I am not, by any definition of the word, organized. I operate most efficiently in some sort of chaos, which I think is true for most creative people. I like to have my tools accessible, I like to see what I have to work with, not keep it all neatly arranged inside a box. For me, that image of the two sides of the human brain is pretty much an accurate visualization of who I am, a total right brain…..a bit messy, colourful and usually not staying in one place for very long.

I used to think it was kind of silly that some people needed to write lists or keep a day planner to stay organized. I felt that I was able to just log it into my brain and there it would be forever, which is true….it stays there along with the hundred million other things I think about during the day. Around July of last year I found myself coming up with concept ideas and then forgetting about them when the time came to work on photos, thus began my Mind Map Journal.

 

 

If you’re not familiar with mind mapping , it’s pretty much the artistic version of a brainstorm. There are no rules, there are no guidelines…it’s just get those ideas out on paper any way you want. I decided to make a recycled journal from a cereal box and cover it with a drawing of some cameras to make it easy to spot. Essentially on each page I start with a word, phrase, idea or theme and then shoot out different concepts out from the centre.

For me, this way of staying organized is the easiest to do, it’s all contained in one book and I don’t have to keep it in lines or point form, I can doodle, scratch things out, colour it in…whatever!  My mind map quickly became my daily companion, I would bring it everywhere, just in case i had an idea, I could write it down and let it go for a while. When I did come back and revisit one of the ideas I had written down, I coloured it in yellow. It’s a relief of sorts to have this book, it’s like an answer key to concepts…when I’m stuck for ideas I can flip through this book and read through the pages and say “oh right! I was going to do “_________” photo!”

Another way I’ve been trying to stay more organized and in the present moment is to sketch out my ideas before I try to photograph them. I feel that this helps create a clearer image in my mind of what exactly I’m going for. To me, drawing and photography really help build each other up, if I sketch out composition, I feel like I’m more aware of it during a photo shoot and it really makes me happy to see the same idea in two different mediums.

 

 

How do you try to organized and focussed on what you love?

Levitation Tutorial (and giveaway!)

It’s been a while since my last tutorial but I wanted to wait until  I had the right photo in mind before writing one, I hope that you find this one as informative and fun as the previous ones

So this is what I think is the easiest way to do a levitation type photo, there are endless ways for you to interpret this style and editing and I hope that it gives you a good starting point for creating your own floating, flying, levitating photos.

First off, I’ll say that the most important parts of doing a levitation photo are basically to have a base image with nothing in it, and your main focus image. For the tutorial I’ll break it down into three main points; the set-up, the photos, and the processing.

Part 1: The Set-Up

So one of the key points of doing a levitation photo is to have something to sit, stand, lean, lay on. I’ve used anything from stumps, stools, chairs, even an ironing board. Use what you think is going to give you the best height, and will be the easiest to bring in and out of your setting. Keep in mind you want the surface of what you’re going to be on, to be rather small that way you don’t have to worry too much about creating a large flat section of your clothing when you’re laying or sitting on your item.

this is what I found in the field to lean on….probably not too safe

Part 2: The Photos
Once you have your scene set up with your resting item (we’ll call it your seat),  you can start shooting. I usually take a lot of images at this point just so there are more to choose from, change your pose often so that in case you want to borrow parts from one image and add it to another, you can (like flying scarves, different hand positions etc…) If you’re wearing something that’s loose try to drape it over the edge of your seat so that when you are editing, you can create a more natural looking line. Also, try not to hide anything behind your seat, make sure your hands and legs aren’t hiding behind the seat!

Once you’re done shooting what we’ll call your “focal image” go to your camera and set the focus from Auto to Manual (usually on the side of the lens, switch to MF). That way from now on, your photos will all have the same focus length. Now you’re going to need to take your base image which is going to be the exact same as your “focal image” just without you in it. Remove your seat from where it was and then take a few pictures without moving your camera, you should have the same image as your “focal image” just without anything but a background. From this point you can take any additional images you need to fill the frame or expand.

Part 3: The Processing

In your editing program, open up all your images. We’ll be working with your “base image” (aka the image with just the background).  If you’re expanding your frame using stitching presets or manually do that now with your “base image”.

expanded frame

Now, open up your “focal image”, select the whole thing and copy it. Now paste it in as a new layer onto your “base image”. Lower  the opacity of your “focal image” and then get it to match as closely as possible to your “base image”, then you can put the opacity back up to 100%.

matching both layers

With a soft eraser tool, start to erase your “seat” from the “focal image”. You should be seeing the background starting to show up. Erase all of your seat and any other parts of that layer that you don’t need. This is pretty much the basics of doing a levitation image.

You can at this point do any other editing like changing tones, curves, levels etc…you can also add in other parts of other “focal images”. For this photo, I liked the flying scarf from another photo so I pasted it in as new layer and softly erase the hard edges until it matched  the rest of the image. At this point I also added the snitch and the “broom” part of my broom.

after the "seat" has been erased

I hope that this short tutorial helps you out and I’m really excited to see you try it out. In fact, I’m offering a give-away of some custom made Harry Potter props if you try out this tutorial and share it either in the comments below, on my facebook page or linked on Flickr. All you need to do is let me know that you’ve tried this tutorial and I’ll add your name to the hat and 3 weeks I’ll pick a winner! I made the “golden snitch” in this photo, as well as some other Harry Potter props like a wand and some other goodies and I’ll send them to the winner

Open Happiness

Well this is it! The big reveal of my brand new project that’s been next to impossible to keep a secret for the past month or so!

The short of it is that I’m doing a flickr-based project with…..Coca Cola!

Here are the details.

Coca-Cola is looking for ways to engage their fans and to encourage them to create imagery and content in an fun and inspirational way, which is the purpose of this brand new project. Using inspiring and motivating key words, fans and photographers can share their photos and stories through the official Coca-Cola Flickr group, hopefully growing a community of like-minded, supportive and talented artists creating fun and exciting new works of art inspired by Coca-Cola.

My role in this new adventure will be a kind of moderator to the Flickr community in the group, I’ll be introducing the new themes which will be posted every 2 weeks and in doing so I’ll be presenting my own photograph inspired by the key-word as well as explaining my inspiration behind the image and a bit of the process of how it was created.

I’m honestly still a bit stunned that I’m going to be working alongside such a well known and respected company and that they appreciate my work enough to have me be a part of this new project. Coca-Cola has always had distinct and beautifully crafted advertisting campaigns and imagery and to know that my work, even in the tiniest way, can be a part of such a great history is really a huge confidence boost in regards to photography.

The best part of this whole project is that it’s not just me partaking in it, the group is open to everyone and I REALLY want to see you join and play along, while I can’t say too much about the upcoming themes, I can say that they should prove to be inspiring and fun photo prompts!

The first key word or call-to-action is

TOGETHER

You can see my interpretation as well as my thoughts on the theme and submit your own image inspired by “Together” at the flickr group which is located here:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/thecoca-colaco

Hope to see some of you playing along and creating more beautiful pieces of art!

Branches, Roots, and Me

For the month of January I’m holding a contest based around trees. To enter all you need to do is link a photo you’ve taken that fits the theme to my Facebook page and on the last day of the month, I’ll be putting together a little parcel with all sorts of tree goodies and mailing it off to one lucky winner!

I’m a bit late on explaining why I chose trees as my contest theme (of which I plan to do more) but better late than never right!?

I grew up and still live in a rather small town, built in a valley between two mountain ranges that seemingly go on forever, I never noticed growing up how much I valued all of the nature that surrounded me, I just took it for granted and kept doing my homework and watching cartoons. Then once I hit my late teens and early 20′s something changed. I started to look at the endless expanse of green in a new light. I travelled to bigger cities and saw them in a new light too, I saw all the grey….all the glass and concrete and cars and all I wanted to see was green again. Once while on a cross-country road trip, I remember looking out the window to see the prairie fields and the endless sky and not a tree in sight…for hours it seemed I didn’t see anything that even resembled a tree, that was the first time I felt homesick.

 

I remember the exact day that I realized that the forest would be a place of solitude, reflection, and inspiration for me. I was jobless and had found myself feeling depressed and frustrated and getting sucked in to watching horrible daytime television in the comfort of my air conditioned basement suite. Then all of a sudden, I felt a sudden urge to just be out in nature, anywhere…just out. I grabbed my journal, a granola bar and apple and hopped on my mountain bike and within a few minutes I was away from everything manmade and surrounded entirely by nature. I sat in the warm summer grass and wrote. I wrote about how mad I was that I couldn’t find my passion, how disconnected I felt from the rest of the world, and how I just wished I could feel alive again. I went back the next day and rode a little longer, and then the day after that I tried some new trails and pretty soon I was spending hours every evening exploring every inch of the 9,000 acre community forest adjecent to my town. I found my place to be free.

A few years later when I started training for my first marathon I was looking for long stretches of running routes to carry me through the 20km runs I was doing every weekend. I remembered the community forest and the old logging road that winds it’s way from one end to the other and pretty soon it became once again, my nightly ritual. I’d run from one end to the other and back and when I turned my music off all I could hear was the crunch of my feet on the dirt, smell the wildflowers blooming in the fields and feel the warmth of the sun hitting my arms and neck through the breaks in the trees. Again I found myself thinking about my future, planning what I wanted to do with my life and feeling my body changing physically and mentally. The forest became yet another place for me to be free.

When I started to become interested in photography I would venture out into the forest, which is now about a 50metre walk from my door. When I step off the pavement and into the trails I feel like I’m leaving the outside world and entering into a space that I’m supposed to be in. It’s hard for me to explain but I look out at the trees and grass and birds (and sometimes bears) and I feel more inspiriation in that simple glance than I do spending days at home thinking. I feel that my thoughts are linked to the leaves and pinecones and that when I’m in the midst of all that organic goodness I’m recharging my brain and soul.

 

So yes….that’s why I chose trees. Because they make me feel alive and they make me feel like I’ve taken a deep breath of inspiration.

What do you consider to be your place of inspiration?

Sameness vs Style

Last week I received a comment through Formspring from an anonymous person letting me know that they thought that all of my work has the same look to it; “you doing something in the middle of a bunch of grass against the skyline”.  At first I was a little offended and kind of embarrassed but then after I got over it, I started to think about it.

This person hit the nail on the head and brought my attention to something that I had been neglecting in the last few months, trying new things and putting my creativity to the test. It’s no secret that I like to shoot in wide open vistas with lots of space and nice backdrops. I have a favourite field that I visit often for photographs and I kind of rely on it a little too heavily at times. While thinking about this whole topic I was trying to find ways of defending my “sameness”. The field is close (about a 5 minute walk), its nice to shoot in (well, yes but so are other things), it’s familiar (ah yes it is, but when was photography about being familiar?).  I tend to want my photos to turn out exactly as I see them in my mind, which I think is a normal desire for any photographer, and typically my mind pictures these images in familiar settings and that’s where I end up shooting them, and returning over and over again.

  

It’s a balancing act to develop a style without becoming boring and to try new things without losing your own vision. I think in the past few months I’ve become a little complacent with shooting in the same locations. I go to these spots because I know that they work, it’s like a favourite recipe that you make every week because you know that it tastes good. Well, sometimes you need to dust off the cookbooks and try something new, which is what I think I need to start doing in my photography. Granted it’s easier to fall back into the “field” or “bunch of grass” photos, I need to try to let my mind create images that allow me to explore more of my natural surroundings, to develop new areas of my photography and to not get stuck in the same old photo.

I might argue that it’s in my style as a photographer to shoot in wide, grassy spaces with the subject in the centre and while that may be true on some level, I want to be known for more than just that. I want to try to express my ideas or thoughts in new ways that people might not have seen before and that lights a creative spark in themselves and in me. I don’t want my portfolio to look like the same photo over and over, but in that breath I also want to develop a style that people can see as “Joel’s style”. The trick I suppose is learning how to do both. To walk both lines without leaning heavily onto one side.

What are your thoughts about developing your own style versus being too similar?

Patronus Tutorial!

It’s not exactly a secret that I’m a big Harry Potter fan, I’ll admit that it took me a while to actually read the books but once I did, I was hooked! It’s a story that has so much visual goodness that it’s easy to get inspiration from it and create art based on it’s characters, words, and themes. Back in July when the final movie was being released I did a few photos based around the books/movies and one of my favourites was one based around the Patronus Charm mentioned in the books.

Patronus Charm:  “Conjures an incarnation of the caster’s innermost positive feelings, such as joy or hope, known as a Patronus. A Patronus is conjured as a protector, and is a weapon rather than a predator of souls: Patronuses shield their conjurors from Dementors or Lethifolds, and can even drive them away.”

When I was coming up with a list of tutorials I’d like to do on my blog, the patronus tutorial was one that jumped right to the top. Last week I wanted to work on the image and thankfully my dear friend Sabby agreed to my model! Hopefully the tutorial is easy to understand, I’d LOVE to see you guys create your own Patronus images

Step 1 (optional) -
I’m starting from the very beginning of the photo, this is the ”bare” image straight out of the camera. Because I used a fixed focus lens, I always expand my frame which essentially means that I take the main photo you see here, and then change my focus to manual and then take about 20 photos of the background. Then in photoshop, I expand the canvas size (for some reason 300cmx300cm is my number, and then add each photo onto a new layer and work at getting them all to match up.  You don’t have to worry about this step, but I thought I’d start from the very beginning.

you can click on the images to make them bigger

^—– before expansion

^——- after expansion

Step 2 (Flying Scarf)
This is another optional part, but I think it adds a bit of dramatic flair to the final image. While taking the main photo of Sabby, I also took another one of her scarf in the air, just by using my timer and flipping the scarf up to catch it flying. Then I just added the scarf on as new layer and matched it as closely as I could to the original photo.

 

Step 4 (Light)
This is where the fun part comes in, and the part that you can start to be creative. To achieve the “bright light” that a patronus charm would give off, I use a series of “fractal brushes” from deviant art (link below). The brushes are used on a new layer with screen as the blending mode. I use a light bluish green tone, but really you could any vivid colour, play with what looks best for you. Same with the brushes, you can use a variety of different brushes to get different effects.

In this layer, I also added a dark gradient (add a new fill layer and set it to radial gradient and then to forground to transparent mode). Then you just drag and click to add the gradient to the part of the image you’d like to be a little darker, for this type of image I usually like to make the outer part of the photo quite dark to highlight the lightness of the spell. Play around with this step and you can create neat effects.

Step 5 (Adding your patronus)
This is another creative part! Sabby chose (well, actually I chose based on our conversation) to have a white horse be the animal that is coming out of her wand. Once you choose your animal, locate a silhouette image of that animal. Add it into your image on a new layer. Invert the image so that the animal is now white (CTRL-I) and then get rid of the black (I use the magic brush and delete). Then duplicate this layer and blur the duplicate using a Gaussian blur, you dont’ want a large blur but enough that it takes away the rough edge of the silhouette.

Step 6 (Fancy Stuff)
Now, duplicate your animal layer again and this time colour it in (paint bucket is fine) with the same hue as your lights/brushes from step 4. You should have a blue/green animal. Set the blending mode to screen and blur this layer to give the silhouette a coloured-hue around it. As you did in step 4, play with different brushes (on screen mode and using a bright colour) and try new things. I like to give off little trails of light so I use brushes that give that effect. You can find links to all the brushes I used at the bottom of the post. I usually end up applying a soft blur to this layer as well just to get rid of any harsh lines.

Step 7 (Final Touches)
Now that you have the hard part out of the way, it’s time to have some more fun. It looks like a big jump from the last image to this one but it’s really only a few small steps. First a couple of radial gradents, the first was that same blue/green colour that should match your other colours from the last steps, I use this just to create a nice radial blur of colour, set this layer to screen mode and have the gradient  positioned over the wand/brush/animal . Then I add another radial gradient set to muplitply mode and with a darker tone, this radial gradient should cast a darker tone over everything but the wand/brush/animal. Blur both these layers.

In my image I played with the curves, levels and colour tones of the image but you don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. It’s interesting to use the colour balance tool to give everything an even hue but you certainly don’t need to do this. I also added some cloud textures to enhance the sky, but again not necessary. To add another dimension to the sky I painted over the clouds with a pink brush set to “soft light” and on a low opacity just to give it some colour.

Final Image:

Resources!
Fractal Brush
Sparkle Brush

- Sihouette-

How to Load Brushes

Favourite Images of 2011

I must admit, one of my favourite parts of the year coming to an end is reading “Best of ____”  posts and articles. For some reason I’ve always loved seeing what people consider the “best movie” or “best song”, I like to look at what happened over the course of the year and what contributions were made during the past 12 months. I’m hoping to do a post about my own adventures in 2011 but  I also wanted to share with you some of my favourite images by other photographers this year, here is my own personal Best Of 2011. These artists make me want to be a better photographer and I hope they inspire you as much as they have me.

Enjoy!

The Parting Part ii – Luke Sharrat
I love the drama that Luke created in this, the levitation is seamless and works so perfectly in this image.

The City Beautiful by The365SpiritSearch
One of my favourite photographs ever, so much so that I have a print of it hanging above my desk! I love the layers that the buildings create and it almost makes me want to live in a big city….almost…..

 

I read the news today, oh boy – David Talley
It’s almost impossible to pick one favourite image from David’s collection of photographs, his eye for detail and concepts are brilliant. I love how he uses space and you can tell from images like this one how much work he puts into his images.

 

the world above -Brooke Shaden
What would a favourite images post be without an appearance by Brooke? She is a magician with a camera, creating new worlds showcasing her unique perspective and distict style. I love the whimsical concept behind this image.

just another day – Andrea Pun
When I first saw this photograph it was like “BAM! Perfect” and to me that’s the sign of a great peice of art, that you recognize it’s beauty and quality right away. This is such a simple and beautiful piece that looks so natural and calming.

First Contact – Marwane Pallas
The stories that Marwane tells through his images are captivating, you almost feel that you’re reading a vintage book on the history of civilizations. The amount of skill that he has to pull off his cloned images is absolutely incredible.

Alice’s broken tea party – Sarah Ann Loreth
This is one of my favourites from Sarah’s collection of work, her style is so vivid and so full of contrast and I love how she manages to make images just pop.

rorshach – Robby Cavanaugh
This is just a simple and beautiful photograph that seems so real yet so full of whimsy and fantasy.

draft – FiddleOak
Ah, the wonderful brother and sister duo that is FiddleOak have developed such a wonderful genre in conceptual photography, their perspective has certainly opened my eyes to the tiny areas of the world that can be filled with art.

More to check out:
I could keep going for a long time so here are some more incredible artists to check out!

Sean Wright
Casey David
Misconception Photography
SuperPipo2010
Brad Wagner
Gurbir Grewal
Rob Woodcox
Nichlas Boysen
Seanen Middleton
Nicholas Max Scarpinato

Photographer’s Wish List

With Christmas on it’s way, I remember back to when I was a kid flipping through the christmas catalouge (taking turns with my brothers) and writing out my christmas wish list for Santa. Written in crayon, in that little kid scrawl I’m sure I had quite the list. Now as a ‘grown up’ I don’t really write out those lists, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t have things that I’d like. Now, of course I wouldn’t mind a new camera, some lenses, maybe a lighting setup but my Photography Wish List is actually a list of things I’d like to photograph rather than material objects. Here’s my wish list of what I’d like to photograph next year

1. The Ocean

I grew up and still live in the mountains, in a valley about 10 hours away from the nearest ocean. I think for that reason, I’ve always been intruiged by taking photos next to the open water. I find something so isolated and beautiful about the vast landscape, the backdrop providing the most surreal negative space. I feel that my mind naturally wanders to visions of water, boats, and seascapes so being able to shoot images with an ocean as my muse would be awesome.

2.  Animals
I’m not just talking about a cat or dog, I’m sure I could borrow my parent’s pets with no hesitation, I would really love to shoot a photo of something bigger, or wild! I’d love to incorporate a horse into an image, I don’t exactly have an idea for what I want to do but being able to include the magic of an animal into an image would be something that I would really enjoy. I secretly wish that I could include something wild like a real elephant or a bear or (going back to my first wish) a whale….wouldn’t that be awesome?

3.  Collaborations
This year I’ve been fortunate to meet up with a few flickr-ites from other cities and a few from my own neck of the woods and I really loved the experience of getting to see another person work with a camera, I would LOVE the opportunity to meet up with more photographers and work on some images together.

4.  Abandoned Buildings
I have always had a soft spot for those secret places that are long abandoned but still seem to have so much life left in them, unforuntately so few of those places exist where I am, but I would love to explore an old factory, hospital or school to use a backdrop. I’m slightly jealous of those that are able to visit these places and create such amazing pieces of work within their walls.

That’s not a big wish list is it? Here’s hoping that 2012 brings with it some awesome photography experiences for all you! What is on your photography wish list?