The Practical Photography School
Our approach to teaching photography is to give you insights and understanding of individual technical pieces while shooting. We start you by understanding what an f-stop in your lens is, what it does, what it can do creatively and all while you are using your camera. And we continue from there to many other aspects of making beautiful and interesting images.
We are located 1.5 blocks east of Union Square in NYC and help kids and adults better their photography craft. While we like to work one-on-one with our adult students, we do offer specific classes for 4-6 students at a time for Middle/High School students. We also offer private tutoring for students that are taking photography at school and want to gain an edge on their learning or better understand what they are learning at school.
Please find below some of our current offerings.
School Photography Tutoring
These individual classes can cover areas that you are struggling with: the use of the camera, aperture and shutter speed, color temperature, composition, subject matter, portfolio presentation, basic photo editing and more.
If you have a specific area you need to cover, you can sign up for an hour and we can help you with that.
Per hour tutoring at our studio: $50/student
Per hour tutoring at your home: $80 / 1st student & $40 per additional student (max of 2 students)
Parent or Guardian supervision is required
Photography for Parents
Most parents we know love taking pictures of their kids, but every so often they see images that could have been better, or are blurry and they don’t understand why. We can help you with that! We can teach you how to expect the right moment, have your camera ready to capture it beautifully, and of course all other aspects of photography you wish to learn.
Per hour tutoring at our studio: $50 (without kids)
Per hour tutoring at your home photographing your kids: $100 for the first hour & $80 additional hours
Photography Basics for High or Middle School Students
This is a course tailored to those that wish to take photography more seriously than just snapping with your phone.
Whether you want to use an advance photo app on your phone, a point and shoot or a DSLR, you will understand the basics such as: aperture control (f-stop), shutter speed, color temperature (WB – white balance), focal length (lens mm vs angle), basic composition, subject matter and more.
10 hour course / 4 students per class $300/student
Classes are 1 hour per day, twice a week from
5:00-6:00 pm or 6:30-7:30 pm
Monday /Wednesday or Tuesday/Thursday
If 4 students join together,
class times and days can be customized.
Curriculum
- We only have one our of theory as required by some schools. In this hour we will cover an intro to photography, types of cameras, style of photography, subject matter and some of the technical aspects that we will work with during the course. We will also review of students equipment and their knowledge and interests in photography.
- Understanding your camera or app will be done while shooting or planning a shot. Basics of an f-stop is done while doing a still life shot, what happens when we change it, what needs to be done to correct problems, what effects can be achieved when the aperture is open vs closed.
- Shutter speed is covered while photographing another student. This will teach them how to freeze motion so an image is not blurry, or how to use motion creatively. What shutter speeds are best for different scenarios.
- While doing a studio portrait of a friend they will learn what white balance is, and how to make sure your image is not yellow or blue, and why that happens. An intro into color temperature in light.
- ISO and going a little more complex. By now students understand aperture vs shutter, and they had been introduced to ISO from the beginning. Now we will enter on why ISO is important and how it affects every other technical aspect previously discussed. How it can be used creatively.
- Creating a project: this will cover basic composition in different styles such as street photography, still life, portraits, family photos, and documentary. And we will also cover basic planning and approaches. The project that will be shot in the studio will be based on what the students come up with.
- For the last 3 or so hours we will work on shoots based on the project ideas that they come up with. All shoots will be in the studio.