When someone comes to me for photography mentoring, they almost always think the first thing we’re going to talk about is their camera.
Settings. Modes. Which lens to use. How to get sharper images.
And we do get there. But it’s rarely where we start — because those things aren’t actually what’s standing between most photographers and better work.
Lesson One: Learning to See Light Before You Shoot It
The first thing I do with almost every new student is ask them to walk around a space and tell me what they notice about the light. Not shoot it. Just describe it. Where is it coming from? Is it hard or soft? What is it doing to the shadows?
Most photographers, even ones who’ve been shooting for years, haven’t trained themselves to read light the way a painter would. When you learn to see light first, you stop fighting your environment and start using it. That shift alone changes the images students make almost immediately.
Lesson Two: Understanding What Your Camera Is Actually Doing
Lesson two is where we get into the camera — but not in the way most people expect. I’m teaching the relationship between aperture, shutter speed, and ISO as a system of trade-offs, not a list of settings to memorize.
The goal is to get to a place where you can look at a scene and know what the camera is going to do before you press the shutter.
Lesson Three: Looking at Your Own Work Honestly
By lesson three, students have been shooting between sessions and bringing work back for us to review together. Most photographers have never sat with someone who will tell them, directly and kindly, what is and isn’t working in their images and why.
Learning to look at your own work honestly — to identify what you were going for, whether you got it, and what got in the way — is how you improve on your own, between sessions and long after the mentoring ends.
I offer one-on-one mentoring sessions through Savvy Shutterbug, both in person in Saint Paul and virtually. Reach out if you’d like to talk about where you are and what you’re working toward.
