{food shots from the workshop can be seen here and here}

My first instinct here is to be incredibly effusive. I feel pretty schmaltzy about my 4 day workshop in South Carolina. But it is hard to really describe a weekend away doing nothing but the thing you love, while at the same time meeting people awesome enough that you hope to still call them friends decades from now.

Going into this I was familiar with the talent of our instructors because I have followed their work for years and am so inspired by their style. What I didn’t know was just how lovely they would be in person. In addition to all the direction and instruction on food photography, they were always on hand to guide and critique and encourage. At one point during a shoot I felt stuck and was second guessing my styling decisions and the lovely Clare came to my rescue. We talked it through. We put stuff in, took stuff out. We edited the shot until it felt right. Having her beside me helped me work through my edit and feel so much more confident about the styling process.

On the last day as we were all pulling together our final shots, I listened as Helene sat with one of the other attendees and went through her shots and the feedback she gave on each image was incredible.

But just as much learning and sharing was happening amongst the attendees and I am so grateful this was a generous group of women eager to improve their work. Everything from camera settings, to equipment, to post processing was discussed and shared as we all worked on shoots and processed images. It was my kind of heaven.

I am so inspired by the work of my fellow attendees and I hope to shoot with you again soon!!

Here are some casual snapshots of all of us from the weekend…..

As we were walking back from having a drink in town, this orange pick-up pulled over to the side of the road really quickly. This young man jumps out and runs over to a grouping of pink flowers and before we know it we realize he is picking a flower for his girlfriend in the passenger seat of the cab. I only got this one shot and it’s not great but it was SOOOOO cute!

And there we all are!