Whichever Retreat you want to join, find out how we can help you during it.

We want you to leave our Retreats with photographic - or food - skills you didn't have when you arrived, skills that you can use on projects once you're home. And that applies whether you are a beginner, experienced or expert photographer. or foodie.

We're very open about how everything is done - sharing brings its own dividends as techniques are experimented with and new uses found. 

First, let’s figure if you’re:

A Beginner

• You shoot on automatic. all the time.

• your tripod has legs like Mini mouse.

• iPhone or camera: to be honest, usually iphone but you realise its limitations and that’s why you bought a “proper” camera.

• You are still learning what ISO, shutter speed and APerture are all about.And what the heck is “RAW”?

• You take most of your photos on holiday then have some of them printed.

AN Experienced PHOTOGRAPHER

• You are au-fait with most of your camera settings.

• You don’t like your tripod but feel guilty when you don’t use it.

• A camera for serious photography. an iPhone for everything else.

• You are an avid reader of photography books and magazines and have a photography website.

• You worry that you’ve not yet found a focus for your work. And you’d like to discover your style.

A foodie

• Photography is all well and good but you’re really more interested in baking, chocolate work and cooking.

• Food is your creative medium.

• You actually like shopping for ingredients and visiting markets.

• You like going on holiday with your spouse/ partner but not if it involves you standing around for ages “waiting for the light” with nothing to do.

• You have a good set of knives in your kitchen at home.

AN EXPERT

• A Camera is simply your creative tool of choice.

• You have a tripod but use it only when you really need to.

• You’ve mined various creative veins over the years but are looking for new ideas.

• for you, photography is a communication tool. The RAW file is just a starting point.

• Can you sync. an Iphone with your studio flash kit? That would be cool.

Especially for beginners

essential composition

optimal exposure

mastering your camera’s controls

Especially for experienced photographers

colour transects

chocolate bar collages

objectography

Especially for expert photographers

post production for mood

word pictures

Light painting

for all photographers

digital workflow and asset management

essential lightroom and photoshop skills

review, ideas, discussion and inspiration

Especially for foodies

baking

chocolate

vegetarian

Essential composition

Principle

Composition, on one level, is simply about organising elements in space. We introduce you to The Rule of Thirds and demonstrate its usefulness and limitations. Once you have absorbed that basic construct we delve a bit deeper to understand how composition can also be a powerful story-telling tool.

Practice

When you are ready to move beyond the basics, you will learn how to analyse the different elements of a scene you want to compose into a photograph. This should include consideration of a hierarchy - separating important from ancillary elements; the relationship between colours and their significance; perspective and dominance. You can then choose what should go where in the picture according to the story you want to tell.

Optimal exposure

Principle

A well-exposed photo is like a sentence with good grammar and accurate vocabulary.  The viewer is able to make sense of an over or under-exposed image but the experience is much less enjoyable and it hinders their appreciation of the subject. Good exposure is a basic courtesy to the viewer.

Practice

Getting a good exposure isn’t very difficult but many inexperienced photographers struggle with knowing the best combination of settings in any given circumstances to get an optimal one.  Understanding the histogram lets you know if you’ve captured as much data as you can but knowing how far you can push the ISO, what the action-stopping speeds for different pixel-counts are and which is the best aperture for the look you are trying to achieve, are all vital skills too.  You will master exposure through a combination of practice, review and repetition.

Mastering your camera’s controls

Principle

In a world where we are over-burdened with choice and information, knowing what you don’t need to know is just as important as knowing what you do. We work out which of your camera’s functions you most need and concentrate on making your use of them intuitive.

practice

The old days of tossing aside your camera’s instruction manual are gone; if you don’t have it, come to the Retreat with an on-line version. As well as knowing how to operate the camera, we look at best practice for different subjects and approaches including how to get the sharpest photographs possible with the equipment you have.

Colour Transects

principle

There are two main ideas behind Colour Transect images.  Firstly, they draw the viewer’s attention to the diversity of colours present in a scene - often much greater than they imagine. Secondly, Colour Transects hold the viewer’s attention for longer than a “normal” photograph as they speculate where the colours have been sampled from. The approach puts colour to the fore rather than treating it as an incidental element.

practice

There are many ways of creating the square colour swatches which represent the colours in the image but we provide you with a Photoshop template to speed up the process. This also makes the technique accessible to those with little Photoshop experience.

Chocolate bar collages

Principle

Offer a hungry man - or woman - a single square of chocolate from a big bar and he is not going to be satisfied. You keep giving him small chunks but what he really needs is a big mouthful. It’s the same with the photographs of details many of us like making: they rarely impress by themselves. But presented en-masse, they are visually much more satisfying. 

Practice

The elements of these panels are shot in much the same way as if they were stand- alone images. You’ll need maximum depth of field so don’t shoot obliquely; use diffused light to render maximum detail; avoid references to scale, such as the horizon or edges, if you are after an abstract look. Indesign makes for the easiest layout but you can achieve the same look with Photoshop and Lightroom. Seek out subjects that tend to be overlooked but that are naturally varied. We also provide excellent templates to make the job a breeze.

Objectography

principle

The absence of context characterises “Objectography”: the subject (or inanimate object) is presented in isolation, the sole focus of the image. Its form becomes the composition. Subjects are photographed against a pure white, backlit background which shows their translucent qualities and adds depth that is lacking in regular cut-outs. These images acknowledge and celebrate individuality. This is the technique that underpins the world-wide Meet Your Neighbours Project.

Practice

The illuminated white background is positioned near opaque or dark subjects, at more of a distance from pale or translucent ones. The background is exposed as pure white with front fill provided by a second diffused flash. Since the background of these photographs is already pure white, they can be laid out seamlessly on the page without having to be cut out. Out of focus edges are therefore rendered naturally. Results from low-tech equipment are comparable to those from high end gear. Different tints can be applied to the background subsequently, as can retro. effects

Post production for mood

principle

Sometimes, a photograph shows what someone has seen without suggesting what they actually thought. When an objective representation is needed, that’s fine, but the pictures aren’t personal. If you’ve something more you want to tell the viewer, follow Ansel  Adam’s advice: regard the negative (or RAW image today) as a musical score for you to interpret into your own performance - the final print.

Practice

We will concentrate on interpretation at the post-production stage. “Effects” are chosen to create associations in the viewer’s mind and to guide them towards what you were thinking and feeling when you took the photo. Plug-in software packages with highly editable presets, such as Exposure, let you create nuanced images from within Lightroom. As well as the image itself, don’t under-estimate the influence a border can have on a picture: match one with the photo’s mood or story.

Word pictures

principle

Photographs can be read as well as simply looked at: “interpreted”, if you prefer. Unfortunately, relatively few people are schooled nowadays in reading pictures and so, often, miss the point as they concentrate on their appearance. By making words an integral part of the image, there is a better chance we will get our message across.

Practice

Niall will talk about two different approaches: one involves creating print material containing the message which we shoot on location (these are often spoof signs). The other uses typography in the creation of the final piece and is more in the realms of graphic art. Either way, your job will be most easily accomplished with Adobe Indesign or another desk- top publishing application, although Photoshop will allow you to do many of the same things.

Light painting

principle

Light painting involves illuminating the key parts of the scene with artificial light. On the one hand, this draws the viewer’s attention to particular features, but it also gives the photographer scope to create a more personal representation of that space. Without the limitations imposed by natural lighting, the photographer can create images in conditions that would send others home.

practice

Since it is usually better to  paint the subject from more than one side, wait until it is dark enough to allow an exposure longer than a minute to give yourself time to move round the subject.  A halogen or tungsten bulb gives a much warmer light than LEDs, which contrasts well with the rich blue sky that is rendered by a long exposure in the dark (and that’s enhanced if you shoot with a Daylight white balance). Switch off long exposure noise reduction to eliminate delays between exposures and use the eyepiece blind.

For all photographers

Digital workflow and asset management

Some photographers’ hard drives are the modern-day equivalent of a shoe-box full of transparencies jumbled together so they waste a lot of time searching for what they’re looking for. A good workflow allows you to make the most of your “digital assets” and satisfies two basic needs:

• you can easily find any image you need to locate;

• you can easily identify those images ready to be archived when you need to de-clutter your hard drive.

If you’re not happy with your current workflow, Niall can show you the simple and robust system he has used for the last 15 years, or help you to make your current strategy more efficient. Key-wording is at the heart of Niall’s method and he shows you how easy it is to take control of your collection with minimal time investment.

Essential lightroom and photoshop skills

Niall published his first book on digital imaging 20 years ago and has since acquired a wealth of knowledge in this field. But he hasn’t forgotten what it’s like to start off and how daunting these two applications in particular can seem at first. So, he helps you to identify what you want to do then shows you how to use the tools you need to realise the image you are after. Topics include editing, basic processing, sharpening, split toning, exporting, working with layers, adjustment layers, compositing, blending modes and preparation for printing. These alone could take up a whole week!

review, ideas, discussion and inspiration

A stack of photography books, some dating back 30 years, accompanies us on Retreat to provide both inspiration and context for our discussions about your work. We also host “consultations” for our guests in which everyone is allotted an “appointment” for 20 - 25 minutes when they have Niall’s undivided attention to discuss a particular photographic issue, idea or problem they have. At least twice during a Retreat we have a group review of two or three of everyone’s photographs, considering them from a technical, aesthetic and narrative perspective. This is all done on a 55'“ Ultra HD Sony AF8 OLED TV screen which allows guests to see their work in extraordinary detail.

Niall has an unparalleled reputation in the UK as a thoughtful and sometimes provocative writer about outdoor photography and a massive publication record over the last 30 years. The late editor of Outdoor Photography Magazine, Steve Watkins, wrote in the foreword to Niall’s last book,

“From humorous homemade road signs set up and photographed on location to poke serious fun at our overly safety conscious approach to risk in nature, to the colour transect images distilling tones in a scene into a palette resembling something you consult when buying household paint, Niall has consistently pushed the limits of what we perceive to be outdoor photography and how it can be used to communicate powerful and thought provoking messages.”

Baking

charlotte’s take on baking

More than simply comfort food, baking transforms a kitchen from a place of work to one of welcome. At home and on Retreat, Charlotte makes everything from bread to biscuits, macarons to muffins. And delicious cakes too. She will show you how successful gluten-free baking can be and introduce you to her own special creations, including the “cruffins” shown below, when croissant meets muffin to envelope delicious sweet or savoury fillings. Spend time browsing her baking books and see if there is something you fancy making with her.

Chocolate

Charlotte’s take on chocolate

Charlotte has trained professionally as a chocolatiere with Chocolate Master, Ruth Hinks, of Cocoa Blacks. She has won three coveted Great Taste Awards from the Guild of Fine Food for different chocolates in recent years. She will help you to master the art of tempering chocolate, show you how to make the perfect truffle ganache, create moulded chocolates and share great ideas about packaging and presentation. Everything you make you take home - if it’s not eaten before the end of the Retreat!

Vegetarian cooking

charlotte’s take on vegetarian cooking

Charlotte has achieved the near impossible: to convert her Scottish, vegetable-intolerant husband, Niall, into a flexitarian. She did this simply by cooking delicious, beautifully textured dishes without any meat in them. And when we serve these to our guests, they love them too. Charlotte will show you have to improvise with what you have in your fridge and store cupboard, how effectively meat can be substituted with lentils and sweet chestnuts, the discipline of mis-en-place and how to create a beautiful, colourful plate.