Wildlife Photography Class at Dungeness River Nature Center For BirdFest 2025

I was asked by the Dungeness River Nature Center to prepare & present an all day seminar on wildlife photography. Of course I said yes, and went to work on a complete overhaul of the PowerPoint photography class curriculum that I use in my ongoing one-on-one wildlife classes. For 14 people I had to make sure I had it structured as a script, as opposed to my more casual individual student-teacher free-wheeling style of teaching.

It was an incredibly difficult task, as I just tossed what I had prior, and started at ground zero, assuming my students never held a camera before, and put into words and examples everything they needed to know, from camera settings, photographic principles, the exposure triangle, color spaces, how to edit, and then finally a few pages of resources for follow-up continuing education.

And the ever important slide covering ethics in bird photography, to make sure I am encouraging conservation and respect for our wildlife. I want to thank my friend Michele Deo for spending an entire afternoon helping me with organizing my PowerPoint slide deck, as I bounced the class off of her. She was a former student of mine, and a friend now of course! What a life saver!

This was a volunteer project, but as I always find, just like the photography work I do for the Sequim Irrigation Festival and the United Way, there is always some rewarding aspect. In this case it was the catalyst to expand on my photography knowledge, to be an even better teacher, with even more science than before. I learned so much, and created so many slides I had to trim much of it back to fit it into our class time slot, and even so, I gave them an extra free 40 minutes to be sure I gave them all the critical info.

Want to be be really good at something? Write a class about it!! The fear of being incorrect, or ignorant, is a great driving force to want to "know it all"!

Just like when I do the individual classes here in our studios, the best way to learn is hands on drills, where I request one of the settings in the camera and they have to adjust the other two sides of the exposure triangle to get the picture correct. Here are some photo of the class at Carrie Blake Park in Sequim, doing the drills. kindly taken by Jennifer Waters-White, the Communications Coordinator for the Dungeness River Nature Center.

If you are interested in taking my class go to https://www.keithsframeofmind.com/wildlife-photography-class

The Olympic BirdFest is a partnership of the Olympic Peninsula Audubon Society, Dungeness River Nature Center and Jamestown S'Klallam Tribe. Proceeds from this festival help support the educational programs of the Dungeness River Nature Center. Thanks to all of them for all they do for our community!

📸 Keith Ross | Keith’s Frame of Mind

Capturing wildlife, nature, and the world through my lens and my art

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