John Paul Caponigro

The photography group in Traverse City, the Traverse Area Camera Club, hosted a seminar with John Paul Caponigro over the weekend. Walking into the seminar it was obvious they had their ducks in a row. Multiple vendors, a nice room and projection system, well thought out registration and great door prizes. They also had a good turnout, especially considering it had been almost 80 degrees the day before. It appeared to me that they had about 150 or so attendees.

They seminar itself was great. The speaker is a well known digital artist and the son of a famous photographer. He spent the morning talking about creativity and especially honed in on the process he uses. I was surprised by how much planning he does. What especially struck me was the amount of thought he puts into a photo shoot before he gets to the location. He showed an example from a trip to Antarctica. He had done a series of sketches showing possible compositions with icebergs, the water and mountains. Basically just line drawings, but definitely more planning than I'm wont to do.

After lunch, he talked about printing. He went over the steps he considered needful to get a proper print and especially emphasized the need for color calibration. After a short break, he spent the rest of the afternoon talking about his work and a little bit more on creativity.

All in all, an excellent seminar and I'm glad I went. While a little artsy for a camera club crowd, I learned a lot. I'll have to think about some of the pre-planning exercises he does and see if I can start incorporating some of them into my work. Kudos also to the Traverse City group who sponsored it.