On Thursday evening, April 13th, Flagpole Photographers Camera Club member Charlie Batchelder presented a program on “Traditional Still Life Photography.” Charlie has established himself as a terrific award winning “Still Life” photographer and drew a large crowd of both club members and guests to hear about his passion for this type of photography.
He began the evening with an educational presentation on how he defines “Traditional Still Life Photography” and how artists from the 17th century have influenced this style of photography. The definition he provided was, “Traditional still life photography is the art of photographing one or more groups of distinct, inanimate, still objects, intentionally chosen and carefully arranged by the photographer, for the purpose of artistic expression.”
Charlie followed that with a discussion of the steps he uses to create the photograph, including choosing the objects fitting a theme or mood, choosing a foreground and background, arranging the objects, adjusting groups for the best composition, arranging the lighting, and then checking that composition of the image in camera. He then went into a discussion of taking a series of photographs where the focus point incrementally moved deeper into the scene so they could be post-processed and focus stacked giving a sharpness that went throughout the image.
Following a question and answer period, attendees were encouraged to use their cameras and try out this form of photography using a wide variety of elaborate stations set up around the room. Charlie truly inspired his audience to give this art form a try not only that evening, but once they got home with other objects as well.
To see and hear Charlie’s presentation on YouTube Click Here.
