My GPP-PHOTOFRIDAY | Experience 2013

It’s been more than a week now since GPP opened up for its GPP week 2013. I know this was a late run but I was hooked up in watching several TV series that I lost track of time and have left off caressing the keyboard of my laptop. Then it came to my senses that I have to cut my TV series addiction and focus again on the one thing I love which is Photography!

GPP kicked off with its “PHOTOFRIDAY” event last March 1, 2013 with their line-up of mini-workshops. I was thrilled to participate once again, but this time I had the privilege to learn for free and it was all because of HIPA (Hamdan International Photography Award). Days before the opening of GPP, HIPA had given 4 PhotoFriday tickets through a contest on a social network and I was luckily chosen as one of the winners. A big THANK YOU!!!

So my friend and I went early for the registration to secure our seats for our choice of workshop. Upon entering the venue I just found it odd that there were less people than I have expected. I immediately thought that there was less hype from the crowd compared to the previous GPP Week where people are swarming the registration as early as 8:30 in the morning. I told myself that it might still be early to say and people might come in just a tad late.

Session 1 - Picture Perfect: Portrait and Beauty Retouching by LINDSAY ADLER

Lindsay Adler at the podium

Two years ago, I took up a crash course in one photography organization for portrait and fashion photography. I have been into this since then that I was very interested what Lindsay Adler has to share to the participants. Lindsay Adler is one of the newest additions to the list of GPP Pro-photographers that caught my attention. She is young vibrant NYC photographers that have worked her way up to the fashion industry, which I know is very hard to break in. I find Lindsay a persistent person in which her persistency had propelled her career in the fashion world.

Session 2 – PANEL | Social Media Essentials for Photographers by David Hobby, Zack Arias, Lindsay Adler and Yumna

David, Lindsay, Yumna and Zack at the panel

This is my second time to take this course and I am proud to say that it was my eye-opener to make my own blog (which you are now reading). In this year’s class, it was David “Strobist” Hobby who was retained from the panel along with Zack Arias and the newcomers Lindsay Adler and Yumna. The workshop was still as informative as it was last year adding to it the personal experiences of the photographers themselves that pumped some more motivations to us participants.

Session 3 – Fabulous Faces: A guide to better portraits by Bobbi Lane

Bobbi Lane in action

I missed last year’s class of Ms. Bobbi Lane so I told myself that I will not skip it this time around. The class was held in the auditorium where you can immediately see the studio set-up they made on the stage. The lecture was all about practical application of studio strobe lights into a subject for a portrait photo. It was nice to see Ms. Lane in action, from using different light set-ups, using of light modifiers and communicating with the subject (which is the most important). Good thing is that I have technical knowledge about studio strobes and I can apply some of the things she shared to us.

Session 4 – A philosophy of light by Greg Heisler

Greg doing stand-up comedy

At first I only knew Mr. Greg Heisler when he won last year’s GPP week 2012 shootout until I saw an interview of him explaining how he photographed Michael Phelps. I’m a big fan of Michael Phelps and the photo he produced for Time Magazine was really amazing! The guy is a natural stand-up comedian and there were no dull moments during his presentation, he cracked up jokes starting from being hired by Playboy during his younger years and up until he photographed celebrities like Tommy Lee Jones. It was fascinating to hear the Heisler history knowing that he was lighting his subjects before the CLS of Nikon was invented. It was learning the old school way!!!

Wrap Up

However, I do have a couple of things that I noticed, comparing the previous year’s and this year’s event. First, there were fewer participants. Last year (2012), I remembered there were participants coming all the way from Abu Dhabi and the place was so jam-packed, I even had to scramble my way just to get some lunch in the food court. Also, I found that there was less “booths” than previous, especially I haven’t seen Nikon, BlackRapid and printing booths. Was wondering what happened that these guys weren’t there?

David Nightingale

By the way, we (and I mean me and some photography enthusiasts) miss Joey L, Luis Pang, David Tejada and Manny Librodo. I hope they could be part of the next GPP, as they have imparted a lot of knowledge from the previous years.

To sum it all up, it was a whole day of fun and information-overload! It was a day well-spent with photography enthusiasts alike.

Mr. Joe "Numnuts" Mcnally, David "Strobist" Hobby, Zack "One Light" Arias and Greg Heisler

Again, my big thanks to the GPP Team lead by Mr. Mohammed Somji. Also to HIPA and most of all, thank you to all the pro-photographers who have shared their knowledge to us, it means a lot! 

Thanks for your time... 

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