Episode 21 – Rick Ferro and Wedding Photography
Rick Ferro is an author, international speaker, and a certified PPA Master Craftsman photographer. He has had a number of important projects during his career. For 40 years, he has been one of the leading wedding photographers in the nation. His career includes highlights such as commissioning the development of the wedding photography department for Walt Disney Corporation in Orlando, 7up, Sprint, Miami Dolphins, and many more.
Today Mike and Rick sit down to talk about some of the workshops that Rick leads. The topics for his hands-on workshops include lighting, posing, and many other aspects of photography. He emphasizes that his class sizes are small and that this is done on purpose. He notes that when you limit the number to around 15 people, it ensures that Rick can help each individual with the questions that they may have or the things they may want to learn.
Mike notes that Rick actually asks for the participants to tell him what they are looking to learn from the course, and he tailors the lessons to the specific group for their workshop. Rick responds by encouraging any of the participants to “send me your wishlist” because he wants to make sure you get out what you want and paid for from the course.
For the lighting course that Rick is leading in Alpharetta, GA April 9th, 2019, Mike mentions that since the course is so long, Rick has an opportunity to teach students about lighting even in the worst natural lighting time of day: midday.
Rick then mentions that it isn’t just lighting that can make or break the picture. He says that posing is also a very important part of portraits, especially in the wedding photography industry. The workshop will also go into posing for weddings and how to effectively pose your subject within minutes to increase your accuracy and quality for wedding photography.
Rick finishes his talk of the workshop by mentioning the talented models that have been selected to model for the class. He notes that the models are going to be wonderful subjects for the photography students to take amazing shots throughout the course. He also notes that he will be shooting right there with the photography students, which is not always the case in photography workshops. Rick remembers instructors who only let the students watch them shoot.
Mike talks about how the workshop begins at a studio in Alpharetta but moves to a church in the nearby area. Rick explains that he has never been to the church before so the purpose of this is to teach about how to properly meter and use ISO for shooting in both outdoor scenes and indoor scenes. He says that he is not always shooting inside churches or outside under direct sunlight. He often has to work in low light situations, so he wants to make sure that the students understand how to properly use ISO settings on their camera.
After learning how to set up the camera, Rick then leads the class into posing and how to quickly pose family members for quick photos so as to utilize the ever-changing lighting setup in the scene.
Rick also discusses how he will be letting students use some of his lenses (if their cameras are compatible) for certain impact shots. He notes that he wants to teach as much of his process as he can to help students improve their skills in the photography field.
To conclude, Rick emphasizes again that if you have any questions or if you are attending and wish for him to discuss a certain topic, don’t hesitate to email him about it. He is happy to talk with you about anything that you may need to discuss! His email is rick@rickferro.com
You can find more information about his workshop here!
If you are interested in photography workshops around the world, go to our Fisheye Connect website!
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