Beecher's Handouts >

Introduction >

You're photography will benefit if you do the following.

Take/make lots of photographs.

Use every learning pathway.

• Text, such as this book

• Visual, such as the photographs seen in newspapers, magazines, books, galleries, and museums.

• Experiential, such as doing assignments and projects

Reinforce your learning with visual notes (to be described).

Think about your type of intelligence.

The interests and career of a new student tell me something about how they'll learn in my class.

That may be a good starting point for your thinking as well.

For example, an opera singer may learn differently than an investment banker.

In addition to type of intelligence, think about your photographic personality and identity.

PATH is about the photographer—his or her photographic personality and identity—his or her way-of-working.

The Creative Energy Questionnaire asks you lots of questions about you and photography.

With PATH and the Creative Energy Questionnaire you'll find out who you are as a photographer.

Understand that you'll be confused at first.

You have a mastery of what you do.

It may be disconcerting to suddenly find yourself confused, especially if you haven't been a student for a long time.

You can't learn photography easily and quickly.

The landscape photographer, Philip-Lorca diCorcia, wrote, "Photography is the foreign language that everyone thinks they can speak."

Learning photography takes effort and time.

. . . as long as it isn't your best friend's wedding.

Make lots of mistakes, and learn from them.

Don't try to learn everything at once.

Limit your variables.