Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

Inspired by the masters of photography

Posted by Rebecca Raymond

For the Advanced Digital Photography class for Winter Term, we studied and were inspired by the masters of photography of the 20th Century, starting with Alfred Stieglitz and Edward Steichen. Two photographers were presented every week for six weeks, concluding with the use of color with Ernst Haas and Jay Maisel. It was great fun exploring these masters of light and expression.

Assignments were given to learn, emulate or be inspired by these historic and important photographers and their various photographic styles in order to inform our own photography. There is also much to be learned from photography you don’t care for, and why. The majority of class time was devoted to reviewing student’s photographs, adding comments make suggestions and discuss challenges. Constraints were also required in the assignments to get a feel for what it was like before the days of auto exposure and autofocus. Street photography can be also be rather challenging, but everyone rose to the task.

We had a number of interesting field trips, including a visit to Blue Moon Camera in St. John’s, given by Zeb Andrews, to examine and view through period film cameras, an Old Town/Steel Bridge visit, and a private lecture/tour at the Portland Art Museum by Dr. Julia Dolan of the Fotofolio exhibit, which featured many of the photographers we discussed.

Please enjoy a sampling of some of the fine photographs created by my students during this class! ~ Byron Will
Byron Will is a landscape and nature photographer based in Portland, OR. He has been teaching photography, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Lightroom for PCC since 2004. He currently teaches Digital Photography and Adobe Lightroom at the Hollywood Senior Center in NE Portland.

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