How do YOU learn best?

[craig]

Excellent thread. Learning for me has been taken on all levels. Currently I learn by visual only. I will look at a photo and say Aha! he used 4 lights as opposed to my 3 or what ever. These days I also have to see it then do it. Books are ok I guess, but I just do not retain the info that well.

More importantly I love your 3d portfolio. Why is there no colour in it?

Love & Bass

 

[jlykins]

For me it's a combination of all things. I started my love of photography when I was young just playing around with cameras. Nothing major usually just my mom's fully automatic 35mm and disposables. Then in highschool I took a class on photography and I learned how to use a fully manual 35mm and develop B&W myself. Today I read (a lot). I ALWAYS have a book checked out of the library on photography that I carry with me everywhere. I usually have three or four out at a time actually. I also follow several blogs of many well known photographers and instructors. I also watch any DVD's that I may have access to on photography(which usually isn't many). And last but deffinately not least is hands on. I take photos every week. Maybe not every day, and maybe not hundreds a week, but I do take at least one picture a week. Usually I am working on a technique that I read/heard about. I wish I had the time to devote to a photo program at a local college. I work full time plus shoot weddings, portraits, ect... Maybe when I hit the lotto.

 

[mrodgers]

Interesting thread because I find that 99.9% of all internet forum users, when coming across a subject or a word such as "aperture" will simply do the following:

click [new thread]

Subject: aperture

Body: "What the heck is this aperature thing?"
(note, aperture was deliberately misspelled by me to have the quote accurate )

When I am interested in something in today's internet age, the first thing I do is seek out a good forum. I tend to browse through at least the past years worth of posts reading everything I can find. I seem to always find an excellent forum whether it is my old Honda Nighthawk motorcycle, my newest Mazda vehicle, playing the guitar, flying RC airplanes, when I got into computer flight simming, when I was computer sim racing, and now photography.

The RC airplane stint I did for a while is a good example. Much like the "nikon or canon" questions here, the forums are littered with "what is a good beginner plane to start out with?" posts. I read and browsed the forum seeking out information and came across 3 of the most popular recommended beginner electric planes. I searched for threads about those particular aircraft and made my decision. I think my first post on the forum was along the lines of, "After reading so much around here about beginner airplanes, I ordered x plane and it arrived today! I just came back inside from my first ever flight and it was fantastic!"

There is so much information on the web, it is sometimes difficult to find the good stuff. But links posted on forums always provide great information. Any time someone posted a link on this forum, I saved it in my favorites to read at a later date. Stuff that I have read through, I created a little list and uploaded it to provide to others when I see someone asking beginner questions here. This list of links, I've probably read through 80% of them. I have a ton more still listed in my "photography" folder of my favorites at home.

I'm mostly an internet reader, but I want to pick up some of the books that are always recommended here. I'm not much of an internet purchaser though, and there isn't any decent book stores around me. The mall book stores are basically filled with fiction novels and are not a good place to find reference books.

So it's mostly reading good forums and internet sites for me. I read a lot here about dSLRs, but I don't have one so a lot of the information doesn't pertain to me. But when I see something someone posted such as in post processing or something else that I can do, I'll try it out with my camera/processing.

 

[RyanMTaylor]

Excellent thread. Learning for me has been taken on all levels. Currently I learn by visual only. I will look at a photo and say Aha! he used 4 lights as opposed to my 3 or what ever. These days I also have to see it then do it. Books are ok I guess, but I just do not retain the info that well.

More importantly I love your 3d portfolio. Why is there no colour in it?

Love & Bass

Thanks a lot! The way 3d works is that you have different elements that make up the whole, meaning that you play god ENTIRELY. So if you want color, you add it in. For this reason people specialize in different areas. I'm a modeler so I make the geometry.

General progression goes something like this:

modeling(make geometry)> texture it(the color), rig that model(setting it up for animation), animate it, light it, then render it(flatten 3d space to 2d space(this is the final output you see in the movie theater or in a video game)).

Thus we have people called modelers, texture artists, riggers, animators, lighters and sometimes someone who specializes with that rendering technology
A lot of times people overlap the areas and do more than one thing. I do this but not for the reel that I sent out to studios. Hope that clears up the b&w thing. Lengthy but it was the only way I knew how to explain it so you totally understood.

For the learning thing, I learn that way as well a lot of times.


mrodgers: Great info! Really helpful. Thanks for that compiled links list.

 

[Overread]

I can tell you how I am trying to learn, but I can't tell you how I learn until I have learnt. At least with regard to photography.
I find different things are often learnt best in different ways, though I would say I prefer a more hands on approach to reading or post event analaysis with regard to photography simply as a key element is light and light is very hard to describe meaningfully in a book. Good light, poor light, strong light, harsh light - mostly we can tell roughly when we are at the extremes, but that leaves a lot of grey areas which you have to deal with (unless you only shoot at the best times and never outside of them). Being in the field with someone who knows these things means that they are there to tell you (at least in their experience) what sort of light you are in.

However in the field learning is something that I have had very very (to no) experience of - so so far I have had to learn by reading (both books and online) and also talking (posting) to other photographers about both their work and mine. I have come a long way since I started, but I know there is still a long way to go till I am shooting as well as I want to be able to

 

[Josh66]

Hm,... I take notes but never read them.

The very act of writing them help you remember it better than if you had just read it then moved on. I guess if you read the book (or whatever material it is) aloud and then take notes that would help it stick even more... (Seeing it, saying it, and writing it)

 

[notelliot]

For me, mistakes. How boring and cliche, right?
When I started shooting, I was using 135 film, and wrote down EVERY detail I could. I recall, as excessive as it may be, noting how long and hard/strong/dark the shadows were on specific surfaces during the day. Same with the moon - this was before I grew a taste for strobes and taking control of the light.
Now, shooting digitally, the histogram is my best friend. I can't stress it enough to people that come to me for advice that the histogram is the bee's knees. (that's business, for those of you whom are not in fact hipsters )

 

[RyanMTaylor]

For me, mistakes. How boring and cliche, right?
When I started shooting, I was using 135 film, and wrote down EVERY detail I could. I recall, as excessive as it may be, noting how long and hard/strong/dark the shadows were on specific surfaces during the day. Same with the moon - this was before I grew a taste for strobes and taking control of the light.
Now, shooting digitally, the histogram is my best friend. I can't stress it enough to people that come to me for advice that the histogram is the bee's knees. (that's business, for those of you whom are not in fact hipsters )

I know how to use my histogram but what specifically do you look for? Sometimes I don't use it because if half my image is purposely all white then I'll get a histogram reading that doesn't look "correct".

 

[notelliot]

I know how to use my histogram but what specifically do you look for? Sometimes I don't use it because if half my image is purposely all white then I'll get a histogram reading that doesn't look "correct".

pretty simple really. depends on what my intended end result is.
for high-key, I push it to the right; low-key, I push to the left. when shooting available light, I try to keep it centered, with a left-hand bias.
there's really no such thing as a "correct" histogram, it's just a really detailed analysis of your exposure. if you look at the image on your screen, and feel that it's too bright, you can check the histogram, and pull back on your exposure with less guess work.
it provides you with information, not necessarily facts, if you know what I mean. and I imagine that some people use it in other ways, but from what I gather, a guide is all it is. (even a light meter works that way - gives you the "proper" exposure for a given scene, but that might not be what you're really going for..)

 

[RyanMTaylor]

pretty simple really. depends on what my intended end result is.
for high-key, I push it to the right; low-key, I push to the left. when shooting available light, I try to keep it centered, with a left-hand bias.
there's really no such thing as a "correct" histogram, it's just a really detailed analysis of your exposure. if you look at the image on your screen, and feel that it's too bright, you can check the histogram, and pull back on your exposure with less guess work.
it provides you with information, not necessarily facts, if you know what I mean. and I imagine that some people use it in other ways, but from what I gather, a guide is all it is. (even a light meter works that way - gives you the "proper" exposure for a given scene, but that might not be what you're really going for..)

That's really helpful. I totally know what you mean. Bryan Peterson touches a lot on what a "creatively correct" exposure is in Understanding Exposure. Thanks a lot.

 

[notelliot]

Not a problem

 

[Joves]

Im one of the learning by doing. While I am good at reading many things it doesnt equate to improving from it. I like to make mistakes or, supposed mistakes and, learning from them. Instructional videos and classrooms make me sleep.

 

[BeemerPhotography]

I learn by doing, trial & error. I learn best when I'm shown how to do something, instead of reading or told how to do something.

 

[RyanMTaylor]

Same here. If i had that at my disposal I would take full advantage of it.

 

[Silverado_13]

I learn best by observation and then trial and error. I have to see something being done and then try it out myself. But I won't stop trying it out until I've got the technique down. One example is welding. I just recently learned how to weld. I observed my boss welding one day and put on a mask and just watched. When he was done, I got a couple of scraps of sheetmetal and just practiced different techniques until I could do it consistently without burning through the metal. I played with amperages and feed speeds and spent about 3 hours on this one sheet of metal. I can now TIG weld flawlessly. Next up is MIG welding.

I try to learn at least one new thing or skill a day. But, since I am such an observant person I can get the theory pretty much nailed down but won't understand it completely until I've tried it myself.