Wildlife, Birds, Macro, Fieldcraft, Light Painting, Processsing
Wanna get new tips and tricks for your photography from top gurus?
Want to be inspired by 7 top professionals?
Want to improve your RAW and Focus Stack processing?
Want to do all this from the safety of your own home?
Discount WildBunch and Conference tickets available
Special on the day discounts on kit too!
Then here's our Spring WildBunch Shoot Like a Pro e-Conference!
Buy the recording for streaming anywhere in the world (free to delegates)
Friendly and Inspiring, a great kickstart to your post lockdown spring and summer
The low down...
COME AND BE #INSPIRED - In these tough times, photography is one of the best tonics for our mental health, so we have deliberately chosen inspiring photographer gurus who walk the walk and talk the talk. No matter where you live they will give you new and fresh ideas for your photography, inspiring you to get out and about with those cameras. We are platform independant so as well as Olympus gurus we have expertise from other systems as well, but for us it's all about the images! Plus don't forget the amazing David Grover giving live demos of the powerful Capture One too plus it's all recorded fir future streaming.
There is nothing like the feeling of a live conference, everyone has loved the last two as they have a very special atmosphere.
So the Shoot Like a Pro Spring e-Conference will be on Saturday 20th March 2021 from 8.30am GMT
Here's the main exciting bits:
Inspiring Professional Photographers - So we have brought 7 outstanding professionals to share their passion and vision with you, right from the comfort of your favourite armchair! They will share their knowledge, their favourite images, and will give you killer hints and tips that you can use for your own photography. So we have experts on bird photography, mammal photography and fieldcraft, light painting, macro focus stacking plus raw processing. Plus in our new inspiration slot we have a working pro to inspire you from a different genre of photography... the British Army.
Of course you get to ask questions after as well. As before @Wildmanrouse will be the joint host during all talks, asking questions and ensuring that you get max benefit from our gurus.
Online session - The conference will be hosted on the popular Zoom platform, with regular breaks during the day, so you will get all this wonderful knowledge without leaving the comfort of your home! Full instructions will be sent.
Network and chat - Via the Zoom Chat function you can message and chat to other photographers in complete safety.
Recording - The Conference will be recorded and will be available to all delegates for streaming for free via a FREE membership of the Wild Bunch platform. So no matter where you live in the world you can buy a recording of the conference so your photography can benefit too!
Discounts - Olympus UK have given us some great discounts on the EM1x, EM1 MK3, 40-150mm, 300nn f4 and a couple of binoculars as well. They are cheaper than the high street and exclusive to all registered conference attendees. Details will be sent in a special newsletter after the conference but suffice it to say that with the discount you can get cheaper kit and a conference ticket too so it's a win win. We are hoping for discounts from Capture One Pro and Park Cameras too. Watch this space!
WildBunch Discount Membership Packages - The conference is open to anyone to sign up and benefit. WildBunch members receive a special discount price for the day and if you wanna join in the fun we have a great membership / conference combo package for you too!
This awesome day will kick start your post lockdown photography!!
BUY YOUR TICKET HERE
For those that have been before and just wanna buy a ticket here are your links, otherwise read on and there is another link at the end!
Tickets are only £75 for the day's entertainment, great value for what you are gonna get and the skill of our speakers.
If you wanna join the WildBunch too then we have a special combo ticket priced at £130, that's a £20 discount.
Presenter Line-up
We have a superb line up of top professional photographers for you, curated by @Wildmanrouse. They have been chosen because they take jaw dropping images in their own genre and are good at communicating their way of thinking too. We do not choose photographers because they tick a box, we choose purely on the quality of their images and nothing else. All presentations will be based around the concept of showing inspiring images and analysing how they were taken, so you can take the techniques into your own photography. Alright check out this amazing line up!
Georgina Steytler
Georgina is an Australian wildlife photographer, specialising in native birdlife, who's incredible talent has become the talk of the conservation world. Andy has known her for years and has watched her grow into one of the most exciting yet humble bird photographers on the planet.
Georgina grew up on an orchard in Donnybrook, a small country town in Western Australia, where she developed a love of nature.
She is very ethics based and believes that as a nature photographer, she has the duty to do everything in her power to minimise our impact and help conserve our natural world. In this regard, her photographic philosophy can be summed up in these three words - Art, Conservation, Ethics.
Georgina became the first Australian woman to win a category (Invertebrates: Behaviour) in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year, the world's foremost nature photography competition, won the Best Portfolio in the Bird Photographer of the Year and Australian Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year (Portfolio Prize).
Her talk is entitled "How to turn common birds into the uncommonly beautiful, my top tips for artistic bird photography". She will show here amazing images taken on the Canon and Olympus systems.
Neil Mcintyre
Neil Mcintyre is a legend of British wildlife photography. The last time he presented for Andy at one of his conferences every image was greeted with awe by the crowd. Neil is based in the highlands of Scotland where he takes iconic images of his local wildlife.
Over the years he has won several awards in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition including the Eric Hoskings Award in two consecutive years, He has also been a category runner up and had a further four images highly commended. In the British Wildlife Photography Awards he won the portraits category with an image of a red deer stag, with a further 4 other images having been highly commended in that competition to date.
His thought process is a simple one, basically it’s his feel and vision of the things that he has seen in the wild. A single image which allows him to share these never to be repeated moments with others. He considers it a real privilege to call himself a wildlife photographer and feels duty bound to show our wildlife and wild places in the most compassionate and visually compelling way he can. There is no better feeling than having these magical moments; when you have that one to one encounter with a wild otter and it never even knew you were there, or standing on top of towering sea cliff looking out over a glistening sea with thousands of seabirds thronging around you. His talk will show some of his most iconic work and speak about the fieldcraft behind them.
Denis Smith
Denis is simply the most breathtaking light painter on the planet and an Olympus Visionary. His work is jaw dropping. He bought his first camera in 2009, and during the same year a huge life change saw him leave his home town of Auckland to make a new start in Adelaide, South Australia.The move away from Auckland and a high flying corporate life allowed Denis the time and space to deal with the depression, alcohol abuse and lifestyle that almost killed him.
Photography became the creative outlet that allowed him to replenish both mind and soul. Through his light painting workshops, Denis mentors beginner to advanced photographers and leads them into the night to create ethereal and mind blowing images. Denis believes photography should be inclusive and that we live in an incredible age where everyone, young and old, can create stunning images that spark joy and enthusiasm deep within. With an uncompromised openness about his own mental health issues, Denis brings art, nature and people together whilst influencing mental health acceptance and equanimity.
His presentation will cover the basics of light painting and move to exploring his own incredible work. Here the stories behind some of his most iconic images and get the inspiration to try light painting for yourself! It's gonna be mega!
Geraint Radford
Geraint is a professional wildlife macro photographer, Olympus Ambassador, tutor, an insect’s best friend, vegan and cake addict. Now that is an introduction!
All his subjects are photographed as and where they are found with no physical manipulation or harm. Geraint’s photographs have been used all over the world by clients such as the BBC, his work is featured in regular exhibitions and he has received highly commended awards in both 2016 and 2017 Outdoor Photographer of The Year’s “small world” category.
Geraint was chosen by Olympus to go to the Amazon and make a special video on the OMD E-M3, which is says was the experience of his life.
He is a master of macro and has spoken at every one of our online conferences as we rate his images as world class, plus he is a very inspiring guy to listen to.
His talk will look at the area of focus stacking, why to use it for macro and how to process the files in Photoshop. Perfect for any macro photographer out there, it will mainly focus on RAW focus stacking so will be applicable to all photographers.
The Inspiration Slot Guest Speaker
You can get inspiration from any great photographer no matter what their genre. So for this conference we are introducing a special new slot where we get an acclaimed professional photographer from a different genre to show their skills and amazing work. So welcome Warrant Officer Class 2 Jamie Peters, a full time professional photographer with the British Army... who is a very good wildlife photographer too.
Jamie Peters
WO2 Jamie Peters been an Army Photographer for the past 11 years. During that time he’s been to many places photographing the army including Afghanistan, Kenya, Nepal, Ukraine and Sierra Leone.
In that time he has been an instructor at the Defence School of Photography, Combat Camera Team Leader and is now the Chief Photographer for the NATO Allied Rapid Reaction Corps.
Jamie has won awards for his stills and videos in the past including the prestigious and fiercely competitive Army Photographer of the Year.
After a hard day photographing the Army he likes nothing more than to unwind by trying to photograph the wildlife that lives around him.
His talk will show some awesome Army pictures and talk about the skillset needed to work in such a pressured environment and produce professional quality results. He will then show some of his favourite wildlife images, showing how the skills for both genres are transferrable. Just like @Wildmanrouse he is a stalker at heart. You will treated to an amazing insight into the role of a working professional.
Capture One Specialist David Grover
David has been involved in the photographic industry for his whole career. Starting off at Hasselblad he moved to Capture One where has has been ever since. David Grover is now Business Development Manager and can be found most weeks delivering live Capture One Webinars or anytime on their YouTube Channel.
@Wildmanrouse - "In my view Capture One offers the best RAW conversion for Olympus files in terms of noise, simplicity and image quality. I have been a long term Capture One user throughout my career and it has been via David's amazing tutorials that I have learnt to use the product."
David is an excellent teacher and his session of 45 minutes will show several amazing edits of RAW images to show the power and simplicity of the software.
@Wildmanrouse
@Wildmanrouse (known as Andy Rouse on earth!) is a positive thinking, professional wildlife photographer and animal hugger who advocates the benefits of nature and photography for mental health and well being. Throughout 2020 he inspired countless thousands of people worldwide with his motivational social media posts, Youtube videos and ideas about working with local wildlife and dealing with his "down days".
He has won over 30 international awards for his photography, received the Cherry Kearton medal from the Royal Geographical Society for services to wildlife photography and supports conservation causes worldwide.
He shoots with the Olympus camera system and loves the amazing tech and super lightweight kit, which allows him to take world class imagery that inspires others to love nature and photography like he does.
Over the past year @Wildmanrouse has re-connected with the local wildlife that is around his rural home and this will form the basis of his talk. He will look at how he uses fieldcraft to get close to shy and elusive animals, when to stalk and look like a tree and when to use a hide. It's very much a general presentation on how to outwit species that are naturally suspicious and don't like us very much, using iconic images from his career throughout.
Day Plan
All presentations will be via the Zoom platform. You will need to install Zoom 5.0 on your laptop / computer...it's quick, seamless and free.
Don't worry if you are a bit challenged technically, we will send full instructions to you as we are very experienced now at running these events. So don't worry you are in good hands!
The presentations will be spread out during the day so there will be plenty of time for breaks in between. During all presentations you will have your video switched off and will be muted. At the end of each presentation you will be un-muted by the host and can switch your video's back on to say hi and ask any pressing questions. We will also have a CHAT function to allow you to all interact.
On your screen you will see the photographer speaking in a window, together with the host @Wildmanrouse and of course their amazing images shown full screen. @Wildmanrouse is there to ask questions where needed and to give more of a personal conversational feel to the event. As a professional photographer for over 20 years he knows what questions to ask to get those vital tips explained so that you can use them in your own photography.
It's easy and we will manage every aspect of it so don't worry, here's the rough running plan:
08.30 - Conference open
08.45 - Introduction and Welcome - Andy Rouse
09.00 - Session 1 - Georgina Steytler, Bird Photography
10.00 - Session 1 ends
10.10 - Session 2 - Denis Smith, Light painting
11.10 - Session 2 ends
11.20 - Session 3 - Geraint Radford, macro focus stack processing
12.20 - Session 3 ends, lunch
13.15 - Session 4 - Andy Rouse
14.15 - Session 4 ends
14.20 - Session 5 - David Grover
15.20 - Session 5 ends
15.25 - Neil McIntyre
16.25 - Session 6 ends
16.30 - Jamie Peters
17.30 - Session ends, @Wildmanrouse final bits and goodbyes!
17.45 - Conference ends!
As we are on Zoom expect us to over run!!!
Now this is the itinerary as it stands and things change, so a few days before the event we will contact everyone with final details including the final agenda, which is different from the Final Countdown (cue 80's rock anthem and dodgy perm).
Conservation Donation
We know that you are all decent people and so we wanted the natural world to benefit from our e-Conference. So we chose our beneficiary as the UK Little Owl Project as it's a superb cause.
Run passionately by Dr Emily Joachim, the project carries out both in the field conservation work and advice on Little Owl conservation as well as working with other species like barn owls too. She puts up many nest boxes every season for land owners and is a real champion for the Little Owl in the UK.
We will be donating £5 from every delegate to the UK Little Owl Project as both Olympus UK, Andy Rouse and all his presenting team are dedicated to preserving the natural world.
The WildBunch
So what is the WildBunch? Simply it's a modern and fun online community for like minded photographers. We've premium content videos from @wildmanrouse, inspiring talks on our monthly online club nights and fun challenges with stunning galleries to display the results. We are a friendly bunch, the club nights have a great atmosphere and the galleries get so much support from our members.
Click the link here for more info but remember that you can purchase a discounted membership and conference ticket below1
BUY YOUR TICKET HERE
So you wanna come? Great!! We will inspire you.
Tickets are only £75 for the day's entertainment, great value for what you are gonna get and the skill of our speakers.
If you wanna join the WildBunch too then we have a special combo ticket priced at £130, that's a £20 discount.
Q&A
Here are the answers to the most frequent questions that we expect you to ask, if you have anything else just click here to contact us.
Q. How can I ask a question if we are all muted?
A. Ah that's why the CHAT function is there on Zoom. It's the Zoom equivalent of a messaging system
It will be disabled during the presentations but at all other times it will be enabled so you can ask questions. Andy will be monitoring this and when he sees a question he will find whoever asked it on his display and un-Mute you so that you can ask it in person and get a response. It's VITAL that we do this as otherwise Zoom meetings can descend into chaos!!
Q. Will the sessions be recorded?
A. The sessions will be recorded and available to stream to all registered delegates a week after the conference. Please note that only the presenter sessions and the Community session will be recorded, no user images or names will appear in the recordings to protect your intellectual rights. Personal recording is strictly forbidden, as is distribution of the videos of the presentations.
Q. If I can't attend can I purchase the recording?
A. Yes you can. Once the delegates have their copies (see above) the recording will be available for purchase to anyone who did not attend and will be streamed via a free membership of the Wild Bunch platform.
Q. Do I need a good broadband connection?
A. If you can watch videos on YouTube or the web then your internet is well good enough for Zoom. We will not be showing movies as in our experience this does cause broadband issues. Before signing up to this event please ensure that you have a broadband connection as specified, we are not able to give refunds for any poor connection issues during the day. If your web drops out during a session or something comes up then don't worry, you will be able to sign back into the next session and will of course have the movie to catchup on.
Q. Can I access from my smartphone?
A. Of course but we don't recommend it. To get the full experience and see the images in all their glory you ideally need a laptop or better still connect the laptop to your TV! So please don't access the session by phone if you want the best experience.
Q. How safe and secure am I during the conference?
A. Your online security is of vital importance to us. All delegates will be required to authenticate their email address to Zoom before joining this conference. We will use a waiting room before entry. Our meeting address and password will be secret and only shared with registered delegates. During presentations all videos will be switched off and so will audio. When video is enabled before / after the session, our moderators will be monitoring all feeds and any inappropriate behaviour or language that they see will result in immediate removal of the user. So you will be as safe as we can make it.
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