Are you keen on photographing animals? Are you planning a wildlife safari in Africa, or to explore exotic destinations like the Galapagos Archipelago, the Amazon jungle, Antarctica … to name just a few? Or perhaps you would like to capture dramatic and amusing portraits of animals in your local zoo or wildlife reserve. If you answer is yes to any of the above, then this is the course for you.

Your tutor, Nic van Oudtshoorn ARPS, is an experienced and multi-award-winning wildlife photographer and film maker and a qualified trainer. Spend the morning at the college learning all major aspects of wildlife photography, with particular emphasis on capturing wild portraits. The course covers cameras and lenses, as well as camera supports, lighting, and many other useful accessories. Students also spend time editing wildlife photos on their computers.

Late morning we car-share to Symbio Wildlife Park in Helensburgh to spend the rest of the day putting the theory into practice, learning how to capture portraits of many different animals in both colour and black-and-white. We explore many wildlife photography techniques, including point of view, framing, lighting for portraiture, focus and depth of field, fill-in flash and (most importantly) composition.

Symbio animals include red pandas, monkeys, Little Penguins, meerkats, ring-tailed lemurs, koala, cheetah, a variety of kangaroos, as well as reptiles such as snakes, lizards and frogs. Students also learn the importance of respecting the animals' boundaries and minimizing disturbance while still capturing their essence and personality through the lens.

Please note: Symbio Wildlife Park admission fee is $44 online or $47 at the door and is payable by students to enter the park. This fee is NOT included in the course fee. There are also concession prices – for details go to https://symbiowildlife.com.au/prices/

Course Outline:

• Explore equipment needed for wildlife photography.
• Learn how to handle your camera to capture wildlife and animal portraits.
• Choose correct camera settings for wildlife portraiture.
• Explore different angles for portraiture.
• Explore using different lighting techniques.
• Practice using fill-in flash to reduce contrast.
• Select focus points and determine best depth of field.
• Evaluate different compositional techniques and apply them to portraits

Learning Outcomes:

At the end of this course, you will know how to:

• Set up your camera menu for portraiture.
• Move away from Auto and use advanced camera settings.
• Be able to use different lenses and other attachments to capture animal portraits.
• Understand and apply depth of field.
• Understand colour temperatures and white balance and apply appropriate settings.
• Use fill-in flash.
• Use a tripod or monopod.
• Apply principles of composition, including Rule of Thirds.
• Explore difference between colour and black-and-white for portraiture.
• Understand basic photo editing principles and techniques.

What to bring:

• Students need to bring their own laptops with either Photoshop or Lightroom loaded, if you do not have the programs you can download it 1 week free trial version from www.adobe.com (You need to do this less than a week before the course starting date.)
• Mirrorless or DSLR Camera (fixed lens cameras with a zoom function can also be used.)
• Tripod (optional but recommended)
• Any lenses you own
• Flash (optional but recommended)
• Camera Manual
• Fully charged batteries
• Writing materials, paper, etc
• Own lunch or purchase lunch at Symbio.

About the Tutor:

'Nic van Oudtshoorn is a multi-award-winning photographer, including the 2024 Abstract Photographer of the Year in the professional category of the prestigious international ReFocus World Photo Annual competition. Photographers from over 60 countries took part. He also won a “Highly Commended” award in the professional wildlife section of the same competition.

Nic has been a photojournalist and documentary film maker for more than 40 years, specialising in close-up and macro, as well as black-and-white and wildlife photography.
Nic’s photos have appeared in books, calendars, newspapers and magazines (including Time and Reader’s Digest) around the world. His photographic excellence has earned him the distinction of Associate of the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain, the oldest and one of the most prestigious such organisations in the world.
His footage has been seen on TV around the world, including National Geographic and Discovery channels. He has won numerous international awards for his photographs, both colour and black-and-white.

Nic is a qualified instructor with a Master’s degree from Sydney University and enjoys training photographers at local colleges and online. He is the author of 14 books, including The Photographer’s Guide to Close-up, Macro and Focus Stacking, available from Amazon as a paperback, as well as a Kindle edition.'

Other Information:

• To ensure resources are ready for you at the start of your course, we ask you ideally enrol at least one week before the course commences.
• All courses need a minimum number of students to run ("we try our hardest to get those") . If your course does not have enough students it will be cancelled before the commencement and you will be informed.