Description

Creative flower photography using macro and vintage lenses

Saturday 2nd May 2026 6am – 10am. Only 4 places available due to lens sharing.The cost of the workshop includes a lens mount for your camera and use of both versions of the helios lenses.

We will be working in rotation and when you are not using the vintage lenses you will be working with your own macro or telephoto lenses. There will be ample time during the workshop for you all to get a chance to use each lens.

After the workshop there will be a 1.5 hour Zoom session to discuss images and post processing.  The Zoom session will take place on Thursday 8th May at 7pm.

This workshop is a fantastic opportunity to hone your macro techniques for photographing spring flowers as well as a great opportunity to try out some old vintage lenses. We will be working with the following lenses:

Helios 44- 2

Helios 44 with a Petzval modification which gives an artistic swirly effect.

These are manual lenses which give a soft dreamy feel to your images.

An adaptor will be required to use these lenses which will be provided but I will need to know what camera make and model you are using at the time of booking. 

The workshop takes place in Captains Wood, Sudbourne and is timed to coincide with the bluebell display. We will be starting an hour after sunrise which should give us nice soft light and maybe some dew on the flowers which is always nice to work with.

Captains Wood is an ancient woodland full of rare plants. It has a superb mix of natural habitats supporting a wide range of wildlife, including fallow deer, barn owl and bats. There are some lovely areas of silver birch and coppiced hazel trees as well as a small pond which adds an extra dimension to the woodland scene. Captains Wood is most renowned for its fantastic display of bluebells in May which provide plenty of colourful photographic opportunities.

We will cover:

During the workshop will look at different aspects of creative flower photography getting up close with the bluebells and stichwort. We will look at depth of field, subject and background choice, we will practice shooting through elements to create blocks of colour and dreamy images with lots of bokeh.

During the zoom session we will look at post processing and how to get the best from our images.

The workshop includes:

A lens mount for using the Helios lenses and use of each Helios lens for part of the workshop.

Tuition with your macro or telephoto lens plus instruction and ideas for using the Hello lenses.

A full set of course notes sent via email before the workshop.

4 hours of tuition in Captains Wood plus an included (but optional) zoom session afterwards on Thursday 8th May at 7pm to look at everyones best images and discuss post processing techniques. I will send out a Zoom link with your workshop notes a few days before the session.

For this workshop you will need a macro or telephoto lens and a tripod. You may also want to bring waterproof trousers or a piece of sheeting or a mat to put on the ground to lay on for taking your flowers shots.