I’ve had a few people ask me what I mean by “photo flow.” Let me start by sharing what Photo Flow is not: A one-size fits all workflow solution.
Workflow is a term that is used by many when describing working with your photos. On the professional photography circuit you can find class after class of photographers sharing their personal photo workflow.
Workflow involves software, it involves steps and process (star ratings, keywords, etc.) and often a “best practice” idea of what works. Students learn this workflow and then go home and apply it step by step in their workflow with a few tweaks.
While Photo Flow does involve some of these things (i.e. you can choose to use star ratings & keywords in your photo flow), it is very different. There is no "best practice" involved in Finding Photo Flow.
Finding Photo Flow is kicking things up a notch to work on a higher level. It's more about how you feel about your workflow. It’s about looking at a bucket full of blocks, each block representing a step you could choose to add to your workflow, but don’t necessarily have to. It's about creativity. It’s about being engaged, happy and excited to work with your photos and building a process for yourself that supports that.
Most photo organization classes focus on how many photos you can keyword, rate, and print during class. While the end goal of Finding Photo Flow is to help you process images and create amazing results, the four weeks in this class are about thinking, inspiring and creating an amazing workflow that will last long after the initial excitement fades.
After teaching photo organization for years, the one thing that gets to me is students who have followed my work all this time and write to me again and again saying, “This is it. I know what I need to do. This time it is going to stick and I’ll get caught up with my photos.”
Finding Photo Flow came out of my thoughts of how to help students find something that "sticks." In my own life there have been times when I have tried to adopt something someone else was doing because it looked amazing, and yet I never could keep it up for the long haul. The lesson I learned from that was this: When you try to do something over and over again and it doesn’t stick, the reality is you just haven’t yet found flow.
Finding Photo Flow is about looking at your time, the current season of your life and then creating photo flow that supports that. It’s about letting go and enjoying. It doesn't matter if your workflow is highly complex or completely simplified, what matters most is that it engages you and supports your creativity.
Finding Photo Flow is about taking the time to absorb different ways of doing things in your workflow. I want you to think about what is working now with your photos and creating a simple system that is sustainable. A process that doesn’t overwhelm and at the same time gives you what you want from your photo library.
Quite simply, Finding Photo Flow is about finding joy in your photo library. It's about inspiring creativity.
I hope to see you in the classroom! You can learn more about Finding Photo Flow here.
Hi Kayla, I tried clicking on the learn more link, but wanted you to know it says it's broken. I would love to get the details of this class. Thanks!
Posted by: Amy Kalscheur | 02 October 2011 at 03:21 AM
Thank you so much Amy! They are fixed now. I so appreciate you taking the time to let me know!
Posted by: Kayla Lamoreaux | 02 October 2011 at 10:22 AM