Roots Workshop blog

You could win this:

Yes, this is a joke trophy, but its 2009 recipient takes her win very seriously. Earlier today, I presented photographer Audra Bayette with this handsome trophy (kindly made by Ray Messier at Creative Awards in Scarborough) from our goofy Chubby Bunny contest at Roots Workshop last July. It started as a spontaneous game in 2008 on the last night of our workshop with leftover marshmallows from s’mores (workshop staffer Jenn Domenick’s husband Ethan took the crown then) and, well, I guess with the implementation of a trophy you could say it’s now a tradition. Audra hopes to defend her own title when she returns for her second summer at Roots this July. I hear she’s been practicing.

Who wouldn’t want a trophy with a camera on it, anyway?

Think you’re up for the challenge? We are sold out for 2010 with a waiting list, and have already started a list for when we open Roots 2011 registration next fall as well!!

ps- Congrats on your recent engagement, Audra! So happy for you and Matt! I know a really cool place you could get married on Cape Cod this summer…

Meet the Roots Workshop class of 2010! Registration forms are in and this is our official list!

1. Emily Sterne Emily Sterne Photography Cambridge, MA

2. Amanda Herzberger Orchard Cove Photography Windsor, CT

3. Erica Pelaccia Erica Leighton Pelaccia Marblehead, MA

4. Audra Bayette** Audra Bayette, Photographer Scarborough, ME

5. Amie Otto Amie Otto Photography Ashburn, VA

6. Allison Britton A Britton Photography Woodbridge, VA

7. Robin Shetler Robin Shetler Photography Decatur, GA

8. Melissa Coe Melissa Coe Photography Danvers, MA

9. Whitney J Fox emilie inc. associates Portland, ME

10. Neysa Ruhl* Neysa Ruhl Photography Cincinnati, OH

11. Ian Riley Ian Riley Photography Arden, NC

12. Elisha Tablada Love Life Images Columbia, MD

* denotes Roots 2008 alum

** denotes Roots 2009 alum

Well folks, with just three days of open registration, Roots Workshop 2010 is sold out!! How exciting is that!?!? I am absolutely thrilled to spend the winter cooking up some excellent assignments and not stressing about enrollment. Weehoo!

I realize there were some photographers who were on the fence about signing up and have thus missed out. If that’s you, please be sure to email me as we will have a waiting list in the event extra seats be added.

I have received a flurry of excited emails today asking the procedure for tomorrow’s registration process. This is how it will happen:

1. Registration officially opens at 9a (EST).

2. Email info@rootsworkshop.com to let us know that you want in!

3. I will send you a confirmation email, acknowledging that you are one of the 12 students who made the cut. Attached will be a simple registration form.

4. Return the registration form with a deposit of $1500 to PO Box 2703, South Portland, ME 04116.

5. Registration will close just as soon as the seats are filled tomorrow or by Monday, September 21st. Should there be any remaining seats, we will announce a second registration round before the end of the year.

Flexible payment options available. Please inquire for details.

Thank goodness for liveBooks! Our workshop website was generously donated by liveBooks and serves as our information hub for interested photographers to learn about the experience in greater depth including not just photographs but video as well. I trust liveBooks with my business website and, well, my life. liveBooks employee J Sandifer is my husband. J attended Roots as a student last year and produced an impressive picture story on a lighthouse in Provincetown. He returned in 2009 as a staff volunteer, keeping everyone well fed. We’re all so grateful for liveBooks’ involvement and support. Thank you!

Business: liveBooks
Location: San Francisco, CA
Business description: liveBooks professional website packages offer easy to manage, time-saving website solutions that set you apart from the crowd and greatly enhance your ability to do business through your website. Developed by photographers for photographers and based on input from thousands of creative professionals, liveBooks has created a product that delivers the features needed to create a web platform that meets both the short and long term needs of your business. From unique page layout to innovative interactive content, liveBooks can super-charge your marketing efforts.

Favorite Cape Cod memory: My favorite memory of Cape Cod was a sunrise at the Race Point Lighthouse for my assignment in 2008.  As a student, I spent the night at the lighthouse to get a feel of the place at all hours.  I rarely rise early enough to see the sun rise, but this was a great opportunity to do something out of the ordinary.  The quietness of the morning dew and the stillness of the air set the tone for me to make some terrific images that day!

Why you got involved: I got involved originally to learn from some of the best photojournalists in the wedding world today.  Learning how to tell a picture story in the Cape Cod setting and in the Roots house was magical.  This year I returned as the staff cook and truly enjoyed being at the center of the house…the kitchen.  The mornings meant hearing about peoples’ days ahead and fueling them for the challenge.  While I got involved to learn how to take better pictures, I feel like I have learned even more from the students’ collective growth.

As originally posted on Audra’s blog. Audra, I must add, not only learned a tremendous amount but booked a wedding this fall on the Vineyard from a contact she made while shooting at her assignment! She also just returned from a daytrip to Four Seas yesterday. She hauled 25 quarts back to Maine to enjoy throughout the winter!

The similarities are endless….

For my sophomore year of college I studied abroad in France.  I was nervous about going, my time over there was challenging but rewarding, I met my best friend while living there, in the end I wasn’t sure about going home and, most importantly, it was an experience that influenced the rest of my life.

I didn’t know it – but going to Roots Workshop last week was exactly the same.

I was nervous about going, Matt actually contacted Emilie first and laid the groundwork for me to go.    The nerves kicked in when I got there as well.  I was surrounded by some REALLY talented photographers, leaders who had won Pulitzer Prizes and whose work I had admired and we were all going to live in the same house for a week!    But once the week started I was swept up in the awesomeness of the experience.

My time at Roots was challenging and rewarding.   I thought the workshop was simple – learn to take better pictures and tell a better story.  What I didn’t realize was that the workshop was about how to be a better photographer on all kinds of levels.  The most surprising part of the experience was how the physicality of my photography changed.  How I hold the camera, how I position my body, how I physically react to different situations has been changed.    How did that happen?  How did that come out of a workshop that is about taking pictures?  I blame the house.  When you live in the same house with 15 other photographers you can not help but learn and grow.  Seeing talented photographers in action, how they treat their gear, how they approach a topic, what they see when they look at the same scenario I do was INVALUABLE and not something you get in other workshops.

Don’t get me wrong – I definitely learned how to take better pictures and am forever indebted to Tyler, Jen and Mark for the patience they showed me.   They shared with me(and all of us) their passion, knowledge and patience.  And like any great teacher you had in Kindergarten I will still be gleaning wisdom from their teaching years from now.

I met lots of best friends while I was there.  All of the other brave souls who were willing to have their work critiqued ALOT I now count as close friends!

By Friday I wasn’t sure about going home.  I missed home, hadn’t slept in days,  missed Matt like crazy but I wasn’t sure about leaving.  When you experience something so personal and special you are afraid to pop the bubble.  I knew once I pulled out of the driveway what I had been surrounded by for a week would be gone – that my time at Roots ‘09 would be over and I wouldn’t be able to get it back.   I just didn’t want to leave but I had to.  I had to get to Hailey’s camp graduation and since permanently moving into the house with everyone wasn’t an option I followed the advice of some old British propaganda and told myself to “Keep Calm and Carry On”

I am hopeful by getting this far in my blog post that you know the experience changed my life.  I look at images differently now.  I don’t take pictures now  – I make pictures.  I look at my relationships with other photographers and people differently.  I understand my role better.  I know what it is like to be changed and influenced by great people and this was one of those times.

It seems crazy I have mentioned the assignment yet.  I think that is a testament to the workshop itself.  It wasn’t about what your assignment was although mine was full of awesomeness.  It was about something different, something I didn’t understand until I had experienced it.  Since Emilie said it so much better than I can, I will quote her directly:

“The assignments are simply an exercise to put the art of seeing into practice and, thus, become better visual storytellers.”

But so we are clear my assignment did ROCK!  I had Four Seas Ice Cream in Centerville, MA.  They are the third oldest ice cream shop in New England, which is significant and yet compared to how good their ice cream is they could be the third youngest ice cream shop in the country and it would still be a crazy hot spot for ice cream on the Cape!  I am not ashamed to say I ate a lot of ice cream, I ate it 3x a day for the 2 days I was shooting, I gained 2.5lbs last week and that was with RUNNING!  Can you imagine if I hadn’t run… I try not to.

The assignment had its pros (ice cream, happy kids) and its cons (small space, changing lighting conditions) but all the assignments did and if I had had my pick of assignments this would have been it.  I was so excited when Tyler gave it to me he thought he should take it back I just loved it that much.  Imagine my surprise at the end of day 1 when Tyler said “you don’t really have anything workable here”. How can that be when I love a place so much!!!   I will admit it was intimidating to hear that but I am thankful for his (and Jen and Mark’s) feedback, help and honesty.   I learned to so much and in the end I am super proud of my slideshow.  I am especially proud of this image that Tyler and I worked very hard for as night descended upon us the second day.

Our final night included a video presentation of everyone’s work. I love my slideshow but it wasn’t the best part.  The best part of the evening was having Tyler stand up there with me and knowing that Tyler, Jen and Mark were as proud of me, my growth and my slideshow as I was – that kind of moment is priceless.

As originally posted on Rob’s blog:

I am forever learning – I’m a complete nerd when it comes to photography – I soak up everything photo related and try to put it out simply to my fellow photographers on my Twitter stream. When it comes to new tricks such as the most efficient way to control your aperture and shutter at the same time, I’m the man. Nobody knows where it get it from, but they appreciate the geekdom I know my gear back to front, I can light pretty much anything, but when it came to trying to find a unique story in every wedding or a family portrait session I was honestly starting to become unstuck.

Earlier in the year my friend Shyla was featured in a video review of the Roots Workshop (yes that’s me in both shots) – a weeklong boot camp introduction in photojournalism to get a grasp of visual storytelling. Run by Emilie Sommer a professional photojournalist and wedding photographer extraordinaire from Portland, ME, the workshop gathers together an impressive talent pool of her PJ friends: Greg Gibson, Tyler Wirken, Rachel LaCour Niesen, Mark Adams and Jennifer Domenick (and not forgetting J Sandifer as head chef and Mr Eric Laurits as the resident workshop storyteller). Add just a handful of students to the mix and what you get is a rather impressive tutor/student ratio! I called Shyla and it didn’t take long for her to convince me to go.

The concept is this:
- Throw all of us together under the same roof of a lovely Cape Cod house for a week.
- Provide us with amazing food so we can just concentrate on the task at hand.
- Give us a thorough grounding in story telling and beat out the preconceived notions of what photojournalism really is.
- Assess our strengths and weaknesses and then give us a gruelling two day assignment that really, really tests us.
- Try to find a story and a way of telling it through beautiful images.
- Have your mentors come out, follow you around and kick your butt! Love it!
- Enjoy jumping off the dock after a tough day.
- At the end of each day sit us down in front of everyone, then image by image, dissect exactly what and why we were trying to do.
- Send us back out on a second day with a clearer sense of where we were going.
- At the end of it all relish the lobster bake and present your story to the whole house.

Well I think I made it sound incredibly easy, but as Emilie puts it: “it is most certainly not a fluff workshop. Students will work hard and be critiqued hard”. Yup, hard it was! Not being one that was ever good at easy, I relished the whole week.

My assignment was at a YMCA camp on the Cape with kids hanging literally from my cameras. Not having ‘camp’ back in England, the concept wasn’t entirely new to me but I didn’t really know what to expect. When I got there on the first day I walked up over the brow of a hill to a sea of colour and the immense noise of hundreds of kids and their camp counsellors. Then it hit me: how was I going to find a story in that? Then something else hit me: that was exactly why they sent me here! Not being able to carry any more gear than two cameras and a spare battery, the only thing I could concentrate on was the story.

Jennifer, Mark and Tyler provided critical feedback while I was either drenched from a full day of rain or knee deep in water trying to get action shots of the kids swimming in the lake. I came back from the first day feeling rather deflated, but after the first critique night with Tyler and Mark providing some pretty humorous ways of making me rethink my actions (complete with legendary quotes), I went forth into day two feeling energised and more purposeful. Taking all of the advice on board I was able to develop a simple story that showed the emotions of the kids and the counsellors, as both were as important as each other. At the end of it all I came away with a cohesive set of images that I delivered to everyone on the last evening.

I learned a huge amount, gained a much better sense of visual story telling and came away with a great bunch of new friends. Roots was the best workshop I have attended – the hardest work, but certainly the most ground covered in advancing my skills.

Every time I now shoot I’m constantly drawing on everything I learned – it helped me to see differently and find the story when one is not always obviously there.

All I can say is this: if you are in the business of telling stories through images, this workshop is an absolute must. Call Emilie now and book your spot for 2010 – I’m not kidding – this workshop will change the way that you think and shoot. Without reservation it is easily worth the money and the week away from your business. Listen to what we have to say peeps!

Roots Workshop is fortunate to have several fantastic sponsors, the online studio management software system ShootQ among them. In conjunction with News Wedding Photographers, ShootQ hooked up one lucky Roots student with a 6 month membership in a contest we hosted on our Facebook fan page.

On a personal note, I have been using ShootQ for nearly two years and seriously have no idea how my business ran without it. I am able to stay on top of my leads and track all correspondence with inquiring brides straight through to booking the gig! Not to mention, the program is chock-full of other valuable resources including calculating income, sending invoices, organizing vendor information and connecting me to other photographers. Rachel LaCour Niesen, partner of ShootQ and LaCour Photography, was on staff this year. Paired with Greg Gibson, Rachel was an invaluable asset to the experience for everyone and I cannot wait for her to return in 2010!

Let’s learn a little more about ShootQ and Roots from Rachel, shall we?

Business: ShootQ
Location: Atlanta, Ga.
Business description: ShootQ is a web-based studio management solution designed to liberate photographers from tedious administrative work so they can focus on what they enjoy – building their businesses, investing in their relationships and giving back to their communities. Developed by photographers for photographers, ShootQ increases profits by automating the clerical tasks and processes associated with running a business, including scheduling, invoicing, production, workflow, marketing and client interaction. Hire a virtual studio manager through ShootQ!

Favorite Cape Cod memory: My favorite memory is the magic of dusk on the Cape. The cool blue hue of the sky, combined with the salty sea smell and lyrical sounds of laughter on the porch set the scene for editing evenings. It’s an unforgettable experience that fuels creativity.

Why you got involved: I got involved because I hoped to share storytelling skills with fellow photographers, as well as learn from conversations that happen naturally around the dinner table. Living and working in the same house with so many talented, passionate photographers is an unparalleled learning experience!

Looking forward to Roots 2010!!

Thank you, Rachel, and the entire ShootQ team!!

Roots Workshop student testimonials 2009 from emilie sommer on Vimeo.

A huge thanks to Roots Workshop photographer Eric Laurits and emilie inc. multimedia producer Morgan Kirkham for putting together this testimonial video from a few of this year’s student interviews.

And also, without further ado, please mark your calendars for September 15th at 9a, and pass the word that Roots ‘10 registration will be open to accept students for next summer! That’s right, Roots returns to the Cape July 18-23rd for our third year!! Visit the newly redesigned workshop website for more information and please email me with any questions! Can’t wait!

Even if she had to be pulled out, emilie inc. designer Christina Wnek literally jumped right in to the Roots Workshop. With a background in graphic design, fine art photography and some weddings, Christina was the student with the least experience but the most to gain.

Christina was assigned to cover the Barnstable County’s Sheriff Youth Academy program, a summer school of sorts with a military slant for troubled and not so troubled youth. The first day was spent at the Fire Academy learning fire safety, and the second, at a ropes course. Having two different locations proved challenging, as unlike the other students, Christina was not able to return to the first day’s spot with a fresh perspective and suggestions from the critiques the night before. Christina rolled with it, like she does everything with such carefree flexibility, and impressed us all with her take.

Christina’s thoughts:
Upon returning from Roots I was speechless, unable to find the words to describe what an amazing experience it was for me and unable to describe what made Roots so special. Yet, I managed to talk more than ever about every little detail, the knowledge, all the people and the friendships I gained. Somehow, I think I managed to show my family and friends what a life changing experience I had without even trying. It was more than the place, the people, the education and the experience. Whoever said “this place is magical” could not have said it better. Roots left me with such a feeling of fullness and a hunger to learn that it was difficult to leave.

The best part of Roots was not only the one on one attention from the team leaders and mentors, but for me, being the least experienced photographer of the group, it was the patience and willingness to teach me even the most basic of concepts that I felt made the experience so unique and special. I often felt like I did not know as much as the other students, but I never felt that this was a problem, nor did I feel like I was looked down upon because of this. Instead, each team leader and mentor took extra time to help me understand, and the assignments were refocused to fit my needs.

Still I managed to take in and learn from what the more experienced photographers were being taught. The group critiques were key in making this happen. I was not prepared for the harsh reality of handing over my images in their entirety to the team leader. Going through each image in front of the whole group was intimidating, but it was during these critiques, both my own and the other student’s critiques, that I learned the most. These critiques were one of the hardest, but also one of the best parts of Roots. It was the things said late at night while we all desperately tried to stay awake and soak in all that was said, that will stay with me. Tyler’s voice still rings in my head when my camera is in hand…”snap to grid.”

I am so thankful that I was able to participate in Roots. I feel fortunate to have been taught and mentored by such talented and accomplished photographers and people. I would recommend this experience to anyone.

What an awesome recap from someone I truly adore and admire. I’ve loved Christina since the moment she stepped foot in my studio more than a year ago and have no idea how emilie inc functioned without her previously! I am so happy I had the chance to introduce her to the Roots staff, my core of industry friends who also receive the adoration status. Very proud of you, Christina!!

View her slideshow below and again, special thanks to sponsor Triple Scoop Music for the tune.

Roots Workshop: Christina Wnek at Barnstable County Youth Academy from emilie sommer on Vimeo.

And that wraps the student portfolio recaps! Many thanks again to the staff and students for sharing their thoughts and giving of themselves to such a rich, heartfelt learning experience. Christina said, Can we just stay there all year?! I so wish!