I’m the supported moderator for Melbourne Local Guides and a passionate photographer who loves to mentor and teach. One thing we all have in common is that we never stop learning.
The Problem
When looking at images on maps I often see some absolutely amazing images, but I also see a lot of mediocre and even poor images which reflect poorly on the location.
How do we improve?
To try and improve this situation I’ve borrowed a photowalk that I run annually in my Photograph Melbourne community called The “36” Walk. This year with the encouragement of the Google Local Guides Team I’ve transformed this into a global event with confirmed participation in Melbourne, San Francisco, Brisbane and New York and likely participation in Sydney, Perth and several other cities around the world but we need more to make this truly have an impact on maps.
The concept of The “36” Walk is to eliminate the snap happy from our photos or clicks as many call them and introduce a sense of worth and deliberation by limiting how many images you can make during the photowalk. Why 36? It comes from the most popular film size of 35mm which generally came with 36 shots per canister of film. Since limiting myself my quality ceiling has gone up with more images that I’m happy with each time I go out.
Seeking Leaders
What I’m looking for right now is more people to host walks around the world in your local location on or about April 23rd. Anyone who can attract a group of people and is willing to organise and run an event and report back about it here on Local Guides Connect and in your own communities is welcome to apply.
You can find out more more information about The “36” Walk in general and can register as a walk leader via this form.
Each walk will be able to nominate several images from their walk to be featured on The “36” Page 2017 collection.
Local Guides need you to make this global walk successful because we need more cities to be involved. It does not matter how small or large your group is, if you can get some people together then join in.
Walkers
When the time comes, each of the walks will be shared on Local Guides Connect as an event that you can sign up for. Additionally the walk leaders are likely to share the event on other platforms to gather a greater momentum and to introduce new people to the Local Guides phenomenon.
This is a 36 walk that I’ve run previously in Melbourne, Australia.
Love this idea @PaulPavlinovich ! I get very snap-happy when I take pictures so I think this type of meet-up would be good for me.
Those who host meet-ups for The “36” Walk should make sure to submit their event on our new meet-up site as well. Maybe you can add that as a note in your form
It is difficult @LuisRG but certainly worth having a go. I’m really looking forward to the walk. So far we’ve got Melbourne, San Francisco, New York and we look like having a bunch of others too.
Hi @YK1001 I don’t have anyone from your region as yet mate. I would love to have you take part.
I’ve run this event several times locally and most of the time people struggle to get to 36 because they start to overthink it. There is always someone who just snaps away and takes a few hundred and to be honest if that makes them happy and forcing them to stick to 36 would make them unhappy, I’d rather that they were happy and came on again on a future walk.
Hola @PaulPavlinovich , ya lo compartí con la Comunidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina y veré de compartirlo con la Comunidad de Tierra del Fuego, en esta deseo agregarme, espero que tenga entusiastas que deseen participar, la propuesta es muy divertida y motivadora.
Hi @ShafiulB thanks for asking what kind of camera can you use - the answer is any kind of device that can make images. What you use isn’t the important bit, it’s how you use it. Phone, digital camera, film camera, anything you like.
What a wonderful opportunity to do what I love to do and have fun doing it. I would definitely be interested in organizing in my location. Thanks for the tips and information. The difference between amateur and professional portraits can be vast.
Before the days of smartphones – if you can remember such a time – taking a great photo was a labor-intensive process. You’d have buy a fancy camera and editing software for your desktop computer, and invest some serious time and energy into learning how to use them.
But thanks to our mobile devices and the editing apps that come with them, we can now take high quality photos and edit them without too many bells and whistles – all from the same device that we use to make calls.
One of the easiest and best ways to improve your mobile photos is to turn on the camera’s gridlines. That superimposes a series of lines on the screen of your smartphone’s camera that are based on the “rule of thirds”
– a photographic composition principle that says an image should be broken down into thirds, both horizontally and vertically, so you have nine parts in total.
According to this theory, if you place points of interest in these intersections or along the lines, your photo will be more balanced, level, and allow viewers to interact with it more naturally.
hola @HelloJess , consulta es necesario cargar la Quedada de 33photo2017 en la plataforma de quedadas de Connect para cada una de nuestras zonas? o con que les mande la URL de la invitación alcanza, gracias.
Consulta @PaulPavlinovich , que opinas mejor crear, una Comunidad en vez de una Colección, para postear allí las fotos de los participantes de las distintas zonas. Considerando que las Colecciones son cerradas y solo puede aportar el creador y las Comunidades pueden ser abiertas, de que cualquier participante puede participar y agregar las fotos.
