Samy’s Camera Photo Camp Comes to Meltdown! Ages 9-17
In this 8-week class, students receive a digital point & shoot camera, a t-shirt, hat, and memory card, all to keep! Each class focuses on a different field of photography (e.g. Fashion, Food, Sports, Photojournalism) with a classroom component and a picture-taking portion. Students master a variety of concepts and techniques, like composition, perspective, framing, self-timer, macro, and much more. All equipment is provided (e.g. toys and tripods on Macro day, dress-up clothes and reflectors on Fashion day, jump ropes and basketballs to learn timing & panning on Sports day). The last class is a graduation event for students and families. Students show off what they’ve learned before receiving their diploma, camera, personalized photo book, and DVD. Next, students take a guided tour of the four-story flagship Samy’s store – visiting each department (rentals, video/film, cameras, pro lighting, medium format, and more) to get hands-on time with the equipment they’ve learned about in class.
Samy’s Camera Photo Camp teaches kids that photography can and does change the world. Photography enriches individual lives, while holding the power to transform world perception and history. Photographers alone record a sliver of time, while simultaneously molding the meaning and emotion his/her photo conveys. Samy’s Camera is delighted to share their singular love and knowledge of the art of photography with the next generation of photographers.
Samy’s Camera Photo Camp began in 2009 as a way to bring photography education to Los Angeles schools where arts programs have fallen prey to budget cuts. Two and half years later, Photo Camp has taught over three hundred students at nine different elementary schools across the Los Angeles area, from Eagle Rock to Marina del Rey.
Photo Camp is run by Samy’s Camera’s Deborah Cloyed and Mike Wood. Deborah has a decade+ experience as a commercial photographer, in addition to many years in sales and teaching at Samy’s Camera. Mike Wood runs the Apple Department at Samy’s Hollywood, and also considers Photo Camp his pride and joy.
The class meets on Wednesdays from 5:00pm to 6:00pm. The eight-week class starts April 25th, with graduation held on June 13th.
A $220 flat fee is all-inclusive (camera, too!). Register in person at Meltdown on Wednesdays April 11th and 18th from 5-6pm or contact Samy’s Camera at: photocamp@samys.com. For ages 9-17.
SPACE IS LIMITED. To secure a place in the class, you MUST pay in full, with 1) a signed registration form and 2) signed release form BEFORE April 18th.
This month in MANGA DOESN’T SUCK: Clamp’s CLOVER.
Hey there buddy. Yeah, you. Wait a minute. Come back here. I know what you’re thinking. I’m trying to sell the virtues of manga to superhero comic book readers, and I’ve just posted a cover image of a waifish girl with wings and saucer eyes that take up half her face. Run away, run away! How about I tell you that she’s the most dangerous government commodity in the world? But that’s all I can tell you, because like many layered narratives, CLOVER is best when you read it with very little prior knowledge of its inner workings.
It’s also a perfect example of why genre classifications in manga based on gender (and even American comics) completely baffle me. Shonen vs. shojo vs. superhero vs. “indie”… CLOVER is traditionally classified as a “shojo” (girl) comic. But what about this comic is inherently girly? Beyond the cover, it boasts mythological elements at home in great futuristic crossovers: a parliament of psychics, a fabled amusement park, cage-bound teleportation, baroque weapons that resemble birds’ wings. Of course, it runs on the theme of love alongside its violence, but love does not have to be for women alone. I refuse to believe that Rogue and Gambit kissed just before the apocalpyse purely to satisfy female fans.
Here’s the thing about CLOVER: it’s a story told out of sequence. A great comic writer named Neil Gaiman once said that regardless of what order you tell the events in, the story remains the same. A good single issue drops you right into the middle of the action and then backs up a bit. In CLOVER, after the initial story is told, it backs up into a flashback, and then another, like a camera panning outwards to give contexts and show what is actually at stake. Some of the best films do this, and the best comics (just look at Ed Brubaker’s FATALE).
The plot itself is similar in style and aesthetic to Warren Ellis’s FREAKANGELS: a group of children with special powers, unsure of what to do with them, in a steampunk-y universe set outside of traditional fantasy or science fiction.
As for the artwork, well… it’s CLAMP. Sharp angles. No stray lines. Worlds built upon a single dialogue bubble. There are no ‘panels’ in the traditional sense. Squares appear casually, trailing the action like a spotty camera from the turn of the century. It’s like watching a science fiction movie through a sepia window pane.
The narrative is also laced with the lyrics of a song.
CLOVER is progessive, innovative, lovely to look at, and boasts unique character designs and downright beautiful dialogue. Surely that’s worth a glance beyond the cover image. And remember—a purchase gets you 10% off everything you buy, including all those Vertigo trades you can’t get enough of…
PREVIOUSLY:
BIOMEGA
GODCHILD
UZUMAKI
DOGS
For more thoughts on comics & storytelling, visit my blog: http://concretesoul.wordpress.com
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