November 2020 course launch!
What is A Year With My Camera?
A Year With My Camera is an online beginner’s photography course that is free by email 12 months. It starts every other month and the last course of the year kicks off on 5 November - registration is now open.
It is written by Emma Davies who has a Master’s degree in Psychology, specialising in online education. She taught photography in person for years before she took the course online. She knows where the bumps come, and she has designed the course to get you over them as easily as possible.
A Year With My Camera assumes you know nothing. Nothing at all - we start before the beginning, with all the stuff other courses think is too basic to bother with.
Why join A Year With My Camera?
Apart from being off-auto mode by Christmas you’ll be joining a ready-made community of photographers all of whom have the same priorities as you:
you know you can’t learn photography in a weekend
you want to learn it once and learn it right
you agree that the photographer is more important than the camera (we don’t talk about gear much)
you know you won’t get it right the first time you try but you’re happy to give it a go
Who is a typical A Year With My Camera student?
At the moment we have 80% women to 20% men, the average age is about 57 and most students live in either the UK, America or Canada.
But that is just the “typical” student. We have just welcomed our youngest ever student (aged 8, doing the course with her father) to the November start group. We have students joining us from across Europe, Africa and Australia/New Zealand. As far as I know we only have one student from South America, but I hope that will change. People join us with their best friends and their neighbours, with members of their camera clubs and their hiking groups.
The thing that unites everybody is a willingness to open up the email each week and give it a go.
What do I need to join?
All you need is a camera with manual controls (a bridge camera is fine) and a spirit of adventure. You will only be comparing your progress to your own journey, so don’t worry about people criticising your images or being patronising - you won’t find any of that here.
Why is it free?
When she first wrote the course Emma pledged it would always be free by email. Since it started in 2016 it has grown in popularity and Emma is now able to make a very comfortable living from sales of the associated workbooks and the more advanced courses she offers. The original pledge holds true though: the entire AYWMC course is free by email for one year. There are no catches, no spam, no third party ads. If you enjoy the course, find confidence and perhaps recommend the course to a friend - that’s enough for Emma.
If you sign up you will see details of Emma’s paid offerings in the emails. If this will annoy you, don’t sign up. Emma offers:
the AYWMC app (currently £4.99 per year)
AYWMC workbooks for those that prefer a hard copy of the course (£20 for Book 1, £25 for Book 2)
intermediate paid courses (currently Mindful Photography, The Art of Flower Photography and Composition: Beyond the Basics)
an online camera club for AYWMC graduates
coming soon: A Creative Workbook for Photographers
Workbooks available on your local Amazon store
How to join A Year With My Camera
Sign up for the emails (below).
Choose your community (details in the emails): access the community free on Instagram, or pay £4.99 a year for the app.
The course starts on the first Thursday of every other month, next start November 2020. While you are waiting you can join in the pre-course project Make 30 Photos (details in the email).
Join A Year With My Camera here
Register for the emails here. You’ll automatically be added to the next start date - if you’ve missed the Nov 5 start that’s fine, you’ll be all set for the next one (they start every other month).