Destination Photo Clubs

by Joseph T. Sinclair

Read my ear­li­er arti­cle about join­ing a pho­tog­ra­phy club. The dif­fer­ence between that arti­cle and this one is that the pri­or blog is about a club at home. But what about when you go on vaca­tion at a cer­tain place and stay for a rea­son­able time? Why not join a pho­to club there?

I spend sev­er­al weeks each sum­mer away from home in Pagosa Springs, Col­orado where I belong to the Pagosa Springs Pho­tog­ra­phy Club. The pho­tos in this issue are phone cam­era pho­tos from the Pagosa Springs area. One of my pho­tos is hang­ing in a local restau­rant togeth­er oth­er club pho­tos. In addi­tion, I go on pho­to field trips with the club.

Many mem­bers of pho­to clubs shoot with phone cam­eras occa­sion­al­ly. A club exhi­bi­tion is like­ly to have a few, if not many, phone cam­era photos.

 

 

Pho­to clubs typ­i­cal­ly have low dues. About $20 is aver­age. You have to ask your­self, what can I get from a pho­to club away from home that’s worth $20? That depends. The best way to find out is to go to the pho­to club’s web­site. The pho­to club web­site will like­ly have a sched­ule of events includ­ing meet­ings and outings.

If your vaca­tion tim­ing is right to attend the club’s month­ly meet­ing, what can you get out of the meet­ing? Well, most pho­to clubs have friend­ly mem­bers. You may be able to find a new friend who is eager to go out shoot­ing and uses your pres­ence as an excuse to put togeth­er a short field trip—or even a long field trip. Thus, you not only find a new friend but also an unpaid pri­vate guide to the local area, a guide who hap­pens to be a photographer.

What if your tim­ing is right to be able to par­tic­i­pate in a club field trip? Well, as a mem­ber of the club, you are enti­tled to go on field trips just like any oth­er mem­ber. The field trip will be led by a club mem­ber who knows the area, will keep par­tic­i­pants safe, and is like­ly to be a skilled pho­tog­ra­ph­er. In oth­er words, you will get what you get from a com­mer­cial out­fit­ter run­ning a pho­to field trip. The out­fit­ter will charge you from $50-$250 a day. Typ­i­cal pho­to club field trips are free or have a nom­i­nal cost.

There are also com­mer­cial pho­to work­shops trips typ­i­cal­ly instruct­ed by a pro­fes­sion­al pho­tog­ra­ph­er. Many such work­shops are essen­tial­ly field trips, albeit accom­pa­nied by instruc­tion. Such field work­shops cost from $100-$400 a day. A field trip con­duct­ed by skilled pho­to club mem­ber (and accom­pa­nied by oth­er skilled pho­to club mem­bers) is not so much dif­fer­ent. But the cost is much less.

Hence, the ques­tion is not whether to join a pho­to club at your trav­el des­ti­na­tion or not. The ques­tion is, what does such a club have to offer dur­ing the time you’ll be at the des­ti­na­tion? And you can eas­i­ly deter­mine that by check­ing out the club’s website.

You can take this idea to the extreme. You can iden­ti­fy var­i­ous loca­tions along your vaca­tion trav­el route at which you would like to take pho­tos. Then you can line up local pho­to club field trips for the same days that you’ll be pass­ing through those par­tic­u­lar loca­tions. You may not even need to join a local pho­to club to go on local field trips. Ask each club if they will allow you to go on field trips because you are a mem­ber of a pho­to club where you live, a cour­tesy that many clubs will extend to you.

This is a lit­tle bit more dif­fi­cult to arrange but think of the mon­ey you’ll save over hir­ing local out­fit­ters. And you’ll have a bet­ter oppor­tu­ni­ty to get inter­est­ing pho­tos than if you tried to shoot at such loca­tions by your­self. Local knowl­edge is very valuable.

The best sit­u­a­tion is if you go back to the same des­ti­na­tion year after year for your vaca­tion. You can make new friends in the local pho­to club, friends that you will see year after year and not only enjoy going on club field trips but also social­iz­ing and tak­ing part in oth­er club activities.

Don’t be shy. Pho­to clubs tend to be very friend­ly. Mem­bers are always look­ing for an excuse to go out and do some shoot­ing. You will like­ly receive a friend­ly reception.