Photo Trip: London!

Itinerary and feelings. I liked going on the trip when we were leaving, it was a lot of fun, although I was initially dreading the notion of a dozen giggling girls. But I soon made friends, and enjoyed not only the trip's educational aspect, but its social aspect as well, making a lot of fun friends and laughing sufficiently. DAY 1: Arrived in London, had dinner, went to the hotel. Food is good, so is sleep. The hotel was really nice. Sparkly floors! We also went shopping. I bought a book for my Dad. Everything else was too expensive. Sigh. Hung out with the guys, it was nice. I also got along well with my roommates. Only problem was the shower had no curtain. I guess life can never be perfect. DAY 2: We went to The National Portrait Gallery (like last year's Vogue exhibition) to se the Gerhard Richter exhibition. I really liked his style, I found it fascinating. I love art! Then we tried to recreate one of his paintings in charcoal, and I was pretty proud of how mine turned out. I guess my 1 art class paid off! Then we had to paint our own Version of Richter's work using a Newspaper image. I think I would have done a lot better on it, except that the teacher onyl let us trace for a few minutes and then wanted us to do solid color blotches instead of a paint-by-numbers technique I would have used. Unfortunately, my painting didn't turn out as well as my charcoal sketch. At all. It was still a cool experience though. I have so much more respect for painters now! Then we went to the Saatchi Gallery to see a Middle Eastern Art Exhibit. It was fascinating, but I was kind of frustrated we didn't get much time there. I would ahve liked if our guide have given us a more thorough tour, what she was saying was really interesting! I found the amount of sexual revolution pieces very interesting- I had never thought of the Middle East in such a way. But I guess that's what the exhibit was about. My favorite was probably the little city the Israeli (I think) artist made. It was so cute, but at the same time so deep. I really enjoyed my time at the museum. The free time afterwards was fun. I finally got to Starbucks! Yay! We also did a but of shopping, but I couldn't really buy anything substantial because everything was SO expensive! I was getting really frustrated... DAY 3: We went to a lighting workshop in a famous market. I think it was famous for its smell. I had to hold my breath when we went to the fish market, because it makes me nautious. Smells aside, the workshop was really helpful and interesting. We learned about all kinds of studio lighting and how to create different effects, etc. I wished I had had a paper and pen to write everything down! I though it was fascinating. I'm not sure if it was my hunger or my interest in food photography, but I kept flipping between photographing food and skinny models who coulds use it. When he was talking about the skills a photographer needs to have, I couldn't help but think of myself in that place. I think I would like it. When doing the workshop we learned a lot of cool effects, but I think we would have done better with some organization. We could have done some really cool stuff if we had had not only more freedom but more organization. I enjoyed modeling too, but it was hard to know what they wanted. DAY 4: This was the relaxation day- we had a chance to do some last-minute shopping and picture taking for our photoshop project when we got back. We went to the Camden market again which I loved. It was just as much fun as last year, although obviously I need to polish up my bartering skills! Hmm. I bought some more stuff that day and was pretty happy with the tuff I bought. We also had fun in the city when we went back, because I stoped worrying about looking for something to buy and just looked at stuff and enjoyed the experience. Then we went back to the hotel, got out luggage, and went on the plane to go home. I was exhausted, but it was well worth it!