THIS PRODUCT PROVIDES ACCESS TO THE RECORDINGS - YOU ARE NOT ABLE TO DOWNLOAD.
 
Jackie Kramer posted a bird photograph and people wrote to tell her how much they loved the clouds. There were no clouds. That sky is the wake of a boat, photographed as a texture and layered in afterwards.
 
This is a two part workshop about learning to see birds, and then about what you can do with the picture once you have it. One purchase covers both sessions.
 
Part 1, On Wings and Wonder.
Jackie's own description is that this is not about how to photograph birds, it is about how to see them. Light, gesture, behaviour, colour, backgrounds and a great deal of patience, followed by the practical side: the camera and the two lenses she works with, her shutter speeds, her focus settings and the habits that keep them where she wants them.
 
Part 2, Beyond the Image.
Where to find birds and when, the two free apps she uses before and after a trip, and then a full editing session on screen. Lightroom first, then Photoshop, taking real images through to finished pictures.
 
What you will take from it
A way of looking. Jackie photographs birds the way a portrait photographer works with people. She asks a simple question of every frame: if someone took this picture of me, would I like it?
The patience that makes the difference. One sequence follows a single bird for twenty minutes, with the timestamps left on, so you can watch her move, change her angle, wait, and turn an ordinary shot into something worth keeping.
Her actual settings, said plainly. Shutter priority, back button focus, the focus zones she uses and when she opens them right out, a ceiling on ISO, a floor on aperture, and why she re-registers her custom settings a dozen times a day.
A complete Lightroom edit, start to finish. Denoise, masking the subject, building a mask preset you can reuse, intersecting two masks to lift one part of a bird, inverting a mask to work on the background, and the clipping alert that tells you whether your black background is really black.
The textures, and how to make your own. Photoshop blend modes, hand painted masks, and the trick where a photograph of a rock becomes coloured light you can drop onto a silhouette.
 
A taste of what is in it
She photographed a saffron toucanet by shooting straight through a crowd of parakeets, the way you or I would shoot through a bush. She calls the hummingbirds that fly off at the wrong moment the stinkers. She takes a branch out of a picture with generative removal, live, and says she is not even breathing while it works. And she is honest about what she does not plan: several of the pictures people love best began as a demo before dinner, with no idea where they were going.
 
What our community said on the night
Paula: "I will need to rewatch several times, as I am a total beginner. Thanks so much."
Jan: "Really enjoyed this and have learnt a lot more about PS and LR that I was unaware of."
Diana: "Fantastic images, thank you so much. I look forward to the next session, to find out how you do the processing of your artistic shots."
Ali: "Your expertise in the field to find the shoot-thru opportunities and best backgrounds is magnificent and does require experience and patience."
Richard: "Now I know what to do with all those bird images."
Barbara: "I love seeing your variety of birds and style, such wonderful variety."
Celia: "I prop my phone on the window ledge first thing in the morning at dawn chorus with the Merlin app open and watch and listen to the birds in my garden."
 
Worth knowing.
Part 2 is a working editing session, recorded live, with all the pauses and second thoughts that come with that. Jackie works in Lightroom and Photoshop on a Mac and calls out the Windows shortcuts as she goes. She uses two recent Lightroom masking sliders, so it is worth updating before you follow along, and Adobe Camera Raw will do the same job if that is where you work. Generative removal is used briefly and does have usage limits on some Adobe plans.
 
Who it is for.
Anyone who photographs birds, in the garden or further afield, and wants both halves of it: getting the picture, and then deciding what the picture could become. You do not need to travel anywhere exotic. A lot of what she shows was photographed close to home.
 
Why we love this one.
Jackie asked to come back and share her bird photography, which tells you how much she wanted to do it. She had planned to speak for about an hour in the second session and stayed for far longer, answering everything. She cares as much about the birds as she does about the pictures, and it shows in both evenings.
 
About Jackie.
Jackie Kramer is a nature photographer based in St Augustine, Florida, and the founder of the Phlorography community. She leads photography workshops in Brazil, Colombia and Costa Rica, and she photographs flowers with the same eye she brings to birds.
Streaming only, no downloads. Access for three months from purchase.