At the National Geographic Photo Camp, students learned more than just taking a great picture. Students also learned to view their islands-North Haven and Vinlahaven-in ways they may never have before.
“Since we were doing the camp in our own towns, it was a challenge to show other people where we live,” says Brittany Cooper, a senior at North Haven Community School. “It sort of forced us to look at things we see every day in a new way.”
The National Geographic Photo Camp, a series of workshops for youth held across the country, came to the Fox Islands from October 20-22. Funded by National Geographic, the 20 students from North Haven and Vinalhaven were each provided with a professional-grade single lens reflex camera donated by Olympus. The Island Institute provided staff time to help make the camp happen.
National Geographic photographers Amy Toensing and Matt Moyer instructed the students on both the basic principles of photography and its value as a means of communication.
The camp’s first two days were spent shooting photos and the third editing and producing a slide show of the students’ work, with the ultimate goal of the workshop being to get the students to document their own worlds.
“We want to teach the students to use photography to communicate,” says Lindsay McCullough, Program Director of National Geographic Photo Camps for Vision Workshops. “We want them to use the camera to be storytellers, the documentarians of their own communities.”
“We want to help the students use photography as a tool for language and expression, a kind of journaling with a camera” says Toensing. “The camps are a good way for students to look at their world.”
For some of the camp’s students, using a camera to tell a story about their own life was a daunting concept. “I felt kind of intimidated by the idea of taking a serious picture,” says Katie Hamilton, a senior at the Vinalhaven School. “But when they put a camera in my hands and taught me how to use it, how to look at things correctly and create a picture, it was very easy.”
After instructing the students on the technical aspects of their cameras, Toensing and Moyer presented slides of their own work (and the work of previous National Geographic Photo Camp participants) before sending the students out to document their communities.
Shooting one day on Vinalhaven and one day on North Haven, the 20 students produced nearly 18,000 pictures of life on a Maine island. In doing so, many of the students garnered a new perspective on the places they call home.
“Matt and Amy told us to step outside ourselves and consider the people viewing our photos,” Hamilton says. “We needed to remember that something completely normal to us is completely alien to anyone who hasn’t spent a significant amount of time on a Maine island.”
For Catherine Haley, a sophomore at The Vinalhaven School, trying to tell the story of her home via photography meant literally seeing things that she often overlooked. “Taking all my pictures I got a better view of the whole island, not just what’s on the waterfront, because I usually just bypass everything except the coastline,” she laughs.
While the camp helped educate the students about both photography and the uniqueness of their island homes, it also proved instructive for the local teachers. “I learned a lot about my students by being able to see them interact with other instructors,” says Erica Hansen, art teacher at The Vinalhaven School. “I’ve had some of these students for nine years and I had a much different experience watching them with others.”
“This workshop, for me, was incredibly helpful,” says Alice Bissell, who teaches photography at North Haven Community School. “It helped me get up to speed with new cameras and useful software to manage images.”
Elements of the camp proved eye-opening even to one of the National Geographic photographers in charge, in terms of both content and the creative process. “There were some great, creative shots that surprised us,” Toensing says. “And I think people on islands tend to give each other space, so it was interesting to see the kids have to go into that space.”
Alice Bissell continues to see the benefits of her students having to get up close and personal with their subjects during the National Geographic camp. “The camp really helped them get in close and really go for an image that they might never have considered doing, just because it was outside the traditional comfort zone people have out here. I notice now that the kids are taking different photographs at school. They’re getting really close in,” she laughs.
The subject of this fall’s National Geographic Photo Camp on the Fox Islands may have been photography, but that obviously wasn’t the only that was learned.