Yosemite/NorCal photo tours/workshops Fall 2016?

[drmarkf]

I'm just beginning planning for a 3-week Northern Californian holiday with my wife in Fall 2016 and I'd be interested if anyone could recommend any good people who may be running short landscape photo workshops/tours in Yosemite and/or around the Bay/Redwoods/Point Reyes etc around that time?

We're fully flexible at the moment, and I'm considering both 1-3 day short sessions and/or ones up to 5 days. My wife isn't a photographer, so if I did more than a single day I would probably do it before she joined me or after she's returned to the UK.

I've been to San Francisco & the Bay area several times before so can probably find my own locations well enough around there, but never to Yosemite and I suspect that joining a workshop there might make best use of my time.

Many thanks in advance for any thoughts and suggestions.

[BradSmith]

Ansel Adams Gallery

[bassman51]

highsierraworkshops.com

I've done several workshops with Michael Marient and got a lot from them. 

[drmarkf]

Many thanks - very helpful.
All the best.

[HSakols]

For Yosemite, I would contact Michael Frye. 

[john beardsworth]

Or William Neill?

But with a year to plan, you could find plenty of interesting locations there without needing a workshop.

[Isaac]

… I suspect that joining a workshop there might make best use of my time.

Presumably that would be worthwhile in itself, without all the burden of needing to be the ultimate photographic opportunity?

Fall in Northern California is ordinarily the tail-end of the dry season, and probably peak fire season. California is currently suffering extreme drought.

[HSakols]

Bill Neil used to live in my town (El Portal).  He helped spark my interest in medium format after showing me some of his 4x5 transparencies. 

Yes, we are in a drought in California but the press says that there is a 90% change that we will have an El Nino Year.  This is what happened when we had El Nino in 1997.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GttPGfZgY2w

Fall is wonderful time in Yosemite if you are not set on seeing raging waterfalls.  October is good for Aspens on the East Side of the Sierra while November can be stunning in Yosemite Valley because of the maples and oaks. 

[Isaac]

Yes, we are in a drought in California but the press says that there is a 90% change that we will have an El Nino Year.

One of these years the prediction will be correct.

[dreed]

Yes, we are in a drought in California but the press says that there is a 90% change that we will have an El Nino Year.  This is what happened when we had El Nino in 1997.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GttPGfZgY2w

The 1997 flood came about because in the period leading up to Jan 1997, there had been a lot of snow fall, putting a lot of water on the ground. Then in Jan 1997 a very wet warm front moved through that dumped a lot of rain on Yosemite that melted the snow that had built up previously as it rained. The impact was a spring thawing that usually takes months happening "overnight."

The El Nino this year is up to 95% - i.e everyone thinks it is going to happen and not much is going to stop it now:

https://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/enso/september-2015-el-ni%C3%B1o-update-and-qa

[Some Guy]

I order stuff out of Samy's Camera on the west coast and they just sent me this today for some Yosemite class that hold at the end of Oct. this year. Four days for $700 so not too bad.  Maybe same in 2016 too if it fills.

Samy's Camera Fall 2015 Yosemite Class

SG

[john beardsworth]

Bill Neil used to live in my town (El Portal).  He helped spark my interest in medium format after showing me some of his 4x5 transparencies. 

I'm not surprised! I got chatting to him on a bridge near Bridalveil falls and he had a show on at the AA gallery which was hugely impressive.

[Lightsmith]

For Yosemite, I would contact Michael Frye.

He literally wrote the book - "The Photographer's Guide to Yosemite" that was published in 2000 and is an excellent photo guide, one of the very best I have come across.  As to his teaching ability that is another matter entirely.

Check out http://yosemitephotoworkshops.com/ as well.

Most workshops have 20 participants per 'instructor" and often a name instructor and one or two assistants with less ability to provide instruction. Some provide a nightly review of participants' images from the day with a critique and others don't take the time to provide this daily feedback. Also important to find a workshop geared to your level of experience. I would not want to spend time covering exposure and histograms and the rule of thirds, etc.