Tony Worobiec: Night-time Is the Right Time
By Geoff Harris •
Composition and low-light/night photography are not the easiest subjects to get your head around, so if you'd like to learn more about these key areas you should definitely check out Tony Worobiec's courses on MyPhotoSchool.
Tony is the author of 14 books, and has won photography awards in the UK and internationally. His work also been exhibited in London’s Barbican Gallery, Bradford’s National Museum of Photography, and the prestigious Fox Talbot Museum.
Tony is particularly interested in low-light photography. “I've written a book on this topic, and explored it in my Icons of the Highway project. As part of this, my wife and I explored old US highways in search of independent diners, hotels, motels and theatres.
This led to the exhibition at the Fox Talbot Museum, which was a big surprise and an incredible honour.” So what is it about working in low light that appeals so much? “I'm quite astonished by the way ordinary places can look exciting when the light fades,” he explains. “Prosaic, ordinary places take on an element of mystery and threat at night, and it's really exciting.”
Although Tony was sceptical about digital SLRs at first, he's been very impressed by the low-light capabilities of modern cameras. “With the Canon 5D Mark III I can comfortably take handheld images at night at ISO 6400 and sometimes even push it to 120,000.
This technology is changing how we work at night, even compared to just a few years ago, and it's opening up a whole new genre. You no longer need to put up a tripod outside a fast-food joint to get low-light shots... probably just as well as you'd get a punch in the face!”
Indeed, Tony is currently working on a project about fast-food workers who work at night. “I'm taking a series of panoramas. The US painter Edward Hopper has been a big influence.”
So what will students taking Tony's low-light course learn? “Basically, I show how you can take photographs 24/7. You no longer need to put the camera away on a cold winter's night when you've just got home from work.” Tony's course is not just about ISO, though, as he's a skilled user of flash. “I often use flash to 'fill in.'
One of my projects involved shooting bits of rubbish and cars and old machinery in fields, and I got some great effects. You can make the exposure consistent with the available light or you can go for an 'obvious' flash look. There are so many possibilities with low-light and night photography.” For more information, see www.tonyworobiec.com
If you would like to learn more about Tony’s courses see here:
Low Light Landscape Photography
Composition: How to Compose a Photograph.
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