On Wednesday this week, I had the privilege to take part in Zack’s One Light Workshop in Seattle. This wasn’t my first time to get to meet and listen to Zack. I have seen him at Photoshop World, watched his course on Creative Live and I own a copy of his DVD. You could say I am a fan. There are a few people in the photographic community that I have found and consider to be mentors over the years. Zack is one of those people.
I have found his willingness to share his story, his honesty, his commitment, his willingness to give away what he knows without asking for anything in return and his photographic vision to be a great influence on me. Every time that I have had a chance to interact with him, he has taken the time to listen to me and my story, ask and answer questions about his work, my work and other topics here and there. In the course of those encounters, I have also learned that he is a passionate and dedicated teacher. As someone who also teaches, it takes a lot of work to teach well. It requires knowledge, heart, love and patience. On Wednesday, I got to see all of those things in Zack. He took the time to get to know each of us as students, artist and people. He made sure we all got what we each came for from the workshop. His sense of humor, and his willingness to reach out and push our limits even when we were tired at a long day will really make an impact on those of us who attended the workshop.
He is one of those people who knows that commuinty and sharing makes artist better artist and people better. He knows that the single magic bullet that makes us great photographers is our willingness to be share what we know so that we can continue to learn from others as well. As he puts it we all stand on the shoulders of those who came before us, and we should share what we know that others can one day stand on our shoulders. We are all in this together. There are no secrets, just hard work, vision and a love of what you do in life.
Zack, a million thanks for a great day. I’ll post up a full review of the workshop later this weekend, but I just wanted to say thanks for everything.