Five local teenagers spent six weeks attending The Place's teen photography workshop, facilitated by local artist and photographer Jill Kraft. Participating students will be showcasing their work at a gallery opening from 5 to 6:30 p.m. on Friday, July 14 at Tabryn's Marketplace, located at 17-19 South Broad Street in Norwich. (Submitted photo)

NORWICH — The Place has partnered with local artist and photographer Jill Kraft once again to provide a six-week photography class to local teenagers, and they will be hosting a gallery opening from 5 to 6:30 p.m. on Friday, July 14 at Tabryn's Marketplace, located at 17-19 South Broad Street in Norwich.

The class has been offered for several years thanks to the support of a generous donor. Their contribution has allowed Kraft and The Place to offer photography workshops two to three times per year. The most recent session focused specifically on landscape photography.

Five local students met with Kraft once a week and learned the ins and outs of operating a camera, finding unique composition, landscape photography, and jobs available in the photography field.

"We're doing a lot more with composition because of the landscape. But we talk about F-stop, we talk about shutter speed, we talk about getting to know your equipment, we talk about the different jobs in photography, the different types of photography," Kraft explained. "Really we’ve focused a lot on macro photography with this one because of the landscape type of stuff."

"Their cameras are more point and shoot than they are elaborate. They’re not professional-grade cameras, they’re entry-level, point and shoot cameras," she continued. "So there’s only so much I can show them to control on the manual settings and the ins and outs of using your equipment, but they're able to see what it does when the shutter speed gets slowed down, or how the F-stop correlates with the shutter speed, to kind of slow water down or to do a couple special effects in there, especially with some landscape stuff."

They spent the six weeks exploring Norwich to find locations for landscape photos, including Kurt Beyer Park, Bruchhausen Park, and the downtown Norwich parks.

"We went and did around the hiking trail at Kurt Beyer down near the creek, like that macro stuff trying to get photos underneath the water, photos of what’s beneath the water," said Kraft. "Just going off of the beaten path of the traditional photography and kind of finding something new."

Each student selected four of their photos to be matted and displayed in the gallery show at Tabryn's Marketplace for about a month.

Additionally, each student who attended all six classes will be entered to win their very own camera. The winner will be selected at the gallery opening.

Kraft said one of the best things about the classes is the freedom and flexibility to adjust the curriculum and follow the students' lead.

"Some do it just for fun, some take it really seriously. Some want to go into a future of photography. So it’s just nice to really allow them that freedom," she said. "We don’t have a rigid curriculum. You know, it’s like, okay, where do you want to go next week? What do you want to do? Do you want to do trees? Do you want to do water?"

The teen photography classes are made possible by a private funding source. Kraft said their generosity has made several workshops possible in the past, and allows them to continue providing arts education to area students.

"With the gracious donation of whoever this sponsor is, we've been able to maintain offering this program to teenagers for the last couple years and, it’s a really meaningful opportunity to be able to keep offering this for teenagers," she said. "There's not a ton of stuff for teenagers to do in this realm of arts and stuff especially in the summer."

"I’m just very grateful that, whoever this donor is, we’re very grateful for their donation and to keep the program up and running."