Beginning Family Portrait Photography: Shoot Like a Pro (Udemy.com)

When I signed up for this course I thought it would be similar to the other photography courses I have taken, but Valarie took it from start to finish in a well organized and practical step-by-step approach. What I mean by start, is getting to know your camera all the way through to using Lightroom for post processing. Easy to follow. Easy to understand. Heck, setting aperture finally makes sense! I'm looking forward to taking more shots! Thanks Valerie!!

Some very good ideas and tips. So much of this is revision for me so far as I have done and am doing other photography courses, but I am finding some benefit from this, especially in the latter part so far. The course got better as it progressed. I did enjoy the Lightroom tutorials even though at first I thought it did not fit on this course. Valerie focused on portrait improvement in Lightroom so it was relevant.

The information is really good, but it’s distracting when she’s reading off what she’s going to say instead of just speaking to directly to you.

The first 3 segments of information in this course were great! The overall voice quality of the tutorials was very hit and miss, sometimes too loud, other times I had to crank up every volume setting on my computer to hear. The lighthouse tutorials at the end were not expected and very unwelcome. Maybe should have been offered as optional or as a different course entirely? I did not enjoy the plugs there and did not finish that portion of the course.

I thought the class was helpful and easy to follow. I went out and tried some of the suggestions right away which produced nice pictures.I would have liked to spend a little more time on group posing and working with natural lighting, but that is probably because I have a strong interest in those areas. Overall, it was a nice introduction to improving family portraits.

This course is really worth the money. I had bought it a long time ago and finished it today. Followed the tips suggested by Valerie and shot a few portrait pics of my wife, posted them in the discussion board and Valerie did critique them. I will be looking at buying a macro/prime lens to shoot portrait pictures and will be posting them as and when I do it. Overall, a good simple and effective course. Teaches you the ABC's which is what I was looking for.

Though I have watched a lot of you tube videos and took many courses, I have still learned from this course. One of them was making Lightroom easy to understand. I am more into using Photoshop but this course has been excited to try Lightroom. Valerie gave the basics but you get a lot from it than some other courses. At least I did. She is very well organized and recaps at the end of each segment. I also like that the lectures are short but well-informative. They don't leave you wanting to go to sleep. Thank you Valerie!

This course is excellent - it is comprehensive, well structured and exactly what I was looking for! Valerie is an engaging instructor and presents the material very clearly and succinctly, with a total absence of waffle. The production quality is very good, with no sudden changes of volume or style between letures. I have previously been very uncomfortable about taking photos of people but now feel much more confident. Thank you so much for generously sharing some of your knowledge with us.

I seriously loved this course! The instructor Valorie Goettsch had an amazingly easy and straight forward approach to taking great shots of your family. She really helped reinforce my other online courses, and I think I'm finally starting to understand the full dynamics of shutter speed, aperture, ISO, focusing, white balance, lighting, and all the other good stuff of knowing your camera and composing shots like a professional. The best part of the course was her easy to follow, step by step, manual of retouching your family photos naturally and non-destructively in Light Room. Excellent tips and knowledge. I just loved it!

This course was great. I purchased a Canon Esos Rebel T4i and did not know how to use it. I tried reading the manual but was completely lost. This course helped me understand the different settings I can use to create a decent portrait. Also I did not know how to use Lightroom, and now I have learned the basic. Awesome Course and highly recommended.