Earlier this month I spent three days in Venice at an Olympus workshop run by Steve Gosling and Neil Buchan-Grant. The complementary skills of Steve, being mainly a landscape photographer, and Neil, being mainly a portrait and travel photographer, meant it was an ideal opportunity to learn three of my favourite genres of photography in one inclusive session from experts in their fields so it was really a no-brainer to attend.

This was my first trip to Venice and, I’m ashamed to say, Italy. What a fantastic place it is! I have never seen anything like Venice (yes I know Birmingham, my hometown, has more canals but somehow it doesn’t have quite the same je ne sais quoi). Venice literally has a photo opportunity around every corner as well as the beautiful weather.

The format of the workshop consisted of meeting up as a group (there were nine of us plus Neil, Steve and his wife Julie) taking some guidance from our mentors then going off and doing our own thing for a couple of hours before re-grouping to compare notes and moving on to the next location. Things were spiced up a bit by Neil hiring two models, Ira Lothiriel and Chiara Sgarbossa, allowing us to take some fashion shots around the various iconic locations of Venice.

Needless to say lots of images were made over the three days which I am still editing two weeks after the event and will continue to do so for a while to come I suspect. This post is made up of my people shots, the residents and visitors as well as those of the two models. Future posts will explore some of the cityscapes and the photographic tips I picked up from the workshop.

Neil has put his own post of the trip, The Hunter and the Fisherman – Venice 2014 on his blog. Finally here are our two mentors in action on the streets of Venice, Neil holding the reflector and Steve taking one of his rare photographs of “something that moves”.

Olympus run a range of these workshops and publicize them at Olympus Image Space. Some are free, some are paid like this one. Either way they are a great opportunity to meet other like minded photographers, try out some Olympus kit if you’re not already a convert but most importantly actually spend time taking photographs.

neil buchan-grant olympus om-d people perfect photo suite steve gosling street travel venice