YOUNG PHOTOGRAPHERS
Exclusive opportuntities, activities and resources for Young Photographers
CURRENT OPPORTUNITIES
For more information on our current projects please contact Elise Wootten, Engagement officer, Elise@rps.org
Young Carers: A Life in Focus
The Royal Photographic Society and Action for Children have enouraged young carers across the UK to take part in a project that would enable them to learn new things and show us what’s important to them. Through a series of workshops by artist Jo Bradford skills have been learned to take their photography to the next level.
RPS IN SCHOOLS
We can accommodate school visits to our exhibitions, please contact Elise Wootten to discuss.
School Visits
We offer FREE school visits to our exhibitions.
To book your visit please contact Liz Williams, RPS Education Manager (liz@rps.org) with the date and time you would like to visit, your schools name, and the number of people attending.
Schools Certificate
We want to reward those students who excel in their GCSE Photography exams by awarding them an RPS Certificate in Photography.
If you are a teacher or know of any school teaching photography at GCSE level, please let them know about the certificate. It’s free and has already proved a hit with the students.
For further information please contact: Liz Williams RPS Education Manager liz@rps.org
Image © Will Price-Lockyer, A* student from Crispin School Somerset
ACTIVITIES AND RESOURCES
Our rescources are produced by Photopedagogy and give you ideas on how to look at photography in different ways.
Exploring an Exhibition
Visiting a photography exhibition can be exciting. Whether it's your first visit or you're a gallery regular, these activities give you some playful ideas on how to look at the work in a different way.
What new things will you discover?
Squaring the Circles of Confusion
Explore pictorialism, a movement of photography that shows the beauty of images and photography as an artistic tool, rather than just a way of capturing reality.
Squaring the Circles of Confusion is an upcoming RPS exhibition.
Sugar Paper Theories
Photography is a powerful tool for memory. Remembering exactly what happened around a photo being taken can be difficult, especially if it was a long time ago, the truth can become skewed.
These activities based on Jack Latham's exhibiton Sugar Paper Theories explore how memory is attached to images and how these memories can be recalled or reinvented.
Science Photography at home
Science and Photography go hand in hand. here are some step by step guides on how you can create your own beautiful images with everyday materials such as liquid, ink and smoke.
See how these elements react to one another, experiment and capture what you discover.
In Progress
Identity and storys can be interpreted in many ways within an image. The way we understand and remember the world can be hugely effected by photography and how its presented to us.
This rescource invites you to act as a curator and gather images together. Think about their meaning as individual photographs and the story they tell when presented as a whole.
Altered Ocean
The powerful exhibition Altered Ocean by artist Mandy Barker raises awareness about plastic pollution in the world’s oceans.
This resouce looks at the power of collecting and recording evidence through photography showing the effects we have on our ever-changing world.
Space Steps
These resources made in connection with the exhibition Space Steps: The Moon and Beyond explore how we see the world from beyond its surface and invite you to consider the context of images when they show us things we've never seen before.
What will you discover?
ARTIST SNAPSHOTS
Content and features of Young Photographers within the RPS programme.
WOMAN SCIENCE PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR 2023
Young Photographer - Kelly Zhang
The Beauty of Soap Bubbles ©
'I took this photograph of soap bubbles in 2022 and was genuinely amazed by their iridescent hues and rich textures. The swirling pattern of colours is caused by thin-film interference, where light reflected from the outer soap layer interferes with light reflected from the inner soap layer.'
Kelly Zhang is a young photographer based in New York, USA, specialising in abstract macro photography. Currently, she is a junior at Jericho High School in Long Island. Inspired by the scientific phenomena behind soap bubbles, Kelly began photographing them in 2022. The swirling pattern of iridescent colours in the bubbles, caused by thin-film interference, symbolises the transitory nature of our lives. Kelly has received several awards for her work, including first place in the 2022 American Association of Physics Teachers High School Physics Photo Contest and Honourable Mention in the 19th Julia Margaret Cameron Award.
Young Photographer Runner Up - Lina Yeleuova
Nanosatellite ©
On March 27, more than 150 female participants of the UniSat educational program from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan launched three state-of-the-art nanosatellites into the stratosphere. The nanosatellites, which belong to a class of small spacecraft, are equipped with several cameras, one of which is capable of capturing elliptical images of the Earth in 4K resolution. We were selected from 2,000 young women who had previously completed the UniSat online course to create and launch nanosatellites. The online course curriculum included processing environmental flight data from nanosatellites during launch, visualising the data, preparing a mission report, and using the data for scientific and practical purposes. UniSat is an educational program of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and Kazakh National University named after Al-Farabi. The purpose is to give learning and growth opportunities to women in the field of nanosatellite development. The nanosatellites were created as part of a 10-day marathon at the university.
"I am Lina Yeleuova, from Almaty, Kazakhstan, and I am passionate about photography and science. I believe that photography has the power to communicate complex scientific concepts in a way that is accessible and engaging to a wide audience."
Katy Appleton
Katy Appleton was awarded the Young Science photograpger of the Year award in 2020 for her image 'Rainbow Shadow Selfie'.
The image shows a spectrum thrown onto a wall by shining sunlight through a prism. Katy has cast her own shadow onto the wall while taking the photo, so that the spectrum shines more clearly. It was felt that this apparently simple image contains many optical principles to discuss yet also harks back to the experiments of scientists such as Newton and Herschel.
Raymond Zhang
Raymond Zhang was awarded the Young Science Photographer of the Year, Climate category, in 2020.
His image 'Apollo's Emissary' shows a concentrated solar power generating station in China. 12,000 mirrors aim sunlight at a central tower where molten sodium nitrate salt is heated. The salt passes through a heat exchanger, producing steam to drive generator turbines. The thermal inertia is such that the station can work through the night, saving up to 350,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emission per year.
Ella Main
Photography student Ella Main tells us how an experiment with magnetic oil and a glow-stick turned into a prize-winning photograph.
Esme Lloyd FRPS
Esmé Lloyd explains how at 15 years old she achieved her Licenciate (LRPS) and improved her photography along the way.
Esme specialises in product photography and has a fun and creative practice using objects around her home to produce impressive images.
Derek Man
Derek Man was part of the International Photography Exhibition 162. Learn how he brilliantly created pinhole camera’s from apples for his project What Do You See, Old Apple Tree?
More Artists Videos...
The International Photography Exhibition (IPE) celebrates photography from across the globe. Each year exhibiting artists are selected from a worldwide open-call, encouraging submissions from international photographers of all levels.
Here you will find more artist videos and a vitural gallery of the work on display as part of IPE162.
YOUNG SPOTLIGHT
A selection of articles written by our Spotlight editor, Alison Webber FRPS.
For more articles, exhibitions, and events visit our spotlight page
Their experiences and interests come together to highlight the day to day lives of young people outside of their caring roles and gives them a platform to test new skills and celebrate their creativity.
The effects of bullying seen through the eyes of two photographers.
‘Show and Tell’, organised by The Photography Movement, is a project which encourages young people between the ages of 10 and 18 to explore their own mental health through photography.
Working with the Open Eye Gallery and local charity shops, Fashion Design and Photography students from the University of Chester have designed and photographed a sustainable fashion collection created by upcycling donated clothing.
YOU MIGHT ALSO BE INTERESTED IN...
These opportunities and rescources by our friends and partners outside of the RPS
Show and Tell - The Photography Movement
‘Show and Tell’, organised by The Photography Movement, is a project which encourages young people between the ages of 10 and 18 to explore their own mental health through photography. The aim of the project is to provide a better understanding of how it feels to be young today.
With the guidance of professional photographers, workshop films teach the positive link between photography and mental health. Each workshop is accompanied with a task encouraging the practice of smartphone photography as a mindful technique.
Sharp Shots Photo Club
We are very excited to be supporting Sharp Shots Photo Club in delivering their workshops and courses. We have some great projects in the pipeline, which we hope will inspire the next generation of photographers.