Return to Tuscany

After much deliberation and planning, and several requests recently, I have decided to plan another Explorenation World Travel Photography and Workshop in 2019 to celebrate its 10th anniversary!

Our first ever tour was in April 2009, just over ten years ago where we visited Sarawak in northern Borneo, which was quickly followed by city trips to Paris, Bordeaux, Venice (for the Carnavale!) and Tuscany as well as longer photo tours to Cuba, Rajasthan, and Istanbul.

Return to Tuscany Photo Tour

In May 2019, I’ll be collaborating with travel and lifestyle photographer and filmmaker Daniela Cesarei who is based in Tuscany for a week-long photography tour of the beautiful and historical countryside, as well as sample some of the local cuisine with visits to vineyards and markets and much more. We shall be based in the medieval hill town of Montepulciano, immersed in the land of the nobile red wine.

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Tour Fee – [Go to Preliminary Itinerary]

This includes local organisation and transport, daily photo instruction and review sessions, planned visits to markets, vineyards and sampling of dishes by a local chef.

Not included : personal travel to Montepulciano, accommodation, entries to museums, tips or meals not stated, insurance etc

Facilitators

Steven Lee & Daniela Cesarei

Format of Tour

We believe that travel photography should first and foremost be enjoyable, but also challenging and what better place than the beautiful landscapes and towns of Tuscany to inspire you to make unique images with a group of like-minded photographers. The tour is catered to photographers and enthusiasts of all levels – whether you are just starting out in photography, or a seasoned traveler needing to polish up your visual and creative skills with some guidance. Photography instruction and set daily projects will be available as a guide for each participant to focus on, with regular evening reviews of the photographs taken in the day. We believe in informal gatherings that will form the basis of constructive feedback of each other’s works, through group participation.

Planned Dates

25 May to 1st June, 2019

Group size

Minimum 8, Maximum 12

Accommodation suggestions

A range of hotels and private accommodation will be suggested. More details to come.

Access

Closest arriving International Airports are Rome, Florence, Pisa and Perugia.

Distances from airports:

Perugia – Sant’Egidio (km 75)
Firenze – Amerigo Vespucci (km 130)
Roma – Leonardo da Vinci (km 200)

Railway station on the main line Chiusi / Chianciano Terme

Two exits on the A1 “Autostrada del Sole” motorway Val di Chiana and Chiusi / Chianciano Terme

Contact

To register your interest in this Return to Tuscany tour, or just want to ask a question, please contact either :

Steven     svllee@gmail.com

Daniela   info@daniella-cesarei.co.uk

Daniela Cesarei Photography
Daniela Cesarei Photography

Gallery of random photographs from past Explorenation tours by participants and facilitators.

 

Past Tours posts

See Istanbul photos

See Cuba tour photos

See Rajasthan tour photos

See Bordeaux tour photos

See Venice tour photos

See Tuscany photos, here, here

Featured image © Daniela Cesarei


Steven Lee

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Steven is the founder director of Kuala Lumpur International Photoawards and ran Explorenation World Travel Photography Tours with fellow photographer Andy Craggs from 2009 to 2013. Steven also started the Exposure+ Photo Mentoring program with fellow photographers in Malaysia, and is a regular portfolio reviewer at international photo festivals.

www.stevenleephotography.com

 

Daniela Cesarei

Daniela

Daniela is an established photographer specialising in travel and lifestyle, who lives in Tuscany. She is also an accomplished film-maker.

www.tuscanyinterior.photography

www.daniella-cesarei.co.uk

 

Review 2012 : My Top 20

As we approach the end of 2012, at the cusp of a new year, I always look back through the months to review the images that I have taken to see what has transpired photographically for me, personally. I have selected 20 instead of 15 in 2011, having taken more images this year. I am currently working on a series which I will announce perhaps in the new year, but still lacking in numbers for now, so it is shelved until Spring comes round. Commonscapes, a series of landscapes photographed in close by Wimbledon Common was started when I discovered that I actually like walking, (and contemplating) with dog in tow. I can see myself shooting MF not too long. If only there was a digital square medium format camera to use which doesn’t cost the Earth and more.

Photography today more than ever, takes on a new meaning for me. I still like shooting street images, but because I have seen so many street images that lack intent and story lately, I focus now more on humour and irony rather than drama and contrasts. I go through phases in my photography, like reading books. I am into crime novels at the moment.

2012 has been a challenge in many respects, what, with the rise in prominence of Instagram and smartphone images to a new level, and the slow death of DSLRs  caused by the onslaught of compact interchangeable lens formats, will surely be an interesting story to follow. Now that more and more photographers are composing through LCD screens rather than viewfinders, it would be worthwhile to examine if there are any compositional differences that may be gauged collectively in the kind and style of images that are produced throughout the world.

Here are my Top 20 for 2012 :

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1. Chinese tourists on the steps of St Paul’s Cathedral, London

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2. Height of Summer, Hyde Park, London

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3. Orang Asli mother and her children, ‘Magick River’, Perak, Malaysia

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4. By ‘Magick River’, Perak, Malaysia

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5. Butcher, ‘Little Burma’, Kuala Lumpur

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6. Cult revelers, Notting Hill Carnival, London

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7. Street pose, Notting Hill Carnival, London

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8. Christmas display, Kuala Lumpur

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9. Waiters waiting, San Marco, Venice

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10. Sami, Tunisian, Venice from series Merchants of Venice

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11. Wheatfield, Burgundy, France

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12. Tourists, Piazza del Campo, Siena, Italy

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13. Fairground boy, Wimbledon Common

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14. Wild flowers, Tuscany, Italy

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15. Dinosaur Coast, Brook Chine, Isle of Wight

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16. Wimbledon Common pond, from series Commonscapes

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17. Untitled 1 from series Commonscapes

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18. Veteran and his medals, Remembrance Sunday, London

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19. Winter walkers, Wimbledon Common

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20. Volunteer harvester, Bothy Vineyard, Oxford

See my 2011 Review here

Tuscan’d out : Day 4

Feeling slightly below weather, having the chills and aching joints wasn’t fun, on the last day of our Tuscany workshop. The gelato in Italy is really that good, also. We are all back safe and sound now. Thank you, all.

Tuscany Workshop : Day 3

 

Imagination. Running Wild. Saw these dead wild thorn flowers on some farmland whilst photographing the typical Tuscan landscape at dusk, on the way back from Bolgheri, on the coast.

Simple pleasures to inspire a generation

 

We have finally arrived in to Cerbaiola, a hilltop ‘agri-turismo’ group of restored farm buildings and outhouses where we are staying, in the Tuscany hills after a two hour detour in Pisa. I grabbed this shot of Cerbaiola from the heavy minivan, covering the last kilometres on a narrow unmade dirt track, with my smartphone. It’s s painterly, and reminded me of why I love photography. I remember the simply pleasure of just being able to make pictures, any picture, when I was young and my family to us to the seaside o to the parks.

Sometimes, we need to be exposed to natural beauty, a landscape, a waterfall, or an amazing sunset, to be reminded again of what photography and the making of a photograph really is. We get caught up nowadays with all the technical gadgetry, lenses, sensor sizes, megapixels, or perhaps we want to shoot like Bresson or be famous like McCurry, we loose sight of the basic principles and just the joy of taking pictures.