Youngsters snap up learning opportunity

A group of nine high school girls have thrown their hats into the ring taken up the challenge of a new program aimed at upskilling local youth in photography.

The girls attended the first-ever session of the program at Spoil Bank in Port Hedland, planning for an evening of sunset and bird photography and blurry bird pictures on the town beach. The fruits of their labour will be on display during Youth Week in April at Pilbara Photographics ‘Pilbara Photographics’ correct spelling in the South Hedland shopping centre, owned and operated by Peter Carter.

Mr Carter said there is a lot more to understand about photography and taking up the craft could propel the high schoolers on to “better things”.

“It’s not just about point and shoot, it’s about capturing the moment — you never know, it just takes something to click and that’s it,” Mr Carterhe said. while out with the students at Spoil Bank,” he said.

“They will edit all the photographs for a few hours back in the shop in Photoshop, we’ll show them how to tweak the photographs, and then we’ll print them off and that’s how we will do it.”

Next up for the young photographers is a five hour trip to Karijini National Park. , sure to be a bonding or breaking experience for the young women.

The Ashburton Aboriginal Corporation is sponsoring the project which also benefits from the support of Mr Carter, both as a gallery owner and the President of the Port Hedland Chamber of Commerce.

Also assisting with the program is Tim Turner who was in charge of driving the van on the sunset trip to Spoil Bank.

“One of the connections we want to make is that this is also about vision for the future, about what these young women will do in the future for work,” he said.

Mr Turner pointed out the importance of giving youth a voice, especially in a community such as Hedland which suffers from a lack of established residents and families.

“Guess what, this is their home,” Mr Turner said, “It’s about capturing Hedland, people, place, and home,” he said.

“A lot of the time we focus on the negative with things like anti-social behaviour. You know what, I see a lot of good stuff happening in Hedland and a lot of great people, and these kids are great people.”