What makes ASOP different? [A letter from the founder] 

Most photography schools, (including workshops and online tutorials) essentially offer the same product, which is to say that the factual information regarding how apertures and white balance work, is all pretty much the same. So the way most schools and tutorials try to differentiate themselves is less through the content that they provide and more through their branding, their facilities, or in some cases, the fame and charisma of their instructor.

But at ASOP, it isn’t so much that we teach the same material everyone else is teaching (only better!)… it’s that we’re honestly teaching different material altogether. The ASOP curriculum isn't an extension or adaptation of other conventional methods, rather our curriculum has been developed in-house, and is the result of an intense, ongoing cycle of interactive between our instructors and the very, very diverse kinds of students we’ve attracted over the past 10 years. 

Our program benefits from the fact that we're not exclusively working with aspiring professional photographers (which is a pretty limited demographic). It’s true that many aspiring professionals have passed through our doors, they account for roughly 30% of our student base, however, the other 70% of our students are engineers, architects, psychologists, stay-at-home-parents, marketing consultants, attorneys, retired military personnel, software programmers, executive chefs, graphic designers, etc. 

And over the past 10 years, working intensely with this mixture of motivated students has brought entirely different kinds of knowledge and experience to our curriculum.  For instance, the engineers who have taken our classes have observed the mechanics of the medium as we’ve demonstrated them and then have turned around and contributed a ton of insights regarding how the science and mechanics of photography actually work underneath, in ways not typically presented in traditional photography education. The psychologists who’ve taken our classes have contributed insights regarding how images are read and understood by the human mind.  The attorneys who have taken our classes have contributed insights into what defines intellectual and creative property.  The parents who have taken our classes have provided insights into how this medium can be used to express very personal, familial sentiment.  The software programmers who have taken our classes have provided insights into what the programmers at Canon/Nikon/Sony were thinking when they designed our operating systems. 

Etc. Etc. Etc.

And through this cycle of discourse, ASOP’s curriculum has gradually detached almost entirely from mainstream photographic advice and rhetoric, and has instead embraced its own unique, emerging approach. Our methods stem from the insights that our own, very educated students have contributed over the past decade, as well as the retrospective insights provided by our students who have gone on to pursue professional careers in photography.  

And this alternative approach gives us a decided advantage over more conventional educational platforms, most of which tend to limit themselves to regurgitating the same, common photographic advice.  And the advantages to our approach are clearly visible in the results that our students achieve. Not only do our students progress much faster, but importantly, their endgame is far more sophisticated. They shoot more complex images, and they shoot them more efficiently.