I’ve been thinking the past two weeks, trying to re-evaluate my photos with a better, more critical eye. Seeing how you evaluate each photo, examining each element, their relation to each other, and how they come together to make a photograph changed the way I look at photographs now. And I think this is what I gained most from the workshop: I can already see that your comments were pretty much spot on about the portfolio I presented, but I’m still a long ways from being a decent editor. I’ve already started heavily studying the works of other photographers and I’ll probably do a re-edit of that portfolio in six months to see how much I’ve progressed. The other benefit from the workshop was that I’m more focused in shooting. You saw this change during the course of the week, so I don’t think I need to elaborate more. Now I just need to work harder to make good photos. (…) Completely changing my photography in a week is almost impossible, but I think you’ve pointed me in the right direction. The real benefits of the workshop will come months from now if I follow through on two things:

learn to recognize a good photo and
put what makes those good photos good into my photos (but not in a way that I’m copying).

It was a fun and helpful week. I’ll work to make better photos now!

This was my fourth workshop with Nikos and you wonder how much there is still to learn down and on the road! Nikos is very generous in sharing his knowledge and experience and it is a delight to participate in the editing sessions. Besides the workshop it was great to meet all these motivated photographers and great personalities.

Nikos is a wayfaring man. He takes you on a journey which is neither comfy nor sluggish, but encourages you to witness the foreign and encounter your own limits. This way of traveling with the camera forces you to participate with the world around you and in the evenings during the workshop your participation will be putted to the test, if you have sweated enough. On some days life gifts you with one or two good photographs, but on some not a single one. So the next morning you’ll head out again and demand your luck. And at the end of a week or two with Nikos you make your way home safe in the knowledge that you have achieved and experienced something unique.

I have enjoyed so much the workshop in Athens. My photography has become more compact and coherent and I have been able to focus on something more specific in photographic terms -there are even some good portraits in my portfolio! New questions arise such as the contradiction between reflecting the misery of the people and have pleasure of taking pictures of it. I can see a background in my photos of emptiness, artificial spaces, simulation, loneliness, people with strange feelings…Everybody reflect their own personality in their pictures.

It worked — or as Nikos said “It always works”. I needed three days to throw everything over board I thought to know about photography. How to select backgrounds, how to use the 35mm lens, how to lead the eye of the beholder, how to avoid clichees, how to get closer, how to recognize a good photograph and how to find my own style. Nikos has something like a built-in compass for good photography which always functions. It was a pleasure to learn from him, to talk with him about his philosophy and to see his passion for beautiful visual events. Even when he felt sick and his face looked as grey as some of my worse photographs he got excited and touched by every great picture he saw at our group meetings in the evenings. He is such a nice and open guy and it seems he has also a talent to attract like-minded people to his workshops. I felt very welcome from the first moment. The Thailand workshop was my first one with him. But for sure not the last..

I recently returned from Nikos “Balkan Expedition”, although I have been back for three months, I don’t feel like I am anywhere near to returning to “normal life”. My experience during Nikos workshop was spectacular. Visited locations I would never have travelled to and energized to photograph there. I learned so much and experienced so much that I am sure it will take quite a while to fully assimilate. The symposium experience was truly flawless, from discussions and critiques with an honest opinion about your photography. And lets not forget the participants themselves, an amazing diverse and talented group who were a joy to be around and learned much from each other. If you are serious about wanting to become a better street photographer you can not go wrong with Nikos “Balkan Expedition” workshop. For myself, I am already thinking about my next Economopoulos experience.

Attending a workshop with Nikos as your teacher, critic and guide into the world of creating the best images that you can produce, is both a challenging and inspiring experience. This was my second workshop with Nikos, and it was incredible!! How he teaches you to look at a photograph and “not just see it” makes me compose each individual frame with an more critical eye and deeper understanding on how to make a photograph come alive. With his encouragement and strong commitment to getting the best from me, he guided me in the direction that I wanted to grow. Ultimately the week with Nikos was a very rewarding experience! On another note just spending time with him, over dinner or lunch, listening to his stories, is great. Traveling around parts of Istanbul with him on tram’s, trains and taxi’s looking for stadiums, they are all great memories that will be with me for a longtime.

The workshop in Istanbul with Nikos has been very challenging and enriching experience as I am quite new at photography. When we have to leave our comfort-zone, to see different around us, we struggle to improve and it is never easy. The precious advice of such talented and experienced photographer as Nikos opens up new horizons to work on and sharing comments and time with other partecipants turned out to be very productive and pleasant. I have appreciated so much the method, editing is crucial for any photographer and Nikos helped us understand how to proceed or try it better. I love your attitude and personal approach Nikos, so true … if we’ll be a better a person, we’ll be a better photographer.

My first On the Road workshop was almost a year ago in Oaxaca, Mexico, from which I learned an immense amount. In this one (this time in Ghana), I learned plenty too, not only from Nikos, but also from very good and talented photographers, many of whom have attended several workshops in other places. Nikos is not only a great photographer, he’s also an open, direct, and natural mentor.

With this workshop i finally felt the urge to pay attention to my work, the way to select a photo for a portfolio and harmony between the series of photos in a portfolio. This is not by force but by the inspiration and motivation that Nikos was emitting. I feel so lucky to work with him and with all the other great photographers who have attended. He gave me the direction, inspiration and motivation that I was in need of, now shooting only 35mm and only colour, I feel excitement and joy and cannot wait for another workshop with Nikos to evaluate the improvement (hopefully) together. Now i see 35mm framelines everywhere i look.

Most of all I would like to thank you for inspiring me. I’m still in a learning process in photojournalism, but I felt I needed to know more about photography before moving on. I really enjoyed turning things around. Working with single visual impacts, instead of storytelling photojournalism, took me back to the roots of photography. I’ve learned a lot by doing so. In a way I tried to copy you and those that inspire you, Cartier-Bresson etc, and where that in a way sounds like a bad approach (instead of finding my own style), it made me look at pictures in a new way. In photojournalism I’m supposed to tell a story that has to be told directly. Where the message of the picture is delivered instantly. On this trip I learned how to make pictures that make the viewer look an extra time. Where there is no instant message, but where the pictures create curiosity. It is another way in photography. And a style I will try to combine with photojournalism.

Every literate can write. Not every literate can write poems or short stories. Even less of them can write meaningful or original stories. I think the same thing applies to photographers. Every person with a camera can take photos. Some can produce stories, but just a few are able to produce a meaningful and personal work.
Sometimes I joke and say that Nikos’ mission on Earth is to educate us, his participants, to become original, faithful and personal photographers. After a while, I am coming to believe that my joke was actually real. The transformation he manages from us is unreal. The photos that he choses are a caress to the eyes and soul. And this leads me to a second conclusion: Nikos is the best editor I have ever met.
Gracias, Maestro!

Addis Ababa was my second workshop with Nikos. I came back for two reasons: One, because I know he is a great teacher who brings out the best in you. He gives you honest and relevant feedback which helps you www.ontheroad.grelop more as a photographer in a week than you would normally in a year. Two, because he is a great guy also on a personal level, and he really knows how to make a group work together and have fun at the same time. Plus did I say most of his workshops takes place in exciting and exotic locations, with more motives that your mind can process? I am already looking at how soon I can go again..

This was my first workshop with Nikos. I loved everything about it: Nikos warmth, his relaxed and funny way, the supportive group of participants, the thoroughness of each evening session. I learnt a lot, at many levels, namely improving my ‘seeing’ to obtain more powerful images, how to ‘carry’ myself on the street as a photographer as I approach the world around me, editing pictures, learning to be patient about the process of making images. Nikos is tireless in sharing his knowledge, experience and love for photography. He has a way of teaching that works for me his feedback sinks deep and opens me to other ways of seeing. The workshop was very challenging and at the same time very energising. His passion for a good image is contagious. Nikos has inspired me to persevere.
I am a beginner and I think my greatest takeaway from this workshop is that now I feel I am determinedly on a quest: I am more curious about the art of photography, I have more and more questions, I want to know more, I challenge myself more, I am more relaxed about the whole process. I’m simply enjoying being on the street with my camera without any expectations but to see all the layers of what is right in front of my eyes, and practice, practice, practice.
Thank you, Nikos.

Here is some feedback on the Oaxaca workshop. Simple and short – the workshop was absolutely amazing. Excellence defined.
The feedback sessions in the evenings were transforming with deep inspiration continuing as a growth journey day by day. I highly appreciate the way Nikos gives feedback and shares his amazing vision and way of seeing, it is clear and to the point, with the beauty of the creative process not being jeopardised. A way of life, how to shoot, when not to shoot, and how to discipline your mind loosing the experienced feeling of time. I definitely left Oaxaca with deep and new inspiration.
Excellent workshop. Amazing atmosphere.
Great workshop set up – with a feeling of freedom in the creative process and flow during the day.
Unique feedback sessions in the evenings with firm and clear communication.
Tailored feedback how to improve day by day Again. Just great. Difficult to describe in words!

This workshop provided me with a new prism at taking photographs including more sentiment and injecting more thought and content to my work. As a newcomer to “Street photography”, the workshop allowed me to quickly get into a pace and experiment with this new to me approach, producing some fair results quite quickly. Invaluable was the fact that I gained a lot from the positive evaluation by Nikos of my other coworkers’ work. This evaluation demonstrated to me things to avoid once I get further down in my own journey and also experience paradigms of good quality work that I could try and experiment with. Things that take ages to discover, are presented to you during one week’s teamwork. Absolutely a positive experience with a lot of new friends that I really enjoyed!

First of all I would like to thank Nikos and the participants very much for the workshop in Istanbul. The learning experience of the workshop was absolutely immense. It was participant-centered, and this provided not only close supervision but also great space for creativity and room for www.ontheroad.grelopment. Further, I have really enjoyed meeting with Nikos and the other participants. For me meeting with Nikos was like ‘downloading wisdom’ from a master photographer like himself but the challenge lied in reflecting that wisdom on my photographs. In addition, I think participants added much to my experience with their diverse approaches to photography and they were great company. Given his credentials, I think Nikos is very modest while professing strongly his mastery secrets and has a very nice personality. I feel privileged to have been a part of this whole experience and hope to get together with them sometime in the near future at another workshop.

My name is Seungwoo Chae. I’m working as a photographer for a newspaper in Korea. I was feeling that something was missing in my photography. I wanted to know what I needed. Consequently, it was great idea to participate to Nikos’ workshop. He told me and showed me what was ‘photographic’. I felt to return to beginning. I think I could start again.

Thank you for the workshop, overall it was great and I look forward to joining you somewhere else in the future. In terms of feedback, particularly at my beginner level, I was often seeking more and more direction and information from you and as you probably realise, I would continually ask for more and more information as the days went on. Apart from that however, it was a great experience and an overall (apart from the food) good trip.