Youth With A Mission (YWAM)

A few years back my friends Jeremy and Val Sizemore started a YWAM base here in Pismo Beach. YWAM is basically a community of people from all over the world that come together to reach out to a specific community (Pismo in this case) while training for a bigger mission abroad among the nations. This YWAM in particular has an emphasis on reaching people through the arts. I was asked to teach the photography portion of the training school. So for about 10 weeks starting in January I met with 5 students encouraging their passion and gift for photography. They just returned from their mission the Rwanda this week. They reached out to orphanages and aids victims. They even played soccer against a team of streets kids and got pretty worked. They said the whole village came out to watch thinking they were an American soccer team and just laughed as they slipped and slid in the mud. Here are some of their amazing shots that they got from the trip.

Here are some of the shots that the students took as a result of assignments I sent them on. It is amazing to see unique tendencies and talents through each individual.

Kara Orendorf in particular is a film-only photography. She is crazy about printing on metal and cloth in her darkroom at home in Nashville. Check out her website! I didn't know much about her Rollie camera and so I had to call in a favor from my good friend Michelle Warren who is an amazing medium format and 35mm film photographer. Thanks Michelle for helping out and for taking these cool square pictures!

This is almost all of us: Amy Kusta, Kara Orendorf, Me, Katie Pfruender, Will Barrow and Cindy Robert (not photographed). I’ve had a great time getting to know everybody and feel honored to be considered your friend and kinda your teacher. You are all doing an amazing job using your creativity to reflect our Creator! Keep shooting from the heart. Everyone gets an A++!