Words, thoughts, and invite from Neale James, presenter/producer of The Friday Photowalk.

Spend three days camping among steam, stories, and people at the Dene Rally, a traditional Hampshire English country fair. Long before festivals became entertainment, fairs like this were places of work, where traction engines weren’t simply nostalgia but muscle to hire, and where craftsmanship was put on public display.

This workshop is built around people. Not models, not setups that feel staged, but real exhibitors, engineers, families, mechanics, collectors, and storytellers who return year after year to keep these traditions alive.

You’ll spend time with those who restore and run full-size and miniature steam engines, haul beautifully kept traction engines across the country, polish classic cars and caravans, arrive on vintage motorcycles, and inhabit living history displays that blur the line between past and present.

As photographers, we’ll work on photographing people with confidence and curiosity, learning how to approach them, how to listen, and how to create portraits that tell their story. Alongside candid work across the rally, there’ll be a pop-up portrait space for more considered images, plus photo challenges designed to help you build small, coherent stories from the wonderful people you meet, come rain or shine! Well, it is England! The weather is always a story.

Evenings are for sharing work, talking through what you’ve made, what worked, what didn’t, and why. Friday and Saturday nights end with barbecues, tired legs, full memory cards, and I dare say a wander to the exhibitor’s beer tent for famously warm English ale.

You’ll camp on site (campers also welcome), wake to the sound of steam and engines being brought to life, and photograph a fair as it breathes in the morning and winds down at dusk. This isn’t about ticking shots off a list. It’s about understanding a place, its local history, and the people who keep it moving.

If you’re interested in people, heritage, and quirky stories that make this the calendar event it is, this is one to pack the tent for.

Bring tent, we’ll provide the scenery.

Arrival Friday afternoon 19th June for pitching tents and welcome barbecue, departure Sunday 21st June late afternoon.

Price is £250 and includes workshop tuition, personal and group photo challenges, Friday and Saturday barbecue, and pitch. For those who would like to attend, but stay locally in B&B, there is a £25 discount.