Today photography is an alternate language we all communicate in on a daily basis.
In Bulgaria, outside the big cities, there is no access to any form of photography education. Even in the big cities there are only a few options to get such an education, but is outdated and not related to the challenges and opportunities in front of the contemporary photographers.
Photomentor is an elaborate online mentoring program with some of the best photographers and artists in the country.

Sofia, Plovdiv, Burgas, Varna, Stara Zagora, Ruse, Veliko Tarnovo - all cities in Bulgaria

We are not concentrated in a specific region, rather than on a specific group of people in whole of Bulgaria. We are changing the way art education, and especially photography education is taking place. Our project aims to make quality knowledge in the field of photography accessible to maximum amount of people in Bulgaria in their own language. We are concentrated to make this program accessible to students in schools nationwide and to amateur and professional photographers.

The projects is targeting the following groups:
- The best professional photographers and artists. We will attract them as mentors in the Photomentor program and help them build a quality education programs that are usefull to anybody who watches them.
- Amateur and professional photographers who will use Photomentor for exchange and improving their skills
- Students in schools. We believe that there is a need for knowledge in arts and private entrepreneurship to be accessible to younger generations and we will work for the program to be implemented in schools.

There are several steps we are planning on taking:
1. Creating the content. We will engage some of the best photographers to create the content. We are dividing it into 3 levels: beginners, intermediate and masters. At every level there are several subjects we want to cover, making it a total of more than 30 mentoring courses and hundred of hours of content.
2. Creating the platform. It is an online interactive education system, offering video content, manuals and interactive tests and questionnaires.
3. Promoting and popularization. A series of live and online events to promote the platform to its target audiences.

In one year we will:
- Have finished at least 10 online mentoring courses
- Have the Photomentor platform built up and running
- Have at least 2000 hobby and professional photographer students in the platform
- Have at least 2000 school students registered in the platform

Photography is one of the most accessible ways for someone to express themselves, tell a story or create art.
With social networks and the expansion of internet, Photography has become part of the language we use on a daily basis. More and more people are taking on photography as a hobby and want to turn it into profession.
Improving literacy in photography will help a lot of people to find strength in their inner voice.
Photomentor will empower the photographic community in Bulgaria and build a knowledge base for the future generations.

With all the experience we gained over the years we came to conclusion that quality education is the foundation to everything. The awareness about the world we live together with all the challenges and opportunities it has to offer is the first step towards changing it.

Photography has proven to us to be a powerful tool. A capable photographer could tell stories, change fates, influence what people think. We want to help create more conscious and powerful photographers using their talent to provoke meaningful conversations.

We believe that sharing experiences, ideas, tricks from the most successful people in the field is the best and most inspiring way to learn. In this way you are lead by the example of extraordinary people and not by a soulless system.

1. Building the educational platform (+mobile version) - 20 000 EUR
2. Creating content:
- Video equipment (cameras, microphones, lighting) - 5000 EUR
- Video crew - 10000 EUR
- Studio rental, locations - 3000 EUR
- Fees for the lecturers - 10000 EUR (it is a basic fee of 1000 EUR to 10 lecturers for their time + percentage of the income of the particular course)
- Office expences - 3000 EUR
- Computers - 3000 EUR
3. Promotion (more than 50 live events) + online) - 6000 EUR

Any feedback will be well appreciated. We are really willing to make this project happen and we believe there is something valuable to learn from everybody.

We will be excited if the project provoked somebody to share their thoughts.