Tuesday 28th November - Print Competition - Round 1

Some photographers say you haven't finished until you produce a print.  Luckily a good number of our members agree and we had a good show of prints on display last night.  Perhaps a few of our less experienced members need a little more help and encouragement to venture into the world of print as there were only 4 entries in the Members class.  

We welcomed back Naomi Saul to judge this competition.  Starting with the Members class Naomi talked through the strengths and weaknesses of each print.  Previewing the prints when they were on display on stands at the back of the hall is one thing but Naomi commented on the prints coming to life when viewed on the illuminated print stand.  Across the Intermediate and Advanced classes, 15 prints were held back before Naomi settled on the ones worthy of full marks.  

Here are the high scoring prints:

In Advanced:

SAFELY ROUND THE BEND by Di Jackson (20)

GENTOO PENGUIN LEAPS FROM THE OCEAN by Dawn Osborn (20)

RED DEER STAG AT THE RUT by Graham Frost (20)

ABANDONED by Carol Martin (19)

LITTLE OWL ON POST by Sandie Jardine (19)

BEARDED REEDLING FEEDING ON SEEDS by Christine Frost (19)

THIS MAY NOT END WELL by Graham Frost (19)

BABOON AT DUSK by Andy Caws (18)

A SPRING BOUQUET by Carol Martin (18)

GREAT WHITE PELICANS IN BREEDING PLUMAGE by Di Jackson (18)

In Intermediate:

BODLEIAN LIBRARY, OXFORD by Pam Rutty (20)

THE FISH SHOP by Sue Baldwin (20)

IMPRESSIONS OF THE FORUM by Sue Baldwin (19)

JAPANESE ANEMONE by Graham Jackson (19)

DRAGONFLY by Geoff Lingwood (18)

In Members:

TAKING A BREAK by Ann Barber (20)

COLLECTING POLLEN by Ann Barber (18)

Tuesday 14th November - More help with editing

Every day's a school day!  

Members attending this meeting picked up more tips on editing their images.  Some had brought in images that were proving tricky and were able to get advice from our local experts.  

Other members visited the various workstations where they could see demonstrations on editing a flower image and using Point colour in Lightroom (Jan); producing a Photobook and editing wildlife images using ON1 (Robin); the Depth Blur filter in Photoshop and preparing images for WDPC competitions (Jack); using Lab color in Photoshop (Stephen); and editing in Affinity (Francesca).

Now we need to keep practising at home so that our newly acquired knowledge sticks.

Many thanks to the club members who brought in their laptops and computers and generously shared their knowledge with others.

Tuesday 7th November – "Mindful Photography – slowing down for success" Simon Turnbull

 We welcomed Simon Turnbull, via Zoom, whose presentation was in two distinct halves. Part 1 was an introduction to Mindful Photography and Part 2 tips and tricks on how to achieve it.

Simon stressed the need to slow down, take the tripod footprint shot and then look, look and look again for the details. Taking pictures for yourself and not for the judge or social media was inevitably more rewarding.

In honey pot locations Simon suggested asking the question..What can I take here that is a bit different? He suggested eliminating all distractions and concentrating on the scenes around you. Simon also suggested a few Apps for smart phones to help with our photography.

Simon's talk was peppered with many of his photos, some of which can be seen on his website: https://www.simonturnbullphotography.com

Simon was well qualified to talk on the subject has he has won many national awards, the latest being the winner of the Landscape of the year in 2022.

An interesting evening and Simon gave us much to think about hopefully to increase our enjoyment of our photography.