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NIPA
and Club Competitions Results
I trust that this post finds you all well, and following the
government instructions on Covid19 for all our wellbeing!
The
wait is finally over – NIPA Round 5 “ Open”
results are out!
•
In the colour print section congratulations to all concerned
for super images. Jonny Andrews received a starred print for
“Mum’s the Word” and the images from Linda
Hutchinson, Sean Evans and Alan Hillen were all highly rated.
• In the mono section we did exceptionally well with all
4 contributors obtaining starred images. Alan Hillen “
Cheetah”, Robert Johnston “Standing Bright”,
Sian Kerr “Raphael” and Jonny Andrews “Weathered”
• In the PDIs both Ted McKee “Male Sparrow hawk”
and Jonny Andrews “Heads On “ obtained starred images.
Not far behind were the dream team of Sean and Jacqui Evans.!
So
what does all this mean?
Novice
Competition
1st
Ards - 178
2nd Bangor and N Down - 157
3rd Belfast Photo Imaging Club - 155.5
Main
Competition
1st Catchlight - 540.5
2nd C B Camera Club - 536
3rd Ards - 531
Well
what can you say!!! 7 starred images in the final round.
Ards have punched well above their weight and have received
the results they richly deserve.
Congratulations
to all concerned and here is to next year!!!
As
you are aware alongside the NIPA competition we run our own
club competition. We were fortunate that we were able to complete
both competitions. The club competition results are usually
announced at our Annual Exhibition.
At our last emergency committee meeting we took the decision
to cancel this year’s Exhibition, so it is my pleasure
to announce the results (to great fanfare) of the 2019-2020
Ards Club Competition.
Our grateful thanks go to Marlene and her merry band of helpers
for collating the results for each round. Thank you to all who
faithfully entered images or PDIs, it certainly made for an
excellent competition. I would also encourage those who haven’t
participated for whatever reason to give it a go whenever we
start up again, it will help you on your photographic journey.
General
Section – Black and White
1st Marlene Hazlehurst; Joint 2nd Sean Evans and Jonny Andrews
4th Sarah Shaw
Colour
Prints
1st Sean Evans; 2nd Sarah Shaw; Joint 3rd Marlene Hazlehurst
and Jonny Andrews
PDIs
1st Sean Evans; 2nd Chris Davidson; 3rd Glenn Service; Joint4th
Marlene Hazlehurst and Jackie Evans
Overall
Placings
1st Sean Evans; 2nd Marlene Hazlehurst; 3rd Jonny Evans; 4th
Sarah Shaw
Advanced
Section - Black and White
1st Keith Malcolm; 2nd Patricia Mackey; 3rd Robert Johnston
Colour
Prints
1st Keith Malcolm; 2nd Sian Kerr; 3rd Patricia Mackey
PDIs
1st Ted McKee; 2nd Patricia Mackey; 3rd Steven Ferguson
Overall
Placings
1st Keith Malcolm; 2nd Patricia Mackey; 3rd Ted McKee
Well
done !!
A
special word of mention to Allen Hillen who half way through
the season moved sections from Novice to Advanced Section and
that is why he didn’t feature in either section.
We
will, in due course, celebrate all the winners and present the
certificates and medals for all their hard work throughout the
year.
In the meantime Sarah will keep us all informed of any developments
and any photographic related issues that we may find interesting
to help wile away any spare time we may have.
Well I have said enough and I must return to my papering and
painting; it’s not going well !
Keep
safe until we meet again, back in our clubhouse.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
13 March 2020
Change of Programme
On
Friday last we had a change of programme due to Covid-19. Only
9 members turned out (the others no doubt considering their
position regarding the virus.)
Nick
Page, when he was over in N Ireland giving a lecture, also did
a workshop around the North Coast and it was these YouTube videos
that we watched. There were 3 short videos, the first concentrating
on Elephant Rock. The weather was not very kind, but in true
photographic fashion they just battled on. Sean, Neal and Ryan
from our own club featured. The second video concentrated on
Dunluce castle, The Dark Hedges and KInbane Castle. Nick, with
help from colleagues demonstrated how to make the most from
the conditions and still achieve good results. His third video
concentrated on Giant’s Causeway, The Poison Glen in Donegal
and Fanad Head and Lighthouse.
He
did advise the viewers that weren’t too many photo techniques
to be gleaned from this video as everybody was too busy having
a good time. It was our own Neal who the focus was on. (See
what I just did there?). Neal comments can be very dry and caustic
at times and he really shone through in this video. The video
showed some of the shots that were achieved, despite the conditions.
Throughout the videos the beauty of the North Coast was captured
by Ryan using his drone and it really did complement the series.
Thanks
to Claire for uploading and showing the videos.
It
was a shortened evening due to current events. The committee
will be meeting shortly to decide on the best plan of action
and you will be informed in due course.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
6 March 2020
Auction Night
On
Friday past, Bargain Hunt came to the camera club. The room
was well filled with 30+potential buyers all looking for that
elusive bargain. Our thanks go Marlene and Claire for cataloguing
the items, and to our auctioneer for the evening Mr Leslie Armour
for taking charge of the proceedings. There was a wide variety
of items all requiring new homes, from camera gear to everything
else under the sun.
Leslie had to work hard; there was lots of heckling and banter
passed between the auctioneer and the members. He produced some
awful jokes and puns in an attempt to get members to part with
their money. At times it was like getting blood out of a stone
!!, but he persevered. Members got wise not to rub their nose,
or scratch their ear, in case it was misconstrued as a bid.
There were over 70 lots and a large percentage of them found
new homes.
It had gone 10:30 whenever the proceedings were finished. (Memories
of one Sinclair Adair passed through my mind!) Our thanks go
to all those who donated items for the auction as well as those
who purchased same.
If you weren’t there you missed a great evening of craic,
fun and frivolity. We look forward to seeing some of this year’s
auctioned items making a return next year!
The total raised for club funds was £275.00. Thank you
everyone for a magnificent effort.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
28 February 2020
Guest Speaker: Ernie Patterson - 'Harry Ferguson - A History
of Flight'
On
Friday night the club welcomed Ernie Patterson from CPA and
his friend Alan Morrison. There were 30 members eager to hear
about “Harry Ferguson – A History of Flight.”
Ernie spoke of the early days of aviation from gliders to powered
flight, from Orville and Wilbur Wright to Louis Bleriot, from
the first free flight in October 1902 by the Wright Brothers
to the first channel crossing in 1907 by Bleriot. His talk was
well illustrated with projected images.
He went on to explain how Harry Ferguson (from just outside
Dromara) took a keen interest in aviation and built his own
plane in his motor workshops in Chichester Street. The first
Air show had taken place in Reims in 1909 and Harry was keen
to make his first flight before the year ended. He took off
from Hillsborough Park and flew for 130 yards on 31st December
1909. He followed this by taking up the Newcastle flying challenge
in 1910. The prize was £100 to fly for 2 miles. Harry
flew 3 miles.
He then went on to speak of Lillian Bland who was also an early
pioneer of flight. She first flew her bi-plane from Carnmoney
Hill, just outside Belfast. Both these pioneers have statues
and memorials erected to them. Harry at Hillsborough and Newcastle
and a replica Lillian’s plane”Mayfly” forms
part of the play apparatus in the children’s play park
in Glengormley.
Harry had a serious crash in 1915 and changed tack and using
his engineering skills developed his 3 point hydraulic linkage
which made the plough a unit with the tractor as opposed to
towing the implement like a trailer, as well as developing his
own Ferguson Tractor and many other farm related inventions.
Ernie then related to his audience how he became involved in
the 1980 Ferguson Festival in Newcastle, how he built a replica
of the Ferguson Monoplane, and recreated the flight path taken
by Harry. The plane is now at the Ulster Aviation Society at
Long Kesh.
He concluded his talk by relating how he got interested in Hang
gliders and how they evolved over the years from being purely
wind driven to attaching a power unit and propeller. His talk
was filled with anecdotes and he readily answered all questions
that were asked from the floor.
All that remained was for Robert Johnston, a frequent flyer
himself, to propose a vote of thanks from the club to Ernie
for a very interesting and informative lecture.
Thank you Ernie.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Thursday
27 February 2020
NIPA Inter-club Round 4 'Transport' Adjudication
On
Thursday past, a dozen or so members of the club went to Belfast
to Christian Brothers for the adjudication of NIPA Round 4 (transport).
Again, we punched well above our weight! We mostly attained
double figure marks in each of the categories.
The highlight of the evening being 15 marks in the mono section
awarded to Neal Ritchie for his print entitled The Passenger.
Top print and a voucher for WEX photography was his reward for
his trouble - well done Neal.
Adding up the scores keeps Ards in a secure 3rd place with a
running total of 417 points, 2nd is Catchlight with 418.5 points
and in 1st place with 434 points is Christian Brothers. It makes
for a very exciting 5th and final round on 25th March to be
hosted by Dungannon and Cookstown.
'The
Passenger' by Neal Ritchie
Congratulations
to member Neal Ritchie on his recent NIPA success!
I'd like to thank everyone at the Northern Ireland Photographic
Association (NIPA) for choosing my photo as the top print in
the latest round of competition!
The shot was taken while walking down a trail towards the back
entrance to Angkor Wat, Siem Reap, Cambodia . We all walked
by the bike parked by the side of the track - it wasn't until
I turned around that I even noticed the little stowaway! I was
using my old, trusty Fujifilm XT1.
Notes for Friday 14 February 2020
Practical Night
On
Friday night past, due to unforeseen circumstances Eileen McCausland
from Dungannon CC, was unable to deliver her lecture. It fell
to Jacqui Agnew to hastily arrange a practical night on portrait
photography. Interest was sought and time slots arranged for
those who wished to participate.
Darren Brown came along with his softbox and a selection of
reflectors and a large gray background, and he demonstrated
how the softbox gave a much more even light distribution. This
combined with a carefully placed reflector gave a very pleasing
effect.
The 25+ members watched and listened to those came to do the
portraiture. There was plenty of assistance from Darren and
plenty of suggestions from the onlookers. It was a very enjoyable
evening and some nice images were obtained, some of which, no
doubt will appear on our boards in due course.
I would like to thank those models who sat for the photographers
and allowed themselves to be poked , prodded and moved into
some odd poses without complaint. Thanks to Rodney, Earl, Linda,
Chris and the main man, Sean.
I would also like to thank Darren for bringing and lending us
his equipment, and the dogs who also managed to get in on the
act.
The previous night we were up at Westcourt for a print battle,
and although we were few in numbers we were ably led by Sean
and Irvine. Single images were put up against each other, commented
on and marked by an independent judge. It was a reasonably close
affair and towards the end Westcourt were just edging it. Just
before the last print was judged Westcourt asked the judge to
mark it out of 3. This would mean that either Westcourt would
win or Ards would win by 1 point. Ards got the shout! Martin
Speckman produced a rather odd perpetual trophy (a vertically
pointed finger??) and asked that it was delivered to Leslie.
Leslie was duly presented with the trophy on Friday night which
he accepted on behalf of Ards Camera Club.
We have another print battle on Thursday next with Christian
Brothers up the Antrim Road in Belfast. It would be good if
Ards could be well represented at the meeting and I urge all
who can go, to go and support the club. Thanks.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday 7 February 2020
Special Night - Sinclair Adair
Friday
night was a special night! It was a Sinclair night, and guest
of honour was the man himself along with his friend Noel. This
was the first time that he had managed to get to the club this
season due to ill health and we are grateful to Carol for the
transport. We created a special night for him to help celebrate
his 96th birthday on Saturday 8th
There were 35+ members, including some of his old friends, Vittorio
Silvestri, Martin Spackman and Stanley and Maureen Matchett
and we were treated to an evening of reminisces and stories
about Sinclair. We watched a short AV entitled 'A Lifetime Behind
the Lens' – an Exhibition by David S Adair prepared by
Peter Knott. It showed a lot of his images that were shot on
film, and processed and printed in the darkroom. There were
many interjections by Sinclair telling who the models were,
where the shot was taken and other little humorous background
snippets that had the audience in fits of laughter.
Leslie Armour then reviewed several of the images and again
with the help (?) of Sinclair explained how the shot was taken,
how he added detail from a different image during the processing.
One image that was entitled Man 2000 was made of over 20 positives
and negatives combined together in the darkroom to give a very
surrealistic final image.
We then saw some images taken at the launch of the exhibition
to publicise his book and some subsequent events over the past
few years. There were comments made as people were recognised
in their younger youthful forms and their dress sense. It was
also a time of reflection when we saw images of those photographers
who are no longer with us.
A birthday cake was produced and a rather flat rendition (although
he didn’t seem to notice) of Happy Birthday was sung in
his honour. After a few celebratory photographs were taken of
Sinclair with his friends the cake was cut and devoured by the
assembled masses.
We had asked club members to supply PDIs à la Sinclair.
There were 8 members who put their heads above the parapet and
offered up images. Our thanks go to Ted McKee, Rusty Adair,
Patricia Mackey, Linda Hutchinson, Leslie Armour and Irvine
Ferguson. It was Irvine’s tongue-in - cheek image of him
being admonished by Sinclair, trying to bring the meeting to
a close at 10:15 while he still had another 8 AVs to show that
was chosen by Sinclair as the winner!
There
were a few minutes left and the chair offered the floor to Sinclair
to show two of his AVs from the many that he had brought along.
However he demanded three. After some mediation it was agreed
that he would show three!!
We were treated to the three that he chose, including Hill Billy
Heaven, with a soundtrack by Tex Ritter. The chair was certainly
not in Heaven!!!.
Sean Evans showed two of his short AVs that demonstrated many
of the techniques that Sinclair had employed in his time. Sinclair
was most impressed. With praise ringing in Sean’s ears
the Chair was able to bring the meeting to an end, just a couple
of minutes past 10:00.
Sinclair will be going out for a special birthday meal with
his family and friends on Saturday and all his friends wish
him well on his special day. HAPPY BIRTHDAY SINCLAIR ADAIR
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
31 January 2020
Quiz Night
On
Friday last it was only the die hard’s who turned up for
the quiz night. The bulk of the membership went to hear Joe
Cornish at Bangor. They missed a very good and entertaining
night! Our thanks go to Marlene, aided and assisted by Claire
for running the quiz. They were able to keep order (and the
scores), whilst remaining impartial and neutral.
There were enough members present to split into three teams,
Clickets, Team Eddie and Critter’s Corner (Where is the
photographic connection in those names?) We had six rounds including
the proverbial picture round.
The questions were a potpourri of photographic questions and
others that were loosely based on photography. I was impressed
by the number of people who knew that the most photographed
Page 3 girl was Sam Fox and embarrassed that I couldn’t
name all the current members of the Committee. I hang my head
in shame!!
It was an evening of fun and good natured banter (what else
would you expect?) and I’m sure we all learnt a little
bit about the history of photography through the questions.
And the final scores were: - Clickets 72, Team Eddie 72½
and Critter’s Corner 85½ It is not the winning,
but the taking part that counts, but just for the record I was
on the winning side!!
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
24 January 2020
Print Battle - City of Belfast PS v Ards CC
On Friday last the room was full with 40+ members and friends
for our first print battle of the season. It was with our old
Adversary, City of Belfast (Peter Knott with his other hat on.)
and he had brought along several members, who were all made
very welcome. My thanks go to Marlene for getting Ards prints
in for consideration and to our panel of advanced members for
choosing the prints for the battle.
We welcomed as our judge for the evening Chelle McGaughey LRPS
from CPA, along with her daughter Maia. The battle consisted
of two panels, one mono with 15 prints and a colour panel also
of 15 prints. They were displayed with Chelle out of the room
to ensure that she was unaware which print was from which club.
There was a good variety of genres on display from landscapes
through portraiture, architecture and wildlife. Chelle commented
on each print as to how she saw the subject matter portrayed.
Backgrounds and highlights were mentioned, as well as contrast.
In the portraits were she felt that some required a little more
separation from the background. Portraits were all about the
eyes and she highlighted how each of the different prints focused
on that point.
In general all the prints displayed good use of depth of field
and all were well exposed. She marked each print out of 5. Six
prints received the maximum mark. At the end of the colour round
the score was Ards 55 and City of Belfast 51. These results
were not made known to the meeting to keep the excitement going.
After our tea it was the turn of the colour prints. Again there
was a wide variety of genres and again Chelle commented on each
print. Maia, had spotted a print during the viewing at tea break,
and her mother asked her to comment on it as she was in complete
agreement with her remarks. It was a shot of a Brown Hooded
Kingfisher. Maia felt that the sharpness and clarity of the
picture enabled the viewer to see makeup of every feather, the
colours were vibrant and popped out and the depth of field used
made the background blurred. All in all an excellent picture!
At the end of the colour round the score was Ards 67 and City
of Belfast 50. The overall score was Ards 122 and City of Belfast
101, which reversed the result from last year.
It was left to Leslie Armour on behalf of Ards to thank Chelle
and Maia for their judging and comments. He commiserated with
City of Belfast (in his usual style) saying that there always
was next year!!. In his remarks Lawson Piggott on behalf of
City of Belfast, was gracious in defeat and looked forward to
next year. He also thanked the judges and Ards Camera Club for
an enjoyable evening.
My thanks to all, for entering into the spirit of things and
making the evening a success.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
17 January 2020
Club / NIPA Competition Round 4 'Open' Judge - John Belshaw
On
Friday night, 30+ members turned out for Round 4 of the NIPA
competition. It was on the theme of 'Transport'. Our guest judge
for the evening was our friend John Belshaw from Shorts Camera
Club.
There was a good selection for John to digest and comment on
and our thanks go to Marlene and Claire for their work in ensuring
that everything went off smoothly.
In the General section there were 11 B&W and 13 colour prints
submitted. In the Advanced section there were 18 mono and 22
colour prints submitted. In the PDI section there were 29 in
the General section and 22 in the Advanced section.
He demonstrated how on the judging day how the prints would
be passed through quickly to the judges for them to ascertain
the overall quality. They would go back again just for a few
seconds for the judges to score the prints.
As usual for us the judge had time to view and speak on each
image. John first confirmed that the image in this instance
met the criteria of 'Transport' . Some were clearer than others,
and some required a little (lateral?) thinking. He gave his
views on each image, some were stronger than others, and some
he felt could be improved by cropping the image. Some of the
images told a good story and packed a punch and some were perhaps
a little over fussy.
For the PDIs he first viewed them all to get a feeling for the
subject matter. Again he critiqued each image pointing out the
strong points and were he felt the image might be improved.
At the end of the evening he selected the best images for our
club competition and from these he selected what he thought
might be the strongest entries that best embodied the transport
theme and put them forward for the NIPA competition.
Congratulations to all who submitted images for the competitions,
and to those who were successful in getting their images chosen
to represent us in the NIPA competition.
Finally it was left to Peter Knott, on behalf of the club to
thank John for his time and considered comments. He felt sure
that the meeting had learnt from the images submitted.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
10 January 2020
Neal Ritchie - 'Habitat for Humanity'
Friday
night was the first meeting of the New Year. Unfortunately our
published speaker, Trevor Ferris was unavailable. Nevertheless
the club was well attended to hear one of our own members Neal
Ritchie gave an illustrated talk on Habitat for Humanity. Instead
of going on normal holidays Neal offers his time and services
for charitable work.
This year he returned to Cambodia to help build two houses on
behalf of Habitat for Humanity. Before reaching Cambodia he
stopped off for a few days with friends in Singapore. He visited
the Gardens by the Bay and took some evocative shots of the
Super Tree Grove during the light show. It wouldn’t be
Neal if he didn’t go wandering the streets with his camera
in 36°C heat in search images that told a story. As we all
know Neal is very fond of changing his shots into B and W and
he showed a series of images in colour and B & W and asked
the meeting which image they preferred. He got a good rapport
going as members gave their opinions and reasons for their choice.
After tea
he showed the work that he undertook in the build in Cambodia.
He described how he took a series of shots that explained the
context of the work, detail shots of the work, images of those
involved, both local and helpers and these would be made into
an AV and given to the charity for them to use for promotion,
awareness and fund raising.
It was very
clear from the photos he took of those for whom the houses were
being built how grateful they were and how life changing it
would be for them.
Neal had
paid his own way and worked with a group (14) to build two houses
to improve the lot of those less fortunate. He is to be congratulated
on his humanitarian works and on the presentation that he gave
to the club. It was much appreciated.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
13 December 2019
Club / NIPA Competition Round 3 'Open' Judge - William Allen
On
Friday past we had William Allen of City of Belfast P.S. to
judge our entries for NIPA Competition (Round 3). It was an
OPEN Round.
There were 30 prints in the General colour and B and W sections
and 33 in the Advanced colour and B and W sections. There was
a wide variety of prints (as you would expect) from him to choose
from.
William spoke on each print suggesting, when appropriate, slight
tweaks or changes that he felt might improve the overall appearance
of the shot. A lot of had gone into producing the images and
all were well mounted and presented. After much thought he came
up with the winning prints for each of the sections and then
after further deliberation chose the prints to go forward for
Ards in the NIPA competition.
After tea he looked at the PDIs in both General and Advanced
sections, (25 and 20 images) respectively. Again he critiqued
each image; giving positive feedback that he felt could improve
its appearance. Again he deliberated long and hard over his
winners and the final choice of the PDIs that would go through
to NIPA.
Thanks are in order to all the members that entered the competition
and congratulations to the winners and to those whose images
were put through to represent Ards in Round 3.
The results are not given here in order keep them secret until
the judging.
Our thanks go to William for the time, effort and comments he
gave to the club in judging the competition. It was most appreciated
by all in attendance.
That was the last evening before our Christmas break. Our Club
dinner is on Wednesday night in the Chef and Manager @7:30pm.
We recommence on 14th January when Trevor Ferris will be our
visiting speaker, and will talk on the genius of Ansel Adams.
On behalf of the Committee I wish you all a merry Christmas
and a happy New Year.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday 6 December 2019
Roy Finlay Memorial Natural History Competition
On
Friday past we were to be found at the Model Primary School
for the Roy Finlay Natural History Competition.
Roy was a past President of Ards and a past President of NIPA
and was a wildlife photographer, who sadly lost his life in
pursuit of his hobby. In his memory his late wife Rosemary instigated
this competition and presented a tray which is given to the
overall winner each year.
We are grateful that the Finlay family’s patronage has
been carried on through his son Neil, who was in attendance
with his wife Kerry, daughter Kayleigh and son Ewan, and he
presented the tray to the author of the winning image at the
end of the evening.
This year there were 120 printed images, and 190 PDIs from 18
clubs submitted by 44 different authors. A very unenviable task
for our judge Louise Borbely, from CPA, to undertake and pick
a winner. Louise critiqued many of the images using her wide
experience in the field of natural history. She was positive
with her comments and generous with her praise of images that
were of wild creatures.
Ards Camera Club were very well represented by Alan Hillen,
Keith Malcolm, Patricia Mackey, Ted McKee, Hugh McComb, Jackie
Agnew, Sean Evans, Stephen Ferguson and Robert Graham all submitting
entries in both the print and PDI categories.
In the PDI section congratulations are due to Ted McKee who
had 1 highly commended and 2 commended images, and Stephen Ferguson
who had 1 highly commended image. In the print section congratulations
are due to Alan Hillen who had 2 highly commended and 3 commended,
and Keith Malcolm and Patricia Mackey who had each 1 highly
commended print.
The highlight of the evening was in Ted McKee coming 1st with
his print “Female Sparrow Hawk with Crossbill Prey”
He just lost out to Pamela Wilson of Catchlight whose PDI of
“Bee Eaters” was judged to be the best image of
the night and hence was presented with the tray as overall winner.
She also won a 5 nights B&B and evening meal at Louise Borbely’s
house in Andalucía (donated by Louise) and a small piece
of china in the form of a squirrel donated by the Finlay family.
The room was well filled with approximated 100 people in attendance
and they were treated to a wonderful display of prints and PDIs
.The evening was definitely an overall success due to, in no
small measure, by Ards Camera Club members pulling together
to ensure that the evening smoothly and everything that was
needed was in place.
I wish to put on record my thanks to ALL in whatever part you
played you have ensured that the memory of Roy Finlay was celebrated
and his legacy will live on.
Thank you
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday 29 November 2019
Guest Speaker - Kieran Murray 'Land of Photo opportunities'
On
Friday night it was the turn of Kieran Murray from Banbridge
Camera Club to come to the club and tell us about America –
Land of photo opportunities. Kieran is a raconteur and a darn
good photographer.
Each of the boards that he showed, he told us how he came to
be there and how he took the photo as well as other nuggets
of interest.
His first board was of San Francisco. He took shots of street
photography, homeless people and architectural abstracts. His
description of how he took the shots was very humorous, but
it had a sting in the tail as some of those who appeared in
the street shots took exception and chased him down the street.
His advice was to be careful of what you take!!!
He said that he felt much more at home in the various national
parks, where he did his best not to annoy anybody. He showed
photographs of Yosemite National Park – his pictures portraying
the beauty and vastness that Ansel Adams had found there. Then
there was Kodachrome Canyon, Zion Canyon, Death Valley and Grand
Canyon. His spectacular shots showed the rock formations dramatically
lit with early morning or late evening light.
He moved on to Monument Valley and Yellowstone National Park
and entertained us with some more stunning shots. He finished
off with his account of how he tried to capture the solar eclipse
- what went wrong did go wrong but he did manage to redeem himself
with a stunning shot of the eclipse.
It was a great evening. There were great stories told and great
images shown that depicted colours and shapes through the dramatic
use of light.
Thank you Kieran, you can come back anytime!!
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday 22 November 2019
Members' Night - Sean Evans 'Expect the Unexpected'
On Friday night it was one of our own members, Sean Evans who
took to the floor. His talk was entitled ‘Expect the unexpected.’
Sean spoke of how his interest in photography really started
4 years ago and how he has come on since that time. He showed
some of his work and explained how he went about getting the
shot. It was very important to him to listen to others comments
whenever he displayed his work especially at competitions.
He would revisit or reprocess the pictures with the judges’
critique in mind. He felt that going to the adjudication rounds
was of tremendous benefit to him. There he could see images
that he could aspire to or images that made his question how
they were captured He would go away and try and try and try
again until he was able to achieve what he wanted.
He had a few favourite go to places - Oxford Island, Glenoe
and Tyrella that he would go to again and again. He showed a
series of 4 images of various scenes that by slight change of
position or exposure time he arrived at a final image, one that
he felt was the one he wanted. He also advocated that in an
image that less could be more.
He also showed how he dabbled in creating images that didn’t
exist on the ground by the clever use of software. Some of the
images were akin to those of the great Sinclair Adair (without
the music!!) Finally he showed a slide show of his recent holiday
in Croatia in which there was a collection of images that he
wouldn’t normally have taken, of bugs and insects. He
made a plea to Santa for a Macro lens to help him improve in
this field.
Our thanks go to Sean for a very informative and personal talk
on his photography. I’m sure that members will be invigorated
and renewed whenever they next lift up their camera!
We mustn’t forget about the longsuffering Jackie who has
had to put up with Sean’s focus in pursuit of his hobby.
Thank you for the supper that was provided and dutifully demolished
by the members.
Sean you can speak again any time!!
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday 15 November 2019
Guest Speaker - Trevor Craig 'A Tale of Two Cities'
On Friday night we welcomed Trevor Craig from Bangor Camera
Club as our guest speaker. His talk was entitled ‘A tale
of two cities’.
His first city was Venice, a place he had visited many times.
He was there earlier on in the week when it was flooded and
showed several shots of St Marks Piazza flooded. He liked the
colours, textures, shapes and reflections that the city offered.
He showed images that were strong in symmetry that reflected
the geometry and architecture of the city. He showed some long
exposure shots of the city and canals as this was the only way
of removing the water traffic and people from the shots.
His second city was Kolkata (Calcutta) which he visited in 2014.
He went out to visit a young girl from Emmanuel Ministries who
he sponsors. Whilst there he captured through street photography
the life on the streets. He showed the filth, squalor and poverty
that existed. People made a living out of what they could find.
He found that people allowed him to photograph them and often
refused the money he offered.
He finished up by showing an AV mainly in B and W that made
me think and consider what I could do for those less fortunate
than myself.
Our thanks go to Trevor for his Tale of two cities, very much
a tale of two different cultures
.
Chris
Chair
Notes for Friday
8 November 2019
Guest Speaker - Alan from 'Creepy Crawlies' Micro Practical
Night
Friday
evening 8th Nov 2019 we have the privilege of a visit from Wee
Critters. Alan has offered his services for free in return for
some images of his animals. I would ask everyone taking images
to let us have at least one image to forward on to him as he
normally would charge around £150 for his services. I
have attached a link to his website to give you an idea of what
animals he may be bringing on the night.
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