Professor Bob Ryan judged our second major competition of the season in his usual urbane, enthusiastic and compassionate style. He reiterated the 10 criteria upon which he judged images, which spanned technical aspects, composition, creativity, narrative and impact. He also gave many ideas on different processing techniques and general ways to enhance the overall image.

Prints were judged first and the top 3 winning entries were as follows:

1st “Sunrise over Wimbleball Lake, Exmoor” – Adam Kowalczyk

2nd “The Folk Singer” – Dave Garmont

3rd “German War Tunnel” – Barry Davies

After the tea break the DPIs were judged which featured a strong set of images covering many genres which posed a challenge to the judge. After some deliberation he decided upon the following winners:

1st “Between the Showers” – Brian Holden

2nd “Lonely figure on a train” – Peter Hodgson

3rd “Cormorant splash down” – Geoff Snowball

This was the last meeting of 2018 and the Chairman extended Christmas and New Year wishes to the attendees and looked forward to reconvening on January 22nd 2019.

Dr Tracey Rich gave us a very entertaining and informative presentation showcasing a vast range of wildlife that had been photographed around the globe. Her passion, enthusiasm and love of all forms of wildlife was fully evident, as was her commitment to conservation and respecting the environment in which she operated. From local images of birds and hares, we were then transported on a worldwide tour covering 6 continents and many exotic species. Whether it was an albatross colony on a Southern Ocean island or a zebra with a newly born foal in the African savannah, she manage to capture the moment perfectly.

Her images were stunning and emphasised the importance of creating a connection with the photographic subject and looking for a message from the image. She even demonstrated a few animal calls that iterspersed her anecdotes.When the lighting conditions were challenging, she still managed to acquire impressive images.

Tracey concluuded her talk with some wonderful dog photographic images where she often had to contend with unruly pets and similar behaviour from their owners. All in all an enthralling evening.

The first competition of the season, which contributes points towards the Mayors Cups award at the end of the year, was judged by Ian Sadler from Five Valleys Photography at Stroud.

Our small but committed band of print devotees mustered a good selection of images to challenge the judge. The winning prints were:

1st “The NAAFI tea lady” by Adam Kowalczyk

2nd “HMS Victory Sailors meal table’ by David Bound

3rd “The Home Guard re-enactor” by Adam Kowalczyk

Most members submitted digital projected images and these proved even more challenging for the judge to pick the top three submissions which were finally agreed to be:

1st “Blacksmith at work” by Dave Garmont

2nd “Open Wide” by Geoff Snowball

3rd “Life imitates Art” by Adam Kowalczyk

Club members were invited to share some of their photographic images and tell the story behind them and what the images meant to them. This is a good way to learn more about individuals approach to photography, their favoured subject matter and also gain some insight into how the images were processed to achieve the final outcomes.

Adam started the ball rolling with a collection of images on a subject close to his heart…aviation. Many featured the now grounded Vulcan bomber taken at various air displays.  He also showed and explained the processing that had been made to a competition winning  image of a B-25 during take off . This included cloning out obtrusive aircraft hangars and buildings and recreating some missing propeller blur, which no-one, including the judge had spotted!

Peter showed some graffiti images taken in Brick Lane showing the diversity of street art and the effect that different perspectives and cropping could make to the final image. Dave B., our steam train enthusiast showed a number of images taken at Hailes Halt on the Gloucester Warwickshire heritage railway and recommended the location for both the photographic opportunities it afforded and the peaceful nearby countryside. Finally Dave G tracked his development from his early involvement in photography through experimenting with different equipment and spanning a wide range of photographic subjects. His underlying love of folk music and wildlife photography were strongly evident from his images, along with motorcycle racing.

Hopefully there will be similar future opportunities for members to share the results of their photographic endeavours.