Your favourite images, Tuesday, 17th April 2018

Hi Folks,

Tuesday night it was a chance for members to show their favourite images and perhaps tell us how they were achieved.

Chris opened the evening by giving us some good news that Imagez camera club had been awarded 3rd place in this month’s National competition with the theme of  ‘Natural Beauty’. Apparently we were only two points short of being joint winners. Well done to those members that had entries. “Now we have the feel for it perhaps next year we can have a chance of  doing even better”, said Chris.

Also the club is in the final of the Rosebowl competition on Sunday at Amersham and anybody wanting to go please contact Kathy.

So Chenxi was the first up to talk and said that 3 or 4 years ago when he joined the camera club he entered a print, it was the smallest and probably the worse and got a mark of  fourteen. Since then he has done trips around Waddesden Manor photographing the usual things like the dining rooms and chandeliers which are taken by most photographers.

Then Chenxi had a passion for taking water drops and the moon and stars.

Chenxi then went on to say, along the way he has been inspired by John Timbrell.  Chenxi recently went back to Waddesden and found he was more interested in other things that he had not noticed before like staircases, lifts and metal structures and took photographs from different angles.

In this picture Chenxi liked the shadows between the red staircase

Chenxi then started taking people going up the stairs

This was his favourite with a window creating a shadow on the wall of the man going up the stairs. Apart from these Chenxi had taken several mono chrome structural photographs of the lift and staircase I have a feeling we might see them again in a later competition as they are cracking shots.

 

Next was Steve,

Who went to an organised photograph shoot which had children. Steve does not normally work with children but was advised not to direct them but let them do the poses themselves as they are more natural.

Steve was particularly happy with this shot as it was almost straight out of his camera but just warmed up the colour tone to give it that antique look

 

A similar one was entered in competition recently but Steve said this was a better one that he did not have time to work on.

Steve wanted it to have the soft look but thought it may be too sharp but  did look better on print. I think most of us thought it was a terrific picture.

 

Next to talk was Alan

Alan said he was around well before digital photography age and did a lot of his work in the dark room but now it’s all layers and bringing it together on the computer.

In his early days around the early 1900’s lol he did a project on breakfast and was photographing everything to do with that subject. In those days he even had a milkman to call and notes would be left.

And he started to experiment on the notes as to what a milkman would think or say.

Also, if the milk bottle was empty what else could be in it. This picture caused quite a stir when first entered in competition.

In this recent photograph he was thinking outside the box but not literally in it lol.

So just try to think differently to stand out from others.

 

Next to talk was Peter

Peter went to a critique night with a photograph taken of the milky way. It did not stand out too well but Kathy suggested to dodge and burn the area and this was the result.

 

Peter was pleased with this one taken on New Year’s day at Whipsnade. The lions were all behind wire and difficult to focus on but he focused just on the lion’s eyes. Peter said he was lucky as there were a family with children to his left acting as bait.

 

Peter woken up in the Yorkshire Dales to see this scenery, although there was snow in the distance most of the foreground was frost. It was a great feeling to go out and photograph it all.

 

Peter took this shot of his two dogs, one is a large leonberger and the two dogs get on so well together

 

Peter also talked of a shot of a red squirrel which are hard to get as they move so quickly.

 

Next to talk was Chris

Chris said he takes a photograph every day and writes a few words and looking back they make a nice diary.

In this next shot he was invited to photograph his work colleagues on what he called ‘Blue Monday’ for a charity cause. What could be better fun in doing this at work on a dreary January day.

 

Chris described these people as an important group of people to him.

They as a group try and visit ten countries in four days in old cars. Some of the group are mechanics and that helps them all get by.

Does the tube ever go quiet, well yes it does and Chris took his shot around 9:30 pm and shots like this make it all worthwhile.

This picture of his family together before University means a lot to Chris as they don’t usually like their photos taken.

Finally a shot of King’s Cross tube station taken at 4:30am in the morning during a ’24 hour photo shoot’. Chris heard that the walls on the side of the passageway normally have adverts running along them but are switched off in the early hours.

 

Coffee time

 

Then I did a talk on this photograph that I took after being inspired by a shot taken by Peter at the reservoir.

I took this for the Natural Beauty competition using F22 setting for my landscape but the background was a little dark and wanted it to have more punch.

pushing it through On1 masking to brighten areas, sharpening it and picking the right atmosphere for me.

I quickly found out f22 revealed some dust in either the lens or my camera and they had to be cloned out

 

Last year on holiday I noticed a wonky light and thought taking it with the rising sun might be fun but on getting home I realised the top of the lamp had been cut off

 

So this last holiday returning to the same place as last year I lined up my shot ready for the sun to come up only for them to switch all the lights off seconds before the sun came up lol

 

Finally I talked about my new camera which was locked in the hotel safe and now only having my little camera thought I just might just get a shot of a helicopter if I was quick enough. This turned out to be a major sea search lasting over an hour and had all the time in the world to grab shots like this of the helicopter.

 

Next was Mike to talk

Suddenly my camera was not working and I was struggling. (sorry Mike)

Mike talked about always having a camera with him and at one time arriving he found there was a race going on

Also in the next picture with wife going shopping he watched the cycle event going on and tried to experiment with taking speed shots.

Rather than go shopping he sat in the car getting different shots.

Finally he captured a shot of a lady in the rain with a broken umbrella which just goes to show having the camera with you at the right time pays dividends.

 

Next to speak was Dave

 

Dave said he work with audio and vision for years and realised photographs need to express both the sound and emotion to the person viewing them

He photographed some tide breakers and said he could feel the sound of the sea and seagulls in the picture.

Going to South Africa the shot of a heron eating a snake could be heard and the heat of the day was also portrayed

Also the scene of an elephant which to him showed the silence  as Elephants would make off at the slightest sound.

Finally the shot taken of Tintern Abbey gave the right atmosphere for him

 

Next was Julia to speak

Julia showed a cracking shot of a spider’s web laden with rain or dew

Julia also showed us a picture of some fungi which reminded her of babies feet.

Next was John Timbrell

John took this picture of the lake district having been inspired by a photographer who specialise in taking photographs 30 minutes after sunset. John used a long exposure

Another shown was taken in a gallery in New Zealand showing a drop of water falling into a darkened room with a timed flash of light. However, John notice the chink of light coming through the curtain on the way out and thought it might be even more interesting and it worked for him.

A sunny day in Winchester and John positioned himself across the road to photograph long shadows created when people walked past a window. John also noticed a person peering out of the window who came across to see what he was doing.

John explained he was just chasing shadows and the person was fine with that lol

For the next photo John was in Latvia coming out of the museum of occupation. there was a large statue in shadow.

Latvia got independence from Russia in 1920, then in 1940 taken back by Russia only for the Germans to capture it, followed by the Russians again. John liked the shadows on the steps and then waited for a pair of feet to walk past to give it a more sinister feel of Iron Curtain country.

 

Last and not least was Jan

Jan meets each Monday with a friend and they visit various places to photograph. One of her set of images was of Burnham Beeches which they like to visit.

 

one was on a frosty morning Jan got pictures of  Manadarin ducks on the lake

Also the frost around the trees

 

On the heath there are horses and cows although the cows seem friendly it is a bit unnerving having them come up to you.

Burnham Beeches has a car park, good facilities and toilets.

Green Dragon Eco farm is another place they like to visit with animals such as reindeer,  cattle, sheep, goats and pigs.

Also Water Perry Park another place Jan likes to visit has gardens and a river with a bridge, plants and garden equipment and gift shops, a museum  and a tea room entry price is £7.50 or £49 per year.

an elderly guy looks after the museum there and has collected hundreds of items. I think he has offered Water Perry the contents on passing away.

Jan and her friend like to visit Tiggywinkles which has all kinds of animals to photograph one is allowed to take photographs but one is not allowed to publish them.

They have deer, badgers, foxes and herons most are behind fences but Jan had got a good shot of a red kite there but not facing her.

 

 

Next week is

Match an Image or Software Evening