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previous meetings - 2010/11 |
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23rd August
Tonight brought the end of
our summer 'break' (and the end of summer going by the weather outside my
window) and we finished with a bit of a social. There was supposed to be a
bit more chatting but so many people had brought in stuff to show that we
didn't get much chance. Nick started of with a teaser for this years
Treasure Hunt and a request for names of people who were interested. Don't
worry if you missed it, he will be asking again! There were several A/V
presentations, a couple of slide shows and even a brief talk about
photobooks by new members Sally. Thanks to everyone who contributed and
especially to Mrs Holding for the food. |
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16th August
This was our third and
final Summer Schools
lectures and it was my turn (Steve Wood) to take up the baton. My brief was
to cover what you can do after you have spent all day slaving over a hot
camera. I tried to ease people gently into the minefield that is image
manipulation by giving an introduction to Photoshop Elements, Photoshop and
GIMP.
Despite this being the worlds most boring subject, I hope some people were
given a bit of knowledge and the confidence to have a go and start climbing
that steep learning curve. I finished off with a look at what to do after
you have turned your snaps into masterpieces, including such things as
publishing to websites and printing. Thank you to Martin (I think that's
your name) for helping me set the equipment up. |
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9th August
For the second of our
Summer Schools lectures Nick Holowka gave an excellent talk on composition.
Titled 'Composition - Think a Better Image', he presented it as a countdown
of his top twenty tips and backed it up with some great images. Nowadays,
you can let the camera do all the work taking the photo and you can fix most
things with the computer, but it is the composition that will make or break
it as a good photograph. If you missed Nick's talk, or are simply looking
for a refresher on photography skills, go to the 'Information' tab to
download a PDF of his talk. Thanks, Nick. |
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2nd August
It is that time of the
year again and tonight kicked off the first of our Summer Schools lectures.
John Bickerdike started us off with camera basics. He covered a huge range
of subjects including camera types, lenses, photographic basics (aperture,
shutter speed etc), digital sensors and camera controls. It got a bit heavy
at times but I think that by the end, everybody had a better understanding
of how cameras work. Thanks John. |
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26th July
Time for our third Clubman
competition of the year and it was very well supported with around 75 images
entered. Judge Brian Hemsworth gave a wide spread of marks to try to
separate the field but still had to give top marks to seven images.
Congratulations to Mike Crowther for his First and Third places in the
Digital and to Les Forrester for his win in the Print. Also, well done to
Trevor for his first ever 20 which got him Second place in the Digital.
Thank you to all who entered, especially those who printed, and to all those
who helped with the equipment. |
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19th July
I was wrong in my
predictions about the members evening on Monday the 19th! I thought there
would be lots of images from the table top night, the Stanley Ferry outing and
the sunny weather in general. There was just one set of images from Stanley
Ferry and they were mine! It was actually an evening of A/V with, if I
counted correctly, five great presentations put to a broad spectrum of
music. David Kershaw did an interesting piece about fly killing and focus
stacking which I tried to match with a look at comparing the ISO settings on
my camera. With other topics like holiday, family, motor racing and black &
white, it was a varied and interesting evening. Thanks you to all those who
showed their work and to anyone who helped with the equipment. |
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12th July
It was my turn to get up
front and didn't I make the most of it! I had picked the title, 'Above and
Below', a long time ago thinking I would cover both land based and diving
adventures. I actually talked about my three most recent holidays that
happened to take place 'Above and Below' the clouds, either when climbing
4,000+ peaks or when staying with the Hmong people up in the hills. All
three countries were so good for photography, the animals of Uganda, the
people of Laos and the architecture of Morocco that even I managed to get a
couple of decent ones. Unfortunately my talk went on until quite late -
perhaps I should stick to two holidays per year. |
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5th July
Stanley Ferry was quite
busy on Monday, especially when we descended on the place. There was some
wonderful evening light and even a bit of interesting cloud for anyone who
lifted their camera off the family of swans. I don't think I saw anyone
taking pictures of any of the hundreds of boats that line the canal there,
instead people seemed more interested in the rusty bridges and associated
fixtures and fittings. It was good to see a lot of new faces there and to
see them having a go. As usual, I look forward to the next members evening
to see how other people tackled the place and what they saw that I didn't. |
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28th June
Tonight brought John Gardner
back again, this time with the lovely Maddy in tow. Spotting that there were
quite a few new faces in the audience, John started off with the basics of
studio lighting building up to a detailed explanation of the lighting setup
he was using. Then, in usual Light Night fashion, people formed an orderly
queue and took turns taking shots of the model. True to John's word, Maddy
worked the camera as much as the photographer and I saw some excellent
images being 'chimped'. Thanks to John for a great night and thank you to
the two guys who, despite it being their first visit, helped us to put stuff
away. Other members take note :o)
The un-mounted A4 competition that was taking place alongside the model
shoot was won by David Kershaw with my favourite image of the evening of the
Angel of the North and that superb sky. |
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21st June
This evening saw our old
friend John Gardner give a How-to on Table Top photography. Despite his
confession that it wasn't his sort of thing he covered all the bases from
lenses to lighting and explained how it could be done on the cheap. He then
invited everyone up to have a go using several prop tables and some of his
own equipment. The results that I saw were mixed but this evening showed how
simple it is so I expect members to have a go themselves and invest the
extra time and care needed to get winning results. Thanks, John. |
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14th June
Stella Gambling was the guest speaker
for this evening, talking about the role of photography on fine art. If
anyone who attended could give me some details on how it went then I will
publish them here. |
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7th June
This was the second of our annual
Clubman competitions and was judged by Erica Oram. If anyone who attended
could give me some details on how it went then I will publish them here. |
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24th May
It was time for Quest
number two and the subject was 'The Best and Worst of Wakefield'. If I
remember correctly there were submissions from twelve members and two of
those had gone to the trouble of putting together an A/V. Nick started of
with an A/V which happened to be Debbie's first ever attempt and very good
it was too. He then went through all the static images, giving the author
the chance to comment on their work and the audience the chance to chip in
as they usually do. The second and equally good A/V, I think it was by David
Lockton, was used to close of the evening. There was quite a bit of
agreement on some subjects (lots of love for Chantry Chapel, not so much for
Kirkgate Station) but a lot of varied and interesting images. |
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17th May
We had a treat at this
meeting with a great evening of photography presented by Michael Newton of
Hebden Bridge Camera Club.
He told us about one of their members, Thomas Beaumont, who died in 2003 at
the ripe old age of 91. Thomas was an excellent and dedicated wildlife
photographer for many years and had left a legacy of many boxes of slides
covering many subjects. Michael, assisted by Thomas's wife, spent many hours
putting a slideshow together from many of the best images. The result was an
entertaining and informative 40 minutes and a fine memorial to a great
photographer. Thanks, Michael. |
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10th May
Tonight saw the third of
Nick's excellent 'Location, location, location'. After an interesting warm
up about the history of Birstall by Geoff, Nick got on with the main theme
of the evening which was 'Urban Yorkshire'. He first covered the rich
subject that is Leeds before moving on to the more historical location of
York. He finished off with the surprising gem that is Sheffield, using a
circular route round the city that had many opportunities. Chris was up
next, telling us how easy it is to get to Paris now and showing us lots of
images, particularly his forte of street photography. I finished off with
the unveiling of the Event Diary, a new page coming to the website that will
supply lots of locations throughout the year. |
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26th April
Nick Holowka put on
another good night with his 'Click, click, click'. The basic idea was to use
the internet as an inspiration tool and he started with this very website
:o) He then moved on to other local clubs and the YPU, photo sharing sites
like ePhotozine and the big boys like Magnum and Getty. There were sites
showing works by the old masters (Adams, Bresson etc), the wonder that is
National Geographic, our old friends Yorkshire Monochrome and lots more.
There were even some image editing tutorial sites to get you thinking from
that angle. John Boyd finished off the evening with several of his
recommendations.
I think the main lesson that came across was just how powerful search
engines like Google are. Just type in what you are interested in and you
will be presented with many pages of valuable inspiration. Thanks go to Nick
for his hard work, John Boyd, and David Hall for his help on the night. |
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19th April
The Yorkshire Monochrome
Group not only made it but turned up in force. We had the benefit of three
of their members, each with his own large box of excellent prints. They had
images of just about every subject, except fish :o(, in a wide range of
styles from HDR to a sketch effect. They even had a couple in colour! A good
night for mono fans and a few ideas for new locations for several members.
Here is their web address if you want to
know more about them -
Yorkshire Monochrome Group |
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12th April
The first Clubman
competition of he year went without a hitch despite the absence of the
Competition Secretary and her little helper. The judge, Andrew Rothery, was
very strict with lower marks then we may be used to but tempered with sound
comments. Both digital and print were well represented with the usual wide
range of subjects though a surprising lack of snow given the recent weather.
Congratulations to Mike Hart and Brian Holding for winning Digital and Print
respectively. Thank you to David Kershaw for the organisation on the night
and David Hall for his help with the prints. |
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29th March
The inaugural Foto Fun
evening took place tonight and went down very well. We started with the
slides from the Camera Relay which took place at the end of last year.
The slides were a bit of a mixed bag, it's fair to say, with a few errors in
focus and exposure and even a couple of (unintended) double exposures but I
am sure all the comments were taken in good fun. Next up was Guess Who where
the audience had to match the baby/toddler photo with the committee member
which produced even more laughter. A round of what I can only describe as
'photographic Pictionary' taxed the audience a little more though most were
quite easy. We finished the night with a load of those images that people
send you in emails, mostly ones with a high WOW factor. A great night and
lots of thanks go to Nick, David Kershaw and David Hall for all their hard
work. |
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22nd March
The first ever Quest night
took place tonight and was a big success. For those not in the know,
Nick gave us a challenge a couple of weeks ago, namely to get out with the
camera and photograph something 'abstract'. This evening was when all the
photos (almost 200 of them) were shown and commented on by their respective
authors. There were some old images but quite a few people had
obviously been out and had a go, flexing both their shutter release finger
and their grey matter. A good evening, good images and plenty of inspiration
- thanks Nick. |
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15th March
Bill Mahoney gave a great
talk as he told us all about his favourite holiday destination, Kruger
National Park. He started with information about South Africa in
general but focused mainly on Kruger. The information flowed thick and
fast as he detailed everything from Airports to Zebras. He also had
lots of great images of the local wildlife, covering all the bases of
mammals, birds and reptiles - he even had a photo of a spider (but no fish
:o( ). If you are fancying a safari in this area then Bill is the man
to go to. |
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8th March
John Gardner was back on
Monday with his ever popular Light Night. He brought the lovely
Rachael for her first visit to the club and she seemed very professional.
John kept everything simple and stuck to a two light setup for the model
consisting of a large soft primary light on the front and a hair light at
the back. He also threw in a tight spotlight aimed at the background
to act as a halo. He also showed us how good the images looked in
black & white so I expect to see some of those in competitions or on members
night soon. The un-mounted A4 competition was won by Bill mahoney. |
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1st March
The first meeting of the
new club year was aimed at all those that are new to the Photoshop family or
were just too confused to know where to start. Steve Wood kicked off
with the simplest steps he could think of - Crop, Levels and Sharpen.
These moderately simple steps, especially if you ignore Sharpen, should
improve most images without too much trouble. He then explained the
use of the Lasso tool to apply Levels to selected areas which is a good next
step to learn. After the break a couple of video lessons were shown,
the first was also about selective application of Levels, the second one
showed a simple black and white conversion technique. I hope most
people managed to take something away with them. |
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Club news from 2009/10 |
