Summary of club activities during the 2018-19 season

7 July - An interesting visit to the Coultershaw Wharf and Beam Pump in West Sussex. Despite light drizzle for most of the morning we were inside most of the time.There were excellent displays regarding the history and working details of the equipment which a former Lord Egremont had installed to provide water for the population of Petworth. The volunteers on duty had excellent knowledge regarding the project, and with which they have been very involved during the restoration project. We were able to watch the equipment started up and running. It was possible to explore the site and view both the mill pond and Archimedes screw which supplies green electricity to the National Grid. Some of the money thus earned is given back to the project by the current Lord Egremont in order to restore the equipment and maintain the site.

Beam pump

 

20 June - There was a good turnout of members for our outside visit: an evening walk along the banks of the River Wey from Shalford to Farncombe lock. The tranquility of the river on a reasonably warm summer evening, broken occasionally by passing walkers, cyclists, kayakers and canal boats, provided plenty of photo opportunities. We ended the evening in the usual manner for weary photographers with welcome refreshments at a local hostelry!

Wey1    Wey2

 

13 June - Final meeting, AGM and presentation of 2018-19 club awards.
The Chairman presented the trophies as follows:

Trophy Awarded to
Colour prints Swales Parry
Monochrome prints Anne Ingram
PDIs Mike Hall
Reg Mullard trophy Miles Thompson
Outside events Ann Smith
Chairman's challenge Chris Flood
Best image in Exhibition Swales Parry
Annual achievement shield Mike Harrison

6 June - A review of the images taken at the Table-top evening held in April. It was fascinating to see the varied ways each member tackled certain subjects and the level of creativity achieved in producing images from what was a jumble of items on the tables at the time, none more so than that of a metal grasshopper or a small bust!
During the second half of the evening Peter Jillians spoke about how he gained his LRPS accreditation and showed us his panel of images. It was interesting and informative to learn how Peter had set about it and where he had sought advice. The result was a well-balanced, beautifully controlled and printed set of pictures.

30 May - The Chairman’s challenge awards 2019. The set subject was close-up photography and from the 50 images (22 prints and 28 PDI’s) entered in the competition, Ann Smith judged Chris Flood’s print Hoar frost pattern through glass as the overall winner. The runner-up was Peter Jillians with his PDI Ethereal snowdrop. The full table of results can be found in the "members area" using this link:   Chairman’s challenge awards 2018-19

Hoar frost    Snowdrop
Hoar frost pattern through glass by Chris Flood and Ethereal snowdrop by Peter Jillians

23 May - Tom Way, a fine art and wildlife photographer, gave a superb presentation Wildlife through the lens. Within his talk Tom goes into what it takes to be a wildlife photographer, talking about the importance of light, the right angles and the emphasis on trying to compose a sellable image when looking through the lens. The first half was mainly about his African photography and in the second half he showed images from his travels around other parts of the world. He favours large prints over PDIs and most certainly emphasises quality rather than quantity. Using Canon equipment, he takes in RAW, then tends to use Lightroom for the necessary adjustments, and is unwilling to change the image through cloning out unwanted stray grasses, leaves, etc. in order to comply with the strict rules of international wildlife photography. He has endless patience waiting for the right moment, in the right light – the latter being very important. He takes pictures that please him, not a camera club judge, and the images he showed were stunning. The use of monochrome images, and the larger animals are his forte. Undoubtedly his talk proved to be the best of the club year.
More information can be found at Tom Way’s website: Tom Way Photography

The following images, copyright of Tom Way and reproduced with permission, is a sample of the type of photography we were privileged to see during his presentation.

Lion by Tom Way    Elephant by Tom Way

16 May - Dave Brooker, a former member, judged the 67 images (39 prints and 28 PDI’s) entered in the Outside events/annual set subject awards 2019 competiton. Despite one of the favourite subjects being the deer in the rutting season at Petworth Park just two such images were held back by the end of the evening.

Congratulations to Ann Smith for her overall winning entry Light - Music and to the runner-up Phil Copestick with his print Guildford Christmas lights 2018. The full table of results can be found in the "members area" using this link:   Outside events awards 2018-19

Light - music   Echonopsis flower
Light - Music by Ann Smith and Guildford Christmas lights 2018 by Phil Copestick

9 May - Tony Baverstock, an Honorary Member and a former chairman of the club for many years, returned to judge our annual Best print and PDI competiton 2019. he was asked to determine which images he thought were best from those which had gained a ten during the seasonal competitions and/or gained a first place in the recent Annual Exhibition.

Congratulations to Chris Flood, the overall competition winner with his monochrome print Desiccated tree trunk with sandstorm behind. Congratulations also to Ann Smith for her winning PDI Echonopsis flower which came second overall. The full table of results can be found in the "members area" using this link:  Best print and PDI Awards table 2019.

Desiccated tree trunk   Echonopsis flower
Desiccated tree trunk with sandstorm behind by Chris Flood and Echinopsis flower by Ann Smith

4 May - The outing to Polesden Lacey was quite well attended, with some of the members choosing to make the most of timed visits to see the House interior.

2 May - Keith Newton LRPS judged our fifth and final open PDI and monochrome prints competiton. He gave a considered opinion on all the 36 prints and 28 PDIs and explained his reasoning holding back a large number of images and awarding many high marks including a score of 10 for three monochrome prints and four PDIs.

25 April - David Smith LRPS critiqued the 60 images (35 prints and 25 PDIs) entered in our annual Reg Mullard flora and fauna competition. Congratulations to Miles Thompson, the overall winner with his beautiful image Flowering grass. Congratulations also to Swales Parry for his print Water buffalo with red billed ox pickers which came 2nd overall. The full table of results can be found in the "members area" using this link Reg Mullard Awards table 2019.

Flowering grass   Water buffalo
Flowering grass by Miles Thompson and Water buffalo with red billed ox pickers by Swales Parry

11 April - Rob Bonfield of Woking PC judged our fifth and final Open Colour Print competition of the season. Rob, a new judge to the club, gave explanations for all his decisions and he certainly had a definite eye on sharpness. He congratulated the club on the high standard of the 42 entries and awarded a score of 10 to three of the images and 9½ to five others.

4 April - We held a practical table top evening when members photographed various objects placed on display. Members could then arrange the objects and lighting as they wished and this generated a lot of discussion. It will be interesting to see the results of their creative efforts at the penultimate club meeting on 6 June.

30 March - The outing to Brooklands was well supported and the weather was glorious. After the first collection of old racing cars, the group spread out to photograph other parts of the museum, namely the aviation factory, sheds and park and the London bus museum, meeting up for an early lunch break and later, a cup of tea. Exhibits in museums are often difficult to shoot because of the lighting, specular reflections, busy backgrounds and restricted viewing angles so it will be interesting to see how many images from this visit are entered into the club's outside visits competition in May.

28 March - A big thank you to Chris Flood for explaining much about Lightroom and working in tandem with both that and Photoshop Elements. It was obvious from the quality of the demonstration that Chris gave a lot of time and thought into preparing this presentation/workshop.

23 March - The Cranleigh Camera Club’s annual exhibition was held in Cranleigh Village Hall. The exhibition has been running annually for many years, providing an impressively varied and interesting range of colour and monochrome images, both printed and projected on screen. On display were 245 photographs corresponding to a wide range of different subjects, which included an open category allowing free choice (for example, street photography, architecture, sport, or still life), landscape, nature, portraits, and panels grouping several related images together.

Exhibition 1   Exhibition2
A category entitled “digital art” covered images constructed with digital software from one or more photographs as expressions of image-makers’ creative imagination.

Best in ExhibitionThe exhibition entries were assessed by David Mendus, a highly experienced judge of photographic work and Swales Parry was awarded Best Image in the Exhibition for his stunning image of Cat Bells in the Lake district.

Home-made refreshments were available and a well-supported raffle.
See winning exhibits 2019

 

 

 

 

 

21 March - Jan and Lyn Roberts gave a most informative presentation on the Hawaii Islands, which had been excellently researched and presented. The photography was good, showing some stunning landscapes and very interesting birds too. Their talk took us to three islands of the group: the administrative capitol island of Oahu; Hawaii (the Big Island) which is the furthest east; and Kauai which is the furthest west and also known as the ‘real Hawaii’. No doubt the talk will have inspired many members to put Hawaii on their list of places to visit.

Below is a sample of the type of photography we saw during the presentation, copyright Jan Roberts and reproduced with permission.

Big Island by Jan Roberts  Oahu shore by Jan Roberts   Pearl Harbour by Jan Roberts   Waipoo Falls by Jan Roberts

14 March - PDI and Mono Print competition evenings are always a little pushed for time but the judge David Eastley, LRPS, managed to finish within time, giving a fair critique. Thanks to the word ‘cat’ in the Set Subject sections, cathedrals featured in many of the images. In the Monochrome competition Anne Ingram and John Warbrick scored 10 in the open section and Chris Flood and Ann Smith scored 10 for the set subject. In the PDI competition Norman Price and Pete Baldrey both scored 10 in the open section and Swales Parry and Phil Copestick scored 10 for their set subject images.

7 March - Nigel Chapman presented several of his winning RHS print panels and a collection of his books of various photographic trips and plant collections with particular emphasis on pattern, design and light. It was a very relaxed, informal evening with plenty of opportunity to scrutinise the prints close up. Hopefully Nigel’s work will have stimulated ideas to put into practice.

Some examples of his work, copyright of Nigel Chapman and reproduced with permission, can be seen below.

For more information visit his website at https://www.nwachapman.co.uk

Agave    Silver Birch     Tillandsia

   Rannoch Moor   Harris

6 March - Three way competition between Cranleigh, Godalming and Haslemere judged by Gordon Rae. Whilst we came second we were given more tens than Godalming (one of the strongest clubs in the SPA). The overall scores are show in the table below:

Cranleigh Godalming Haslemere
172½ 175½ 161

23 February - Angel Karney organised a well-attended visit to Guildford Cathedral with eleven of us spending the morning wandering at will with our cameras and tripods. The modern architectural style of the cathedral provided excellent photographic opportunities with good lighting and bright interior, not often found in many of our more historic cathedrals.

21 February - The 4th Colour Print competition included the set subject of having the word ‘cat’ in the title. Although some members thought John Warren, the judge for the evening, was tough in his marking generally, he still gave a score of 10 to seven images and 9½ to two others. Congratulations to: Swales Parry (x2 images), Norman Price, Chris Flood, Angela Karney, John Warbrick and Mike Harrison all scoring a 10.

14 February - A number of club members presented a selection of themed images for a panel. This was a successful, relaxed evening when we learned from one another. It did not matter that some themes were not made into a panel - it was more about the thinking that goes into producing a cohesive set of images, not only subject-wise but placing and arrangement, to title or not, etc. Whether mono or colour, dark dramatic lighting on wet streets, elegant architecture, travel, or images taken closer to home, the themes were all interesting and enjoyable, and it was also good to see work from those often quieter members.

7 February - Our 3rd PDI and mono prints competition was judged by Ken Scott who gave a reasoned critique of the 34 mono and 25 PDI images on display. Congratulations to those whose images scored 10, namely: Norman Price (one mono and one PDI), Angela Karney (one mono) and Ann Smith (two PDIs). Four PDI and two mono images were awarded a score of 9½.

31 January - Unfortunately the presentation Wildlife through the lens by Tom Way had to be postponed due to bad weather and was re-schedule to 23 May 2019.

24 January - Graham Johnston judged our third colour print competition and gave a reasoned critique of the 44 images and awarded a score of ten to four of them. Congratulations to: Chris Flood for two of the images and to Swales Parry and Anne Ingram. Four other images were awarded a score of 9½.

17 January - A workshop and critique evening, which provided members with a golden opportunity to have their photographs informally but constructively critiqued by fellow members and to receive advice on not only where but also how an image could be improved, especially if intended for use in competition.

10 January - Ruari Cummings ARPS gave a comprehensive and well-researched audio visual talk on The Hebridean Island Dream, concentrating mainly on the islands of Colonsay and Oransay. Covering the topography of the islands, sea and sand, weather, places of interest and the lives of five particular islanders, each sequence was set to music and explored in some detail the beauty and way of island life. Ruari immersed us in his subject and was able to convey a sense of the tranquillity which may be found there. A most enjoyable and professionally produced evening and one which will be remembered for a long time.

Some images from his talk ("Along the sand", "Charismatic Kiloran" and "A round with Keith"), copyright of Ruari Cumming and reproduced with permission, are shown below.

Along the Sand Charasmatic Kiloran A Round with Keith

20 December - An evening trip to Guildford to capture the Christmas lights. We were lucky it was dry and not too chilly and the evening proved a good exercise in practicing low light photography in the company of others.
The results of some of our efforts can be found in the pictures below.

Ed Hull1
Photo by:     Ed Hull
Miles Thompson 1
Photo by:     Miles Thompson
Phil Copestick 1
Photo by:     Phil Copestick
Phil Copestick 2
Photo by:     Phil Copestick
Ed Hull 2
Photo by:     Ed Hull
Phil Copstick 3
Photo by:     Phil Copestick
Photo by:     Angela Karney
Ed Hull 3
Photo by:     Ed Hull
Miles Thompson 2
Photo by:     Miles Thompson
Ed Hull 4
Photo by:     Ed Hull


 

13 December - The Christmas party is perhaps one of the club highlights and this year was no exception. Members and partners were treated to mulled wine on arrival followed by a delicious three-course meal. It was a wonderful evening of friendship and fun, with a quiz to boot! The Chairman revealed her Chairman’s Challenge for the rest of the club year: taking photographs in close up. Whatever camera you have and whether or not you own a macro lens, she believes everyone should be able to get a close-up image of their chosen subject.

6 December - Our annual Match-a-Print competition provided an entertaining evening with much heckling and good humour. Although only half the size of the gentlemen’s team the ladies finished only one point behind. Our thanks to Sue Morley, a past Chairman, for bravely adjudicating the match: she enjoyed the evening and was glad of the opportunity to catch up with those members she had not seen for a while.

29 November - David Mendus judged our 2nd monochrome prints and PDI competitions, Reflections. The set subject gave rise to some original work and he made positive comments on the standard and variety achieved by club members. It was also pleasing to note that one or two images previously shown at an internal critique workshop had been worked on and achieved high marks in the competition.

24 November - Cranleigh Camera Club competed in the SPA ICC prints competition at East Horsley Village Hall. A set of the club’s November entries can be seen by going to the Gallery Archive menu in the Gallery tab above.

22 November - Ann Smith demonstrated a technique for making a PDI panel using Photoshop Elements and she later supplied a set of instructions, see link below to download. After her demonstration we held a critique workshop of members’ PDIs. (Link to Instructions)

19 November - Cranleigh Camera Club visited Ludshott Camera Club for a friendly PDI competition judged by Walter Benzie, Hon. FRPS. The results were:

Section / Club CCC Scores LCC Scores
Natural History 100½ 105
Open 124 132

15 November - Rob Bonfield from Woking judged our 2nd round colour print competition, Reflections, matching his comments to the marks awarded well. It was the first of our Set Subjects and it was pleasing to note the thought which had gone into many of the images.

On 10 November we went on a visit to Hascombe Hill, Surrey and were gifted with glorious weather and plenty of autumnal colour. These outings are very much social in nature as well as providing an opportunity to explore new ground, gaining experience and discussing and getting advice from other members on photographic problems. See selection of members’ images below including an example of a Panel of images courtesy of Ann Smith.

broken fence landscape Phil Copestick Phil Copestick 2 Ann Smith Ann Smith 2 Angela Karney Ann Panel

8 November - Bev Pegram and Ann Smith showed how to produce photographic panels and used their submissions for accreditation to the RPS as examples. They explained how the theme and photographs were chosen and how important it was to achieve a visual balance as well as technical competence when the images are displayed.

3 November 2018 - Cranleigh Camera Club were delighted to assist in photographing this year's Cranleigh Bonfire and Fireworks Display. The Cranleigh and District Lions and the Bonfire Boys do a fantastic job raising money for charity and once again put on a wonderful display for the residents of Cranleigh and visitors. Although the weather on the evening was good, photographing an outdoor event like this can pose big challenges for photographers, who have to cope with poor light, drifting smoke, large crowds and restricted access. However a number of club members were up for the challenge as you can see from their photographs below.


Chris Rogers     Chris Flood

See more images by following this link.

1 November - Rob Irvine, a professional photographer and lecturer at Westminster University, gave a talk titled From Capture to Print. On location with students, he described how he sets up environmental portrait shots and uses off-camera flash to provide modelling which enable his subjects to stand out from the background.

Rob irvine    Rob Irvine 2    Rob Irvine 3

(Photos copyright Rob Irvine and reproduced with permission.)

25 October - Roy Williamson judged the first of our PDI and mono print competitions. Roy had a hard task having to critique thirty four mono prints and thirty PDIs in a single evening. He scored five mono prints 10 and two 9½ and in the PDI section scored two 10 and two 9½.

On Saturday 20 October a very good turnout of half the membership braved an early start for our visit to Petworth Park and, after the mist cleared leaving brilliant sunshine to warm our backs, the clicking of multiple shutter buttons could be heard as the roe deer stags, with their hinds looking on, rutted and manoeuvred for our benefit.

Below are samples of the flora and fauna seen during the visit.

deer landscape flora ann smith

 

18 October - David Southern’s passion for the natural world is reflected in much of his photography and his work has featured in a number of books, magazines and exhibitions, including WWF publications, diaries and calendars. He is an experienced public speaker and a member of the Parhelion Photography Collective and has won competitions, including Outdoor Photographer of the Year and The Scottish Nature Photography Awards. David gave a terrific presentation of his wildlife and Surrey landscapes photographs and included a few recent Northumberland images for good measure. Being an early riser his images clearly demonstrated the advantages of the quality of early morning light especially when a mist is present.

11 October - David Smith, LRPS, CPAGB, the current President of the SPA, judged the first Colour Print competition. There were forty entries and, in what was a closely fought competition, he awarded the maximum score of 10 to five images and 9½ to six others.

4 October - Miles Thompson chaired our third meeting of the season and, along with the more experienced club members, critiqued projected images and made suggestions on how they might be improved and how to submit PDIs for competition.

27 September - Our second meeting was an informal print critique. Prints were displayed on the illuminated easel and critiqued by the more experienced members who offered helpful advice on possible ways of improving the image.
Also during the evening, Mike Harrison demonstrated a method for mounting prints for competition.

20 September - We started the new 2018-19 club season with a relaxed and informal opening meeting. Members brought along recent prints of photographs taken during the summer break with each author providing a brief narrative. Some were opportunistic images, some out of character with the particular member, and some were experimental. However, it was an opportunity to share with others images which were not necessarily taken with competition in mind. During refreshments members mingled with prospective new members and discussed the prints.

5 July 2018   –  - We had an excellent turnout of members and partners for our evening walk along the banks of the River Wey from Shalford to St Catherine's lock. The tranquility of a beautiful warm summer evening, broken occasionally by people walking, cycling and having fun in boats, gave plenty of photo opportunities. We rounded off the day with welcome refreshments at a local hostelry. The following images capture some of the atmosphere of the walk.

Image 1 Image 2 Image 3 Image 4 Image 5 Image 6 Image 7 Image 8 Image 9 Image 10 Image 11

 

 

 

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