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For this week’s meeting we were pleased to welcome some members of the Bristol-based Reflex Camera Club. They were spending the week photographing around Keswick and agreed to come along and show us some projected digital images from their club members. Their chairman, Maurice Thompson MBE, started off by showing us images of the club’s activities including studio portraiture and still life sessions in their meeting hall as well as models photographed on location in bars, stately homes and ancient monuments. There were also macro photographs of creepy crawlies taken in their hall and fighter planes taken at a local viewpoint where the photographer was at eye level with the aircraft on their training manoeuvres. Maurice continued by showng images of his own and from other club members who were not present for this Lake District outing.

We were then given short presentations of images by those members present, which proved to be very diverse and thoroughly enjoyable. Examples included landscapes of Machu Picchu in Peru, the Hobbit village in New Zealand where the Lord of the Rings films were made, the annual hot-air balloon festival in Bristol, the gardens of Stourhead and beach scenes local to Bristol and further afield.

Portraiture and people, both posed and candid, featured frequently and perhaps the most striking was an extremely creative series of selfie images in which the photographer was reproduced in various multiple guises and poses in the same image – a plane filled with himself as all the passengers and titled ‘I Wonder Who Is Flying The Plane’ illustrated the humour behind this approach. More familiar to the Keswick Society members were wildlife images of native bird species; less familiar were photos of pet rats! Alison Davies showed us a series of images of her many cocker spaniels (especially Otis, Tilly and Bazil) in various situations, including on the shores of Derwentwater

and which had featured in popular magazines and had won her numerous lucrative prizes.

Julie Kaye’s images took us under the seas to feature not only exotic colourful fish but also abandoned wrecks and their cargo on the seabed. All superbly photographed with her sophisticated underwater equipment.

After the break some members of Keswick Society showed the visiting club samples of our photography. Richard Jakobson led off with photos of Morocco, each one shown in colour and in monochrome and demonstrating how each format could be superior depending upon the subject matter.

Keith Snell followed on with landscape prints taken using intentional  camera motion or mutiexposure techniques to create impressionistic effects.

Finally Ken Rennie showed landscape images which were based around minimalist compositions, demonstrating that less can definitely mean more in photographic artistry.

November’s first meeting was a competition for members who had submitted printed images on the theme of “Hard at Work”. This theme had been chosen by our Chairman, Keith Snell who also took on the task of critiquing and scoring the images.

At the outset Keith said how much he had enjoyed viewing the breadth of subject and the quality of the images. He then explained that he had judged the images based on their photographic quality and also on how well they expressed the idea of “Hard at Work”. He had been fairly liberal when assessing the latter but admitted his liberal stance was a little tested at times!

A total of 23 images were submitted with a range of interpretations of the theme including portraits of various professions “hard at work”, several images clearly with an ironic slant on the theme, street scenes in various locations, images of wildlife working hard and some photo journalistic action shots.

Keith had clearly taken time and effort to review the images and was able to offer for each one submitted advice on what may have improved the photograph and what he found particularly pleasing. He also fulfilled an educational remit in advising the audience of the details of some of the more obscure professions depicted. eg a “scudder” being a leather worker who cleans the hides after they have been tanned.

The images were scored out of 20 and three received top marks; “Hard Day’s Night”

and “Charcoal Maker” by Alan Walker

and “The Caulker” by Richard Jakobson.

Keith was impressed by the exceptional composition of “Hard Day’s Night” with a sharply silhouetted figure and the arching fluid separated from the background but echoing its curve. He liked the subdued toning of “The Charcoal Maker” which emphasised the workers distinctive face. “The Caulker” showed a boatyard worker sealing the cracks between the planks of a wooden hull. Keith thought that the backlighting was effective but the image still managed to show the details in the workers face.

Other high scoring images included “Under Pressure” by Ed Richardson

“The Jewellery Shop” by Tony Marsh ;

and “Clean Sweep” by David Rayment;

Images of all the submitted prints can be viewed on our gallery page:

Hard Work Gallery

At the end of the meeting Keith presented this year’s “Chairman’s Award for Outstanding Service” to Tom Stenhouse. This was made in recognition of Tom’s hard work and dedication over recent years as Programme Secretary. He brought new ideas and enthusiasm to the role and was unstinting in his commitment to ensuring every meeting was set up and ran smoothly.  Keith’s thanks was echoed by the subsequent applause from the members present.

For our last meeting of October we welcomed Lizzie Shepherd, a professional landscape photographer from North Yorkshire, who spoke to us about her journey in photography to find a new inspiration

Lizzie explained how she wanted to find compelling subjects without having the need to travel. Her talk was called Unremarkable Scenes, but unremarkable it was not!

She wanted to find something new, to experiment and be playful and not too formulaic, to find a revelation and see things differently. When showing her stunning images, she explained how she wanted to find continuity through the image, using light, the shadows, reflections, shapes, angles, patterns and varying her depth of field. She found on her journey that she is very drawn to diagonals and verticals which add a great movement through an image.

Lizzie told us that it’s not always about the light, amazing images can be created on rainy dull days. They can be more evocative with the soft light.

She looks for patterns on a big scale and repetition through the image. With blocks of colour and space so the viewer has to work their way around and image. The images have a graphic cleanliness and demonstrate how a busy image, a chaotic scene, can have simple elements of minimalism but there is a definite structure within an image.

Lizzie wants to make sense if an image and looks for scenes where colour can offer a warm and cold contrast or where there are harmonious colours complimentary to each other. She continued to explain how the absence of colour simplifies a busy scene, showing us images that demonstrated her findings.

When creating an image Lizzie want to create intriguing stories and puzzles, placing objects to create a visual puzzle. Scenes that can suggest more than one thing and keep the viewer looking, creating tricks of eye, showing us an image of a reflection of a that had been turned upside down. She described this as Pareidolia – seeing objects or scenes within an image. It certainly made you consider the image longer.

Through the talk we were shown visually stunning and creative images that had great mood and emotion, energy and depth, power and restfulness. Where composition leads to mood and curves and shapes lead the eye. Lizzie has a real ability to capture the sense of a place.

The journey Lizzie start five years ago has left her seeing things she wouldn’t usually see, and she hopes to continue to improve, to try new things and of course to enjoy it.

The night’s talk was presented by Bob Given from Northern Ireland. Bob lives in Belfast and he belongs to the Catchlight Camera Club which is the current FIAP (International Federation of Photographic Art) World Cup holder in photography. The club is also the current Irish Champion .

Bob was given his first camera at the age of 21 and he has been taking photographs ever since. He has been a sports photographer for more than 40 years and is currently employed by Northern Ireland Athletics to photograph their events. Bob used to play rugby but unfortunately had to give up due to injury. He became a rugby referee instead and served for 22 seasons.

Bob showed around 200 images during the evening  which covered a wide range of sports including athletics, cricket, American football, netball, table tennis, baseball, cage fighting (otherwise known as mixed martial arts), Australian rules football and of course rugby. He entertained the audience with humorous accounts of his personal experiences as well as giving practical advice. His love of sport, particularly rugby, was apparent throughout.

While Bob’s superb and prize winning images made sports photography look easy, he made it clear that it is not and that there are many pitfalls to be avoided.  The first of these is simply in choosing and gaining access to a good  position to take images,  both to achieve the best angle for shooting  the action, but also to avoid distracting backgrounds. Bob pointed out that in a number of sports the low level of lighting could be a problem and in others, for example cricket, considerable  patience is required in order to achieve just one or two quality shots.

Bob pointed out that it is useful to have a good knowledge of the sport you are photographing. Choosing the right moment to press the shutter is critical. His advice was “if you see it in the viewfinder you’ve missed the shot”. Anticipation is crucial and Bob’s many years as a rugby referee enables him to predict what will happen next. He also advised that it is essential to ensure you prepare for the event in advance and have the right equipment, particularly lenses, with you.  Even he had been caught out with the wrong lens on the odd occasion! Post processing is also important and Bob explained how he goes about this.

Bob’s expertise is not limited to sports photography and he brought along the twenty prints that comprised his successful Master’s panel. This demonstrated his proficiency in other fields of photography, particularly people and portraiture. His prints illustrated the exacting standards that are required to achieve a Master ‘s distinction with the Photographic Alliance of Great Britain, the highest award that can be achieved.

Bob gave us a most enjoyable an entertaining evening on a subject that was quite different to previous talks.

Julie Walker

More of Bob’s work can be seen at: https://www.facebook.com/bobgivenphotography/

As we have come to expect, we travelled widely with the Walkers, encompassing the length of South America, from the heat of the Atacama desert(at 15,000 feet in the rain shadow of the Andes it is the driest place on earth), down to chilly Tierra del Fuego, across the Beagle Channel from Ushuaia to the Falklands, South Georgia & the Antarctic peninsula.  It almost goes without saying that the photography was superb, but I was particularly struck by their pictures taken with wide angle lenses, that put the wildlife most dramatically in the context of its wild environment.

The terracotta waters of the famous Iguazu falls in Paraguay were five times their normal volume due to flooding & videos took us right into the tumbling cataracts of water.  It was definitely an amazing place to experiment with long shutter speeds, to produce silky jets of water, despite the major problems of photographing in the spray of 400,000 cubic feet of water tumbling over the falls each second.

The Atacama by way of contrast receives less than 1 mm of rainfall per annum & the aquamarine salt pans attract three species of flamingo – the rare Andean, the Chilean & James flamingos which have pink legs.

El Niňo had left its mark & in places had resulted in unusual wild flower displays.  As travel photographers we have to accept what weather conditions prevail at the time of our visit, however well planned, & sometimes things work in our favour!  The mountains were barren but beautiful volcanoes (some still active) which were coloured by iron, copper, lithium, tin, gold & silver. The Valley of the Moon is used by NASA to test moon landings.  The geysers & thermal features of the area are unprotected – so you need to watch your step rather than end up in boiling mud!

We had a quick foray into Buenos Aires for some street photography & to dance the tango with professionals – available for hire

– before moving further south & departing on a Russian “spy” ship for Antarctica.  The Walkers had a lot of bad weather, & their advice was to avoid cyclones!  In the Falkland Islands, which have a population of 3000 people & a million penguins, they saw the beautiful black- browed albatross, the argumentative rock-hopper penguins and the indigenous Cobbs wren.

Cruising further south to South Georgia, the sight of the panorama of Jason Cove with its 180,000 pairs of King Penguins was astounding.

I wished I had been there to absorb the sounds of the birds as well, but possibly not the overwhelming smell!

There were photographs of the overall scene, close-ups

& fascinating abstract art of the penguins’ feather details. There were also remarkable pictures of elephant seal beach master fighting – males can weigh 3 tons, be 20 feet long & are 6 times larger than the poor female.

In the Southern Ocean, amongst 40-foot waves, despite being very cold & very wet, the Walkers took full advantage of the fabulous opportunity to photograph the icebergs,

whales breaching & beautiful birds in the context of the rough seas.

It was an exciting trip, exceptionally well captured by Alan & Julie & it made for an exciting & enjoyable evening.

Rosamund Macfarlane

The judge for our First Open Competition was Tony Potter, ARPS, EFIAP/p, APSA, GMPSA, DPAGB, APAGB, a Northern Counties Photographic Federation judge from West Cumbria.  The 38 prints and 44 projected digital images had been delivered to the judge beforehand and Tony arrived on the evening having awarded a score out of twenty for every print and projected image. Tony discussed each image, commenting on the good points and, in some cases, suggesting where improvements could be made.

The first half of the evening was devoted to the print entries and Tony commented that the prints, in particular, were of a very high standard and that this was reflected in the large number of images awarded a top score. Both prints entered by Julie Walker achieved a top score of twenty and four other Society members were awarded top scores for one of their prints. The winning prints were: ‘Horses Emerging from the Forest’ by Julie Walker:

‘Forest Maidens’ by Julie Walker:

‘The Beast from the East’ by Roland Harries:

‘Brown Hare’ by Carol Minks:

‘Hockney by the Sea’ by Ken Rennie:

and ‘The Laird’ by Alan Walker:

At the end of the print judging, Tony selected his personal overall winning print and this was ‘Hockney by the Sea’ by Ken Rennie.

Two prints scored nineteen points and these were: ‘Off Street Parking’ by Roland Harries:

and ‘Misty Great Bay’ by David Woodthorpe:

Another print by David Woodthorpe, entitled ‘Chinese Bridge’, was awarded eighteen points:

Prints by two other members also achieved scores of eighteen and these were: ‘On Reflection’ by Richard Jakobson:

and ‘Great Grey Owl Hunting’ by Carol Minks:

After a break Tony then reviewed the projected digital images. Of these six received a top score : ‘Teenage Tantrums’ by Keith Snell:

‘The Widow, rural Mongolia’ by John Macfarlane:

‘Spring Growth’ by Ken Rennie:

‘Christine in Mauve’ by Julie Walker:

‘No Trespassers’ by Alan Walker:

and ‘Puffin Returning to Sea’ by Tricia Rayment:

Tony selected ‘Teenage Tantrum’ by Keith Snell as his overall winning projected digital image.

Three projected images received scores of nineteen and these were: ‘Carnival Time’ by Ted Jordan:

‘Evening Light’ by Richard Jakobson:

and ‘Under Warnscale Beck’ by John Macfarlane:

Images with scores of eighteen were ‘At Full Pelt’ by David Woodthorpe:

‘Reed Bunting with Damselfly’ by David Woodthorpe:

‘Never to Fly Again by Michael Rowlinson:

‘I Told You It Was Slippy’ by Keith Snell:

‘The Happy Window’ by Carol Minks:

‘Face Off’ by Alan Walker:

and ‘Phalarope Hunting for Food’ by Tricia Rayment:

David Rayment thanked the judge for all his hard work judging and commenting on the images.

Please note that next Wednesday’s  meeting will be held in Crosthwaite Parish Rooms, Main Street, Keswick, CA12 5NN ( opposite 117 Main St, Keswick)

There was a warm welcome for Howard Brown at the society’s meeting tonight.  Howard is an amateur photographer, a member of Chorley Camera Club and an expert in seascape photography.  Indeed his photograph of Mangersta Sea Stacks from the Isle of Lewis was short-listed for the Scottish Landscape Image of the Year 2016.

Although Howard’s talk was called ‘Simple Seascapes’ it soon became apparent that his work, the preparation for it and often the degree of physical difficulty actually reaching some of the remote locations, meant that his seascapes could hardly be described as simple.  The first part of Howard’s presentation centred upon the technical and practical considerations of being a seascape photographer.  For all photography the essential ingredient is good light but this is even more critical when taking the striking landscape photographs which are almost always taken during the hour or so either side of sunrise or sunset.  The added complications with seascapes are the tide and the continually changing point at which the sun will be at the horizon throughout the seasons.  There are several phone apps which help with some of these problems and Howard explained which he used.  Howard is meticulous in his planning and will often sketch out the scene beforehand to get the best composition.  He is an advocate of the British Army adage of the 7Ps – Proper Planning and Preparation Prevents P*** Poor Performance.  I’ll leave the reader to consider the fifth P!!

Most of Howard’s seascapes are taken around the British Isles, but the highest concentration of lighthouses, which are in the main very photogenic, are apparently around the Brittany coast so this area is a great attraction to him, too.

The second half of Howard’s presentation entailed a detailed explanation of his approach to a number of his images.  Through his photographs of seascapes taken all around the British Isles he explained his journey from a novice photographer only seven years ago to the expert he has become in such a short period of time.  He has moved from the use of heavy vignettes and the use of HDR (High Dynamic Range) software to give punch to his images post production, to his current approach of light touch adjustments in Adobe Lightroom.  In order to achieve the right image in camera Howard uses an array of filters and light metering equipment and constantly monitors the changing light in his long exposure shots.  His images varied from very dramatic punchy colour images, through monochrome to much more subtle almost pastel colours. He demonstrated his significant progress in getting the light and composition right in camera thereby minimising the amount of computer manipulation to produce his quite outstanding images.

All in all this was a very informative presentation which was much more than a simple display of a presenter’s images but was a detailed analysis all that is required both technically and practically to get outstanding photographs

David Woodthorpe (Vice-chairman)

This was the opening meeting  of the 2018-19 season and, as is traditional, involved a presentation by the Society’s chairman, Keith Snell,  called “Winter Wonderland”. This was based on images taken on a trip that Keith undertook to Yellowstone National Park this January. To start Keith explained a little about the human history and geological past of the area. Yellowstone was the first National Park in the USA, being signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant in 1872 and the largest major volcanic activity there blew up about 600,000 years ago and produced approximately 600 cubic miles of rock and ash having a major impact on the whole global weather system and ecology and left a caldera some 40 to 70 miles across. Geo-thermal action persists with multiple hot springs and geysers scattered around most of the park and Keith showed pictures of marvellous cascading terraces of pools formed by mineral rich hot springs running down a hillside. Exotically colourful algae transform the hot pools and edges of geysers.

Keith then moved on to landscape shots of the dramatic snow covered mountains, forests,  rivers and lakes and the wonderful wildlife there which ranged from Trumpeter Swans to Moose. His group were very lucky to see not only large herds of Bison but to be able to capture a brief head to head encounter between two bulls and, in one beautiful and striking image, a line of bison walking along a ridge skyline above a perfectly situated lone tree, all surrounded by deep snow. This luck continued with the news of a killed Bison close to the road where, with patience, they were able to observe a wolf pack approach, wait for the alpha male to start feeding and then howl their appreciation of full stomachs before playing with one another in the snow. A short video added to the magic.

Keith also visited the Grand Tetons National Park, which holds a dramatic mountain range, with the highest mountain, Grand Teton, rising to 13,775 feet (4,199 m) above sea level. The weather here was bitterly cold and a toe and finger tip threatening 2hour wait next to a traditional farm barn in minus 20 degrees was eventually rewarded by 60 seconds of lifting mist which revealed glorious warm light illuminating the mountain peaks behind the barn before the mist closed down the view again. The resulting image was magical and summed up the harsh beauty of this portion of the United States.

After the break some of the members who had scored the highest points in last season’s internal competitions spoke for a few minutes each about how they had achieved their shots. Keith Snell started with a picture of an Eagle Owl peering round a tree at us the viewer, Keith was rather shamefaced about it as he knew that the owl was sat on the wrist of its handler, albeit hidden behind the tree, but the shot was extremely striking.  Tony Marsh then talked about a picture of a perky Wren atop a gate post, David Woodthorpe discussed shots of a flying Kingfisher and a Jay landing on a branch, both taken in hides near Kirkcudbright and Ken Rennie analysed how he had built up three of his exquisite landscape shots.

Tony Marsh