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Newsletter 20th March 2025

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On Thursday we held an inter-club competition with Vera International Photo Club (VIPC) of Spain. This was an on-line event and our first international competition. We had a total of 29 people witnessing the competition 15 of which were from Wallingford. Each Club entered 20 images with no more than 2 from any one author. The competition was judged by Michael Lurie of Stoke Poges Camera Club. Each image was scored out of 20, the Club with the highest overall score will be the winner. It was a tight competition running neck and neck until the held-back images were finally scored. In the final event there were only 3 points separating the Clubs and I am pleased to announce that Wallingford were the winners with a total score of 339 points to VIPC’s score of 336 points. The Judge also chose his top images with the following positions;

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• 1st – ‘Coralie’ - by Vivian Dacie Ward of VIPC

• 2nd– ‘Bucachaille Etive More Scotland’ - by Lucie Parrott of Wallingford

• 3rd – ‘Little arrangement’ - by Frank Notteboom of VIPC

 

The event went well and we offered VIPC the opportunity, if they so wish, to have a re-match next year.

Thank you to everyone involved in putting this event together particularly, the Image Selection Committee, Wendy Reed, Judith Pignon and Alastair McCormack.

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There is no meeting next Thursday as we have our next Day Out on Saturday 29th March. Following the members poll we were originally planning to go to Bristol but unfortunately due to engineering works there are no trains between Reading and Bristol on that day. We have therefore decided to revert the 2nd most popular choice, London Paddington Basin. Please let me know if you will be participating in the Day Out so I can get an idea of numbers.

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The following week 3rd April is a Club Night when it is planned for members who were on the Day Out to show a selection of their images. Also on that night Andy King will be presenting the key opportunities arising from the recent discussions about increasing membership.

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We have recently sent out a survey to members to get feed-back on what you would like to see included in the programme for next season. We have had only 10 responses so far, the deadline is Monday 24th March. This is your opportunity to have your say on how next year’s programme will look so please take a few minutes to complete and return the survey.

 

Regards

Paul Ross

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Newsletter 13th March 2025

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On Thursday we held our annual Portfolio and Architecture Competition with 18 members in attendance. There were 14 prints entered into the Architecture Competition and 15 Portfolio DPIs. Our Guest Judge for the competitions was Kevin Day. Kevin had a difficult task in selecting the top images but after much deliberation he chose the winners who were;

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• Architecture – David Gristwood – Lloyds Building

• Portfolio – Nigel Glover Wright – Bats

 

Congratulations to the winners together with the runners up and those whose images were commended or highly commended. Full results will be posted on the website in due course.

Those whose prints were in the top three, commended or highly commended please send a digital copy to the Image Bank.

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Next week, on the 20th of March we have an inter-club competition with Vera International Photo Club (VIPC) of Spain. This is an on-line event and contrary to previously advertised, it will not now be a hybrid as running on-line meetings in the Pavilion presents some technical problems.

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The format will be; Each Club has entered 20 images with no more than 2 from any one author. The competition will be judged by Michael Lurie. Each image will be scored out of 20, the Club with the highest overall score will be the winner. A link to join in the event from home will be sent out in due course. Please log-in and cheer Wallingford on.

Our next event will be the Day Out on the 29th March. I have put out a poll with 4 suggested locations. To date I have had 12 responses please take 5 minutes to complete the poll before Monday.

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The following week 3rd April is a Club Night when it is planned for members who were on the Day Out to show a selection of their images. Also on that night Andy King will be presenting the key opportunities arising from last week’s discussions about increasing membership.

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The time is approaching when we need to start putting together next season’s programme. We will shortly be sending out a survey to members to get feed-back on what you would like to see included in the programme. This is your opportunity to have your say on how next year's programme will look, so when you receive it please take 5 mins to complete and return it.

 

Regards

Paul Ross

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Newsletter 27th February 2025

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On Thursday night the Intimate Landscapers competition was held on Zoom. 99 people from various competing Clubs logged-in to witness the Competition. I counted 10 Wallingford members who had logged-in. The event commenced with a run-through of all the images. Each image was then shown and discussed by the Judges and the score revealed. The Judges for the Competition were Maria Leekblade and Tony Oliver who took turns in commenting on alternate images. The scores had been agreed in advance of the meeting by the Judges. Finally the total score for each Club was revealed and the winning Club was Maidenhead CC with a total score of 91. Wallingford came joint 7th out of 14 with a total score of 80 points. Whilst it is a little disappointing that we did not do better, we were up against some much larger Clubs and it was an improvement on last year when we came 14th!

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One of our images by Gordon Roberts, ‘’Snow Islands’’ scored 19 and was commended by the Judges. The winning image on the night was ‘’Drop’’ by Maidenhead CC. All the images are available for viewing at Competition Gallery 2025 | Intimate Landscape. ​For those who were not able to watch the Competition live, it was recorded and is available via the following link; IL Recording

 

Next on the 6th March we have a Club Night. In the first half of the meeting we will be focusing on ‘portfolios’ in advance of the Portfolio Competition on the 13th March. We will look at what makes a good portfolio by reference to previous winners and runners up, followed by a demonstration, by Martin Wiggle and Tony Shields on how to put a portfolio together, using differing software. In the second half of the meeting we will have an open discussion on how to increase membership, to get members ideas on how this might be achieved.

 

On the 13th March we have our annual Portfolio and Architecture Competition. The Portfolio Competition is DPI only with one entry per member. The Architecture Competition is Print only with up to two entries per member allowed.

 

We are still looking for suggestions for the next Day Out on the 29th March. We have had a few suggestions but would like more.

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Regards

Paul Ross

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Newsletter 13th February 2025

On Thursday evening 22 members and 1 visitor gathered in the Pavilion for our ever popular ‘You are the Judge’ event. The event was once again hosted by Dave Griffiths to whom we are indebted for all his hard work in putting this event together. The scoring was via smartphones using an on-line form put together by Dave Griffiths. The system worked perfectly without a glitch and allowed the scores to be added up instantly and the average score for each image calculated. There were a lot of scores around the 16 mark with just a few high scoring images. However the event was not about winners or losers the exercise was intended to give us insight in to what makes a good competition image and help us to improve our photography. A big thank you to Dave Griffiths for all the hard work he put into this event.

Next week we are on-line once again for a talk by Justin Minns titled ‘A learning Curve’ Landscape Photography. Justin is an award-winning professional landscape photographer, based in Suffolk, and best known for his atmospheric images of East Anglia. About his talk, Justin say;
‘’Over the last few years I have become increasingly absorbed by landscape photography. This presentation aims to pass along some of the things I have learnt during that time, illustrated by plenty of images.’’ 
I will not be around for this meeting so I will be leaving you in the very capable hands of Alastair.
The following Thursday the 27th February is the Intimate Landscapes Competition which will be held on-line. A link for the event will be sent out once we have it.

Looking further ahead on the 6th March we have a Club Night. There have been a few new members who have been asking about the Portfolio Competition which is planned for the 13th March. We thought that we would have a session on how to put a Portfolio together. Martin has volunteered to show us how he does this using Photoshop, if anyone has an alternative method and wouldn’t mind sharing this with us please let me or any Committee Member know.
Following our discussions at the 9th January meeting on how to increase membership, we thought we would dedicate some time on the 6th for an open discussion to get members ideas on how this might be achieved.
 

Looking even further ahead, on the 29th March we have our next Day Out planned. So far we have visited; Oxford, Didcot Railway Centre and Bath, trips which were enjoyed by all those who participated. I have put out a call for ideas for our next Day Out and when I have had feed back we will probably once again run a poll to canvas members on the most popular destination.

 

Regards

Paul Ross
 

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Newsletter 6th February 2025

On Thursday evening 20 members and 2 visitors logged-in, for an on-line for a talk by Kevin Pigney titled ‘A passion for Wildlife’. After an initial technical hitch, which was resolved with much technical input and expertise, (he turned it off and turned it back on again!), Kevin shared some of his favourite images, but more importantly shared the story behind them including locations, camera settings, how he sets up a project, fieldcraft, and much more. His subjects included a range of UK wildlife from boxing hares, foxes and seals to puffins and other birds. All the images were stunning and well crafted and his tips were informative particularly to those interested in wildlife photography. 

 

This coming Thursday on the 13th February we have our next Club Night when we will hold the ever popular ‘You are the Judge’ event, which will be hosted once again by Dave Griffiths. For those who are not familiar with this event, the way it works is, we form into groups of 4 or 5 people, each group discuss each image and award a score out of 20. Each group will be asked to critique each image as if they were a judge and give their score. This year the scores will be collected by an app on a smartphone to enable the total scores to be added up quickly. So if you have a smartphone, (and know how to use it). Please bring it along. We will need one phone per group. We will send out the link to the app prior to the event.

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We need members to submit images for the event, it will be for DPIs only, no set subject. They do not need to be your best images, it’s not a competition, but it is an opportunity for you to put yourself in the mind of a judge and hopefully learn how to improve your photography for competitions. We are looking for about 30 – 40 images which will need to be submitted no later than midnight this Sunday the 9th February. The images will need to be named and sized as for a competition and sent to the usual competition email address. For details visit; www.wallingfordphoto.club/competitionrules.

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On the following Thursday we have an on-line talk by Justin Minns titled ‘A learning Curve’ - Landscape Photography.

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I mentioned in the last Newsletter Wallingford PC have taken the initiative of organising a new inter-club competition which will be called ‘The Chiltern Challenge’, to be held on-line on Tuesday the 9th April. We are putting together a Selection Committee to pick images from the Image Bank to be entered into the Competition, We also have an inter-club competition with a Spanish Club planned which will be held on the 20th March and the Selection Committee will also select images for this competition. If you are interested in being a member of the Selection Committee please let me know by the 8th February at the latest.

 

Regards

Paul Ross
 

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Newsletter 23rd January 2025

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On Thursday evening, the images to be entered, by the Club, into the Intimate-Landscapes Competition were selected. 21 members and 1 visitor attended the event where 34 entries were whittled down to the final 5 images to go forward for entry in the Competition on the 27th February. Each entry was critiqued particularly in relation to compliance with the Brief and scored out of 20, the top images receiving the highest scores. Some members had more than one top scoring image and as the rules require all five entries to be by different photographers, a vote was taken by members on which images to include in the final five.

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Of the 34 entries, quite a few were considered ‘none compliant’ with the Brief set by the Competition organisers, which was somewhat surprising as much effort had been put into informing members of the nature of the Brief! However, it was generally considered by those in attendance that the final 5 images chosen were the best of the entries submitted and constitute a sound selection of images to be our entries for the Competition.

 

The selected images were:

• Bubbles on a Beach – Dave Griffiths

• Seaweed on the Shore - Gaynor Roberts

• Snow Islands – Gordon Roberts

• Natural Channel – Paul Ross

• Leaning Trunk – Tony Shields

 

The Competition will be held on Thursday the 27th February on Zoom.

 

Next Thursday, 30th January we have our third regular competition, NSSIII, when our guest Judge will be Peter Cox. (Organiser and Chair of the Intimate Landscapes Competition). Prints were collected on Thursday, DPIs will need to be submitted by midnight on Sunday 26th January. Can you please ensure you correctly size and name your DPIs, the details of the protocols are on the Club website.

 

On the following Thursday 6th February we are back on-line for a talk by Kevin Pigney titled ‘A passion for Wildlife’. A link for the meeting will be sent out in due course.

 

Looking further ahead on the 13th Feb. We have our next Club Night when we are planning a ‘You are the Judge’ event, which will be hosted by Dave Griffiths. We will need members to submit images for the event, it will be for DPIs only. They do not need to be your best images, it’s not a competition but it is an opportunity for you to put yourself in the place of a judge. We are looking for about 30 – 40 images which will need to be submitted by the 9th February.

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Regards

Paul Ross

 

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Newsletter 16th January 2025

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This Thursday 21 members and one visitor joined the on-line presentation by Joe Houghton on mono processing. Joe used images provided by our members to demonstrate his approach to mono processing using Lightroom and Nik Silver Efex software. Joe showed us how he isolates various areas of an image using masks in Lightroom in order to edit them individually and uses the various tools available in Lightroom and Nik Silver Efex to adjust the light balance and bring out the details in an image. Joe’s knowledge of the functionality and capability of the software was impressive and I suggest that even seasoned users of these software tools learned something new. Joe kindly allowed us to record the presentation, so for those of you who missed it, or wish to see it again, we will make a link available in the Members area of the website.

 

Next 23rd, we will be selecting the images to go forward to the Intimate Landscape competition. Each member is allowed submit up to 3 entries for selection. Members will be scoring each image out of 20. The top 5 images will go forward as our entries for the external competition.

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Your entries will need to be in by midnight this Sunday 19th January. Note that images that have previously been entered for the Intimate Landscape competition are not eligible, however you can enter images that have been in other competitions. Please ensure that your entries fit the brief and I refer you back to the presentation given in November by Peter Cox on what makes a good intimate landscape image. If you missed this or wish to refresh your memory, visit the website; www.intimate-landscape.com.

 

On the following Thursday, 30th January we have our next competition, NSSIII. You will need to bring your prints with you on the 23rd. DPIs will need to be submitted by midnight on Sunday 26th Jan.

 

Regards

Paul Ross

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Newsletter 9th January 2025

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19 members plus 1 guest attended our first meeting of 2025. The evening commenced with a presentation by the Club Treasure Phil Swarbrick who gave an update on the Club finances and current budget projections for the 2024/25 Season. The current forecast is for a £300-£400 deficit at the end of the season, this deficit will be covered by the Club’s reserves. Phil explained that the main reason for the deficit is lower than anticipated membership. It was generally agreed that to sustain the Club we need to boost the membership and some ideas to further promote the Club were aired. It was agreed that members would send (via email) with their ideas for boosting membership next season and a brain-storming session will be arranged to discuss these ideas on a future Club Night.

 

Following these discussions the members presentations commenced. We had 7 presentations planned but could only manage 6 due to time constraints, (and so the meeting was spared my Street Photography presentation). The presentation subjects were wide and interesting ranging from, sports photography now and in the 1960’s, African wildlife, travel photography from various countries including Chile, Argentina and Italy and landscapes in the Isle of Harris. Charles and Rachel Smith gave a presentation showing how their photography had improved since they became members of the Club which was a great endorsement for membership to anyone wishing to improve their photography. Thank you to all participants for their time putting together excellent and interesting presentations.

 

Next week on the 16th January we will be on-line with Joe Houghton who will be demonstrating ‘Mono processing live’. Joe will be using our member’s images, we would like 15 – 20 images in total. Ideally for each image we would like a RAW and a processed (mono) jpg version of the file. Joe will load both the RAW and processed images into Lightroom. A Onedrive folder has been set up, where you can upload your image files, just need to click here WPC and click the ‘Add New’ button, then ‘Files Upload’ to add your images. To date we only have 6 images uploaded so we need at least 10 more images. If you do not have RAW files an unedited jpg will be okay. If you do not have a mono edited version just upload the original. Please upload your images by midnight on Monday 13th January as we need to get them over to Joe in advance of the evening. I will be sending out a link to log on to GoogleMeet early next week.

 

The following week, 23rd, we will be selecting the images to go forward to the Intimate Landscape competition. Each member is allowed submit up to 3 entries for selection. Members will be scoring each image out of 20. The top 5 images will go forward as our entries for the external competition. Your entries will need to be in by midnight on Sunday 19th January. Note that images that have previously been entered for the Intimate Landscape competition are not eligible, however you can enter images that have been in other competitions. Please ensure that your entries fit the brief and I refer you back to the presentation given in November by Peter Cox on what makes a good intimate landscape image. If you missed this or wish to refresh your memory, visit the website; www.intimate-landscape.com.

 

Regards

Paul Ross

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Newsletter 5th December 2024

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On Thursday evening 15 members were in attendance for a talk by Peter Crane titled; ‘Street Photography - My way’. Peter started by telling us about his approach to street photography and then went on to show us the kit he uses and the camera settings he generally works with.

Peter continued his presentation with a selection of his street photography including some of which were used in his successful ARPS Panel. Peter warned us that some of the images he would show in the second half of the meeting might be considered as un-PC or risqué, these included photos he took on the ‘no trousers tube ride day’ in London and the ‘naked bike ride’.(yes they are real annual events!). The images were discrete and not too much was revealed. Peters presentation style was relaxed, humorous and entertaining which made for a very enjoyable evening.
Next week on the 12th Dec we will be holding our Christmas Social in the Pavillion. We will be running a pub style quiz, covering all the usual pub quiz topics, music, sport, history, film etc. but all with a photography twist to them…. The quiz will be run in small teams and one person in each team will need access to a smartphone to enter answers so that we can see scores in real time. Bryan Sutton has put a lot of time and effort into compiling this quiz so it would be nice to have a good turnout. And if you need any further enticement mulled wine and mince pies will be provided. Martin is doing well in selling squares the Christmas Draw with a hamper of goodies up for grabs. If you have not yet done so, you can still enter next Thursday.

Our first meeting after the Christmas break is on the 9th January 2025 and is a club evening. We have planned an 8x10 session where we ask 8 members to do a 10 minute presentation on any subject of their choice, provided it relates to photography in some way of course. It could be on; your photography passion, your travels, a particular genre, a technical topic or just a random selection of your favourite images, So far we have 4 volunteers to give a presentation, so we could do with a few more. Please let me know if you feel you can contribute. 

Also on the 9th of January, Phil will be presenting an update on the Club finances to keep members informed and provide an opportunity to scrutinise the current financial projections.
 

Looking further ahead on the 16th January we will be on-line with Joe Houghton who will be demonstrating ‘Mono processing live’. Joe will be using our member’s images, we would like 15 – 20 images in total which we will need to get to Joe in advance of the evening. Ideally for each image we would like a RAW and a processed jpg version of the file. Joe will load both the RAW and processed images into Lightroom. He will edit the RAW files live during the session using LR and maybe Nik Silver Efex, talking through his thought processes as he goes, and then bring up the relevant file from the "processed" folder and display both on the screen so we can then have a chat with the member concerned about the differences in approach, vision etc. 
 

So please start digging out images you would like to see processed by Joe.

Regards

Paul Ross
 

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Newsletter 14th November 2024

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On Thursday evening 16 members were in attendance for the Club Evening. In the first half of the evening Peter Cox of Tring Camera Club gave a presentation on Intimate Scapes. Peter is the President of Tring Camera Club and leader of an international project to encourage and understand the genre of 'Intimate Scapes' ,

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The presentation was aimed to give members an idea of what is meant by an ‘Intimate Scape’ and the sorts of images that fit the brief for the inter-club competition. He started by defining what does and does not constitute an ‘intimate scape’ he then showed examples of good ‘intimate scape’ images, (including the 2022 winner by our very own Gordon Roberts). He also showed examples of very good images that did not fit the brief and consequently did not do well. He then went on to describe how the judging process of the competition worked, including how the panel of two independent judges and Peter as Chair arrive at their decisions on the best images.

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For further information on the competition including the brief and examples of images that did well in previous competitions visit the website at; www.intimate-landscape.com. 

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We will be holding an in-house selection process to choose 5 members images to go forward to the main competition on the 27th February 2025. We will soon be asking members to submit images for the selection process, so get out there and take some great ‘intimate scape’ shots.

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In the second half of the meeting, some of the members who joined the Day Out in Bath last Saturday showed some of the images they took. Dave Griffiths also showed some images he took on Saturday but defiantly not in Bath! Thank you to all the contributors including those who could not be there but sent in their images.

Next week we have our second competition of the season, NSS2, when the guest Judge will be Paul Hendley. Prints were collected at Thursday’s meeting, DPI entries will need to be submitted via the usual email address by midnight on Sunday.

Looking further ahead, on the 28th of November we welcome guest speaker Roger Hance who’s talk is titles ‘Capturing the decisive moment, sport and action’. Note this is an on-line meeting and links will be sent out to members in due course. We are offering tickets via TicketSource to enable guests to log.

Regards

Paul Ross

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Newsletter 24th October 2024

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On Thursday night we held our first competition of the season No Set Subject 1 (NSS1) with 22 members in attendance. We had a good number of entries including 10 mono prints, 15 colour prints and 35 DPIs. Our guest Judge for the evening was Cat Humphries. In my opinion and of those I spoke to after the competition, she did a great job in critiquing the images. Her comments were fair and insightful and those images she selected as the best on the night were deserving of the high scores. It was particularly pleasing to see a number of new member’s images scoring highly in this competition. The score will be posted in the ‘Members’ area of the website in due course.

A reminder to those who’s prints score 18 or more to send a digital version of the image to The Image Bank. For details of how to do this see the Competition Rules on the website.

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Next week, 31st October, we have a Club Night. At this event there will be an opportunity for those who joined-in at the previous Club Night, to show us the images they took either of night photography or still life. Last night a number of members volunteered to bring along a selection of their images to share with us, but we still have room for a few more if you wish to show yours. Please bring your images on the night on a memory stick or similar device. Also, as requested by some members, Judith will be demonstrating how to mount your prints. In the second half of the evening, Dave Griffiths will be demonstrating how to edit images in Lightroom. We would like members to bring along their own images, so that Dave can show how he would go about editing them in real time. Please bring along an unedited image or two, preferably in RAW format, on a memory stick or similar device.

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Looking further ahead, on Saturday 9th November we have our first Day Out of the season when we will be visiting Bath for a photographic walk-about. Members are free to make there own way to Bath but I am proposing that those who wish to travel together meet at Didcot Station to get the 9:39 am train which will get us in to Bath by 10:19 am. There are lots of interesting photo opportunities in Bath including; Pultney Bridge, The Royal Crescent, the Abbey and the Roman Baths as well as lots of, parks and street photography opportunities. Further details will follow.

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There will be an opportunity for members to show a selection of the images they take in Bath on 14th of November. At that meeting we also have a presentation by Peter Cox on Intimate Landscapes, to give members an idea of what is meant by an Intimate Landscape and the sorts of images that will fit the brief for the inter-club competition taking place in February 2025.

 

Regards

Paul Ross
Chairman & Membership Secretary
 

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Newsletter 17th October 2024

 

At this week’s meeting a healthy turnout of 23 members attended a talk by Darrell Godliman on the subject of Architecture. Darrell was a member of the club over 20 years ago before moving to Witney and he has been back on a number of occasions to present to us. Darrell took us on a journey of architectural imagery from all over the world including; Italy, Poland, Thailand and Spain to name just a few. The journey ended closer to home with images from London and Oxford. A recurring theme throughout his presentation was his desire to find a new slant on well photographed buildings and landmarks. Many of his photographs were abstracts and digitally manipulated architectural images to create interesting abstract patterns. His images also included plenty of building interiors, many of which were taken using a fisheye lens. If you missed this presentation and would like to see his images visit his website at - www.dgphotos.co.uk
 

Next week on the 24th October we have our first Club competition when the Judge will be Cat Humphries. This is a NSS (No Set Subject), competition and has 3 classes; colour prints, mono prints and DPIs. Each member is allowed to enter up to 6 images with no more than 2 in each class. Prints should have been brought along to the meeting on Thursday. DPIs to be submitted to the usual email address by midnight Sunday the 20th.
 

The following week, 31st October, we have our next Club Night. At this event there will be an opportunity for those who joined-in at the previous Club Night, to show us the images they took either of night photography or still life.

 

Please let me know if you would like to show your images and how many you have, so we can get an idea how long to allow for the presentations. Also on the 31st Dave Griffiths will be demonstrating how to edit images in Lightroom. We would like members to submit images, so that Dave can show how he would go about editing them in real time. I will send out further details of how to submit your images next week.
 

Looking further ahead, on Saturday 9th November we have our first Day Out of the season when we will be having a trip to Bath. Further details to follow shortly.

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Regards

Paul Ross
Chairman & Membership Secretary

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Newsletter 10th October 2024

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On Thursday Evening 20 members attended the ever popular Critique Evening. Unfortunately Gordon Roberts could not make the event due to illness. However, we are indebted to Dave Griffiths and Tony Shields for stepping in as our in-loco judges.

The purpose of this event is to subject your images to critiquing similar to that they would undergo in a competition with an external judge, with the aim of learning how we might improve our images to gain a higher score. Dave started the evening by summarising ‘what makes a good competition image’ and Tony warned us that his comments may seem harsh but they are intended to be constructive and helpful. Dave & Tony critiqued a handful of prints before moving on the DPIs. We had 60 DPIs submitted so they had their work cut out to get through them. They gave their opinions on how the images could be improved and their thoughts on how they might score in a competition.
Dave and Tony’s comments were based on the sound principles of what makes a good competition photograph together with their experience of judges' views from past competitions. Whilst there is little doubt that if we take on-board Dave and Tony’s comments our images will have a better chance of a higher score, however, judges can be fickle and there is no guarantee on how well your image might do in a competition.

A big thank you to Dave and Tony for stepping in at the last minute to rescue this event. I think they did a great job.
Next week we have a talk from Darrell Godliman on the subject of Architecture. Darrell is an Architectural Designer & semi-pro Photographer living and working in Oxford. The images on his website, ( Darrell Godliman - DG Photos) are stunning, from locations all over the world. Our annual themed competition later this season is ‘Architecture’ so you may pick up some useful hints.
 

The following week on the 24th October we have our first Club competition when the Judge will be Cat Humphries. This is a NSS (No Set Subject), competition and has 3 classes; colour prints, mono prints and DPIs. Each member is allowed to enter up to 6 images with no more than 2 in each class. Prints will need to be brought along to the meeting on the 17th. DPIs to be submitted to the usual email address by the preceding Sunday the 20th.
 

Paul Ross
Chairman & Membership Secretary
 

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Newsletter 3rd October 2024

 

On Thursday 16 members attended our first Club Evening of the season. Activities on offer included; Alastair’s drop-in tech bar, still life and night photography. Members took advantage of all these activities with the night photography being particularly popular.

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We plan to give an opportunity for members to share their best images taken on the night at a future Club Evening.

Next week we have our ever popular Critique Evening. This is an opportunity for members to have their images critiqued in a supportive and friendly environment by our own ex-CACC judge Gordon Roberts. You may simply wish to get an expert opinion on your images or you may like to get some feedback prior to entering them into the forthcoming Club competitions. Gordon will use his extensive experience to give hints on how your images could be improved to advance your photography skills and achieve higher scores in competitions. For DPIs you will need to submit your images by midnight on Sunday 6th October to the competition email address - wpc.competitions@gmail.com. If you would like to have your prints critiqued, bring them along on the night. Each member can submit up to 4 images. For information on sizing and naming your images visit the Members area of our website.

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The following week we have a talk from Darrell Godliman on the subject of Architecture. Darrell is an Architectural Designer & semi-pro Photographer living and working in Oxford. The images on his website, ( Darrell Godliman - DG Photos) are stunning, from locations all over the world. Our annual themed competition later this season is ‘Architecture’ so you may pick up some useful hints.

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Looking further ahead, on the 24th October we have our first Club competition when the Judge will be Cat Humphries. This is a NSS (No Set Subject), competition and has 3 classes; colour prints, mono prints and DPIs. Each member is allowed to enter up to 6 images with no more than 2 in each class. Prints will need to be brought along to the meeting on the 17th. DPIs to be submitted to the usual email address by the preceding Sunday the 20th.

 

Paul Ross

Chairman & Membership Secretary

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Newsletter 26th September 2025

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 This week, we had quite a few members away on holiday or poorly, so thanks to all who braved the weather to join us on Thursday for our first full-length talk of the year - ‘Which Lens for Which Landscape’.

Breaking from conventional wisdom, Robert first argued the case for using telephoto lenses to pick out detail in the landscape while using techniques such as ‘lens compression’ for setting the context. Each concept was presented alongside one or more of his stunning images.

In the second half of the evening, Robert went on to talk about the pros and cons of wide-angle lenses, including the best situations for using them and how they can be used to give an image depth.

Robert is no stranger to the club, having given many excellent talks in the past, but this was the first time ever that he’d given this particular talk. Unfortunately, some of the technical aspects were rushed over, and Robert, no doubt concerned about the running time, didn’t want to engage in questions during the talk. In the future, we’ll check with the speaker how and when they want to take questions.

If you’re interested in learning more, there are some great resources online that better explain some of the concepts Robert introduced.

 

• Hyperfocal: https://photographylife.com/hyperfocal-distance-explained

• Focus Staking:
  https://digital-photography-school.com/a-beginners-guide-to-focus-stacking/

 

Tools, such as Photopills (https://www.photopills.com/), can help you when you’re out in the field.

Next week is Practical Evening. Paul will be setting up lights, flashes and backdrops as he leads a Still Life workshop. Please bring your camera and any still-life objects you might have, such as vases, fruit and flowers.

At the same time, I’ll be running a drop-in “Tech Bar” to answer all your technical questions, from mysterious camera buttons to storing your images safely, as well as getting the most from your smartphone. I’ll also be bringing the essential gear that I use in my pursuit of lightweight photography.

We’ll also be encouraging members to take their cameras into Wallingford for some night photography. As the river is high at the moment, there’s very likely some great shots to be had from the reflections of The Boathouse. 

Don’t forget your cameras and tripods - I will have a couple of spare tripods if you don’t have one.

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Alastair McCormack

Web Master + Tech Support