Meeting Report

Last night we had the 'Mix 'n' Match' competition with Steyning and Southwick Camera clubs, held at the Steyning centre. We were in the smaller of the halls but we all squeezed in without a problem. Unfortunately it was badly attended by our club members, only eight of us, by far the smallest number of supporters.

Anyway, we had a lively time and a lot of laughs barracking the poor judge Mike Chambers from Eastbourne CC.; We have a great relationship with Steyning in particular as several of us regularly support their events and outings and have done over several years.

We had a big problem with the club laptop again which refused to co-operate on more than two occasions and this held everyone up, not that they were too worried. We have a committee meeting tonight and I am going to suggest that we spend some of our savings on a new laptop with Windows 7 before next season.

In spite of this problem we held our ends up and finished second behind Steyning, (although our scorer had us winning!). However, in the right spirit we did not raise an objection, which would have been impossible to verify anyway. Our selection team, Chairman Di and Anne Nagle, decided to go for good quality images and fewer 'quirky' ones and this policy certainly paid off as we won best image of the three many times.

A very good evening was had by all.

Meeting Report

Our old friend (not in years!) Walter came to judge our leg of the Southern Federation PI competition. Each club taking part gets a judge to mark all the entries in their league and then all the totals from all the other clubs who hold similar meetings are added up for the final result. We have not been doing very well.

The first thing that Walter commented on was the lack of titles being revealed for some very silly reason. It makes the job of the judge that little bit harder and does not always help the authors of the images as we will see later.

Our first entry was Charmain Hayes' 'Out of the darkness' which is a striking image of her Son. Walter liked it and awarded 8.5 marks (which proved a popular mark for us!).

Next was Peter Michell's 'Finishing touches' which also got 8.5; but Walter was confused by the hair on the left hand side of the image not realising that the lady was looking into a mirror doing her make up. The title might have helped him.

Ian MacWhirter's 'Polar Bear courting behaviour' also got 8.5. it was much admired but Walter would have 'cooled the image down' a bit by adding a bit of blue to make the snow and ice colder.

Meeting Report

Rosie Armes,who has more photographic honours after her name than you can wave a stick at, gave us a rare showing of the most amazingly wonderful prints second to no other collection that I have ever seen at SCC. They were simply inspiring.

Rosie started by showing us her ARPS panel of 15 prints which were taken at a fairground and it was awash with bright colours. It illustrated how a collection of prints arranged properly can hold together and create a wonderful spectacle although some of the images on their own would not have impressed.

Next we were told how she decided to go to Dungeness to seek material for her FRPS panel; a black and white building caught her eye and she took a series of pictures of it as the basis. Her first submission was rejected on the grounds that the wording of her statement did not suit one of the panel of judges. This Rosie amended, resubmitted and then was awarded her FRPS. we were able to admire both her panels at the break.

Meeting Report

Martin gave us a very well prepared and thorough talk about flash photography. He was assisted by Liz Barber and used our ever willing vounteer Alex as a model. (He started off taking a couple of shots of Paul in his usual position at the front but thought better of it as the results were a bit scary!) Those of us who use Canon gear were asked to bring their flash guns, which I duly did, but forgot the batteries, plonker!

Martin had things set up so that he took pictures on his camera and the results came up on a screen via his laptop and the club's projector. He started with a single gun mounted on his camera and showed us the different results using the ceiling and walls to reflect the flash and by using different attachments to the gun like a diffuser, a favorite with Press photographers. He showed us his 'black foamy thing' which he attached with an elastic band and later a directional aid constructed by him using black straws held together with a bit of a Weetabix box (other cereals are available).