Our Featured Photographer is Vince Gagnier.
Vince is an enthusiastic member of the club who readily volunteers to help out whenever he can. He excels at Nature and Scenic photography and is always willing to share his Photoshop skills. Vince enters all competitions and consistently scores well. He is also a member of the Chatham-Kent Metal Detection club You can see some of Vince’s fine work on our Photo In Focus page.
Club members were asked to vote on accepting the updated CCC Constitution by committee chairman Dave Noordhoff. By a show of hands, the Club passed the motion to approve by a vote of 36 for, none against. The Constitution Committee was then officially disbanded.
Entries from last meeting’s CAPA competition for Altered Reality were reviewed.
This month’s CCC competition for Intermediate and Senior members in the Trash / Junk / Garbage category were judged, with Jean De Bruyn, Dave Noordhoff and Paul Schmoldt receiving the top scores.
The Beginners Division entries for Action shots produced high marks for Laird VanderEnde, Kathy Davidson and Bob Allen.
The top scoring shots of the evening can be seen on our Club Photos page
Entries for CAPA’s Footwear competition were scored, with photos by Patricia Kral, Gavin Stuart, Paul Schmoldt, Les McCracken, Carson Plant and Larry Kearns being chosen for submission.
After the break, Les McCracken thanked the members for the large number of fine prints that were brought in for display. He also led a discussion about the methods of achieving some of the effects that were used.
To close the evening, The Club was treated to Carson Plant’s excellent slideshow of photos he took in Parke County, Indiana. Well done Carson!
Despite the snowy weather, about half of our usual members turned out for the meeting.
President Paul Schmoldt welcomed three visitors by explaining our meeting agenda and CAPA’s Altered Reality competition. The group was reminded of the upcoming Club competition for January 25th: Garbage / Litter / Junk for Intermediate and Advanced, as well as Action for the beginners group.
Dave Noordhoff lead a discussion about this month’s print submissions in the Boats category, with Les McCracken’s overhead shot drawing several favorable comments.
Our submissions for CAPA’s Altered Reality competition were judged, with shots by Gavin Stuart, Ed Hofland, Carson Plant, Les McCracken, Paul Schmoldt and Jim Pollock being selected.
During the break, Andy Stockdill was kind enough to hand out copies of the pictures he took at the Club’s Christmas breakfast. Thanks Andy!
Les McCracken began his workshop on One Light Portrait Photography by displaying some samples of the excellent pictures he’s taken over the years. He then showed the Club how to arrange a simple, continuous lighting set-up using a diffused key light, a background light and a white cloth reflector. Using Jill Pollock and Dave Noordhoff as subjects, several members took advantage of the opportunity to practice their portraiture skills.
Our Featured Photographer this month is Les McCracken.
Les McCracken is a past President of the Chatham Camera Club, presiding in the years 1969-71. His support for the club has been invaluable during his many years of membership and his willingness to help other members has made him many friends. Les has a superior eye for colour and his favorite aspect of photography is printing, making him the obvious choice for being the Club’s Print Manager. Give Les 100 square yards anywhere and he will find something interesting to shoot. Perhaps due to his background as an architect, Les has the unique ability to see what many others don’t, and the way he composes and depicts his images makes them come to life. Originally from Belfast, Northern Ireland, Les often refers to “The Luck of the Irish”, but there is no doubt that luck can’t replace the knowledge and experience that he has accumulated over his 70 years of taking photos.
One of Les’s greatest assets is his wife Jean, who for over 60 years has stood by his side and contributed to his success. They both carry the distinction of being ‘Honourary Lifetime Members’ of the Chatham Camera Club.
Les often serves as a judge in our monthly competitions and has received many awards over the years. He was the first member to be featured in the clubs ‘Photo In Focus’ with a single front page image of the ‘Chatham-Kent Phone Guide’. You can see a few examples of Les’ outstanding work on our
Photo In Focus page.
Our president began the evening by informing our members about the recent meeting of SWOPA (South Western Ontario Photographers Association) in Stratford. Details of that meeting will be presented in the near future.
We are still taking suggestions for next summer’s Walk-Abouts, with Blenheim being one possibility.
Voluntary donations are now being accepted for snacks during our break period.
Upcoming workshops will include Herman Giethoorn’s presentation on Photography After Sunset, which will be presented at the December 14th workshop.
Dave Noordhoff advised the group that the updated Chatham Camera Club Constitution has been finalized and will be sent to each member before Christmas.
Paul presented a short tutorial on How to label and resize images for competition in FastStone Image Viewer
Herman Giethoorn reviewed the CCC Nature submissions to CAPA, which received very similar scores as those given by our club’s judges.
Judging was held for the Beginners in the Nature category, with several entries showing that some of the new members are continuing to advance very quickly. Laird Vanderende had the top scoring photo here at 22 points. Several outstanding images by Intermediate and Advanced members were seen during the judging of their Action shots, with Margaret Manson and Frank Vadovic tie for the high score of 21 points in this category. You can see some of the other higher scoring shots on our Club Photos page.
Our featured photographer is Brian Montgomery.
Brian’s photographic interests are very diversified, although birds and trains are two of his favourite subjects. He faithfully enters both CAPA and CCC competitions and is equally at home with colour or black and white. You can see more of Brian’s work on his Flicker site and our Photo In Focus page.
Paul opened our meeting by presenting Lifetime Chatham Camera Club Membership Certificates to Margaret Chrysler, Jean McCracken and Les McCracken. Congratulations to all.
The Club was reminded of our first Christmas Breakfast coming up on December 11th at the Chatham Breakfast House.
Les, Jim, Carson, Herman and Paul were called upon to share their thoughts on how they judge competition pictures. They all agreed that for a picture to score well, it must meet the following standards.
After our break, Print Manager Les McCracken critiqued a wide variety of member’s prints that showed “Hands At Work”. A special thanks goes out to Frank Vadovic and Vince Gagnier for their very clever and inventive new display rack. Well done gentlemen.
Jim and Paul showed how to make a “zoom burst” photo in Photoshop Elements. You can watch a tutorial at Photo Radar
Paul showed us why he chose Faststone as one of the Club’s official pieces of photo editing software, as he demonstrated the capabilities of this amazing program. You can download your free copy at Faststone.org
The Club’s guest speaker was Diana Martin from The Chatham Daily News. Our members thoroughly enjoyed her fascinating presentation on photojournalism which has inspired us all to become better photographers.
Judging was held for our Beginners group in the “Open” category, with several shots showing the great strides some of our newer members have made recently.
Intermediate and Advanced members had their “Nature” pictures judged, with Margaret Manson’s Flying Herron shot being the top photo of the night.
You can see some of the night’s best entries on our Club Photos page
Paul demonstrated how a simple change in cropping or straightening can dramatically improve a photo.