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.

• Falls into the required category
• The main subject is sharp
• Has a straight horizon
• Is cropped to its best advantage
• Shows an interesting composition

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.

At our second meeting of the season, Judging was held for entries into CAPA’s “Nature” and “Open” categories, with many fine photos being submitted. The shots selected in the “Open” category were sent in by Mike Blazek, Larry Kearns, Paul Schmoldt, Doug Woodman, Nelson Harrison and Frank Vadovic. The “Nature” shots selected were submitted by Gavin Stuart, Harry Arneill, Dave Noordhoff, Martha Gillier, Margaret Manson and Jim Pollock. Congratulations to all. The number of different members who received high scores is a great indication of the talent and proficiency that exists throughout the club.

Our print manager, Les McCracken, examined and critiqued some of the many “Action” photos that were brought in for display by our members.

In his excellent comparison of Point and Shoot cameras to SLRs, Paul pointed out the capabilities as well as the strengths and weaknesses of both.

The Club’s first meeting at our new home, Evangel Community Church, was well attended by many existing members as well as several new friends. Jim Pollock presented a excellent travelogue from his 2009 trip to Great Britain and our President revealed some of the topics for upcoming workshops, print displays and photo competitions. See our Meeting Schedule for more details. A couple of competition shows from Canadian Association for Photographic Art were on hand as well.

Our featured photographer is our Welcoming Manager, Margaret Chrysler, the Club’s longest active consecutive member. Shooting in both film and digital, Margaret’s experience allows her to excel in both nature and landscape photography. To view a brief sample of some of her fine work, see our Photo In Focus page.

Our third and final walk-about of the summer was another successful evening of learning, sharing and friendship, with a good turnout of members searching the King St. West / Wellington St. West area for “Architectural Detail”, “Squares, Circles and Triangles” and “Photographers In Action.” To see some of our members shots: Continue reading →

Featured this month is Lois Kearns, an up-and-coming photographer who joined our club two years ago, mainly to better understand how to use her Sony camera. Her photographic interests are anything that she can use for good reference for water colour painting, at which she excells. See some of Lois’ nature shots on our Photo In Focus Page

The Chatham Camera Club is celebrating our 75th Anniversary.

In conjunction with this, there are currently several public exhibits at various venues in the City of Chatham.

The Chatham-Kent Museum has an exhibit on the History of Photography running till February 2011, ARTspace downtown has 13 large prints and a running slideshow display till September 1st 2010, the Thames Art Gallery has 20 large prints as well as a running slideshow all showcasing the work of various members of the Club.

The Chatham Camera Club wishes to thank the various people involved in making this possible, in particular Thames Art Gallery Curator Carl Lavoy, Curatorial Assistant Mindy Bowls, Chatham-Kent Museum Curator Stephanie Saunders, ARTspace Assistant Gallery Administrator Sonya Blazek, Guest Curator and Artist Hank Bos and Joanne Kjeldsen, City of Chatham-Kent (IT Dept.).

Please celebrate this milestone with us by visiting the exhibits.