Club News

Visual Arts Festival – Portrait Photography

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Our two portrait workshops were a lot of fun. We all learned loads about using backgrounds, lighting, positioning and posing, and created some really nice images.

There are so many styles of portraiture – everyone, quite rightly, has their view. We elected to use continuous lighting rather than flash, as that suits every camera. We helped those with cameras to find the most approriate settings and practise their skills to create images they liked.

We’re still collecting the images from our visitors and will post the ones they like best here.

Visual Arts Festival – Light Painting Workshops

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As part of the club’s engagement with the St Albans Visual Arts Festival 2025, we ran a couple of Light Painting workshops at the Collective Gallery on Holywell Hill. With some (very) temporary screens, we created a black-out area at the back of the gallery where we could let our imaginations loose.

We had a wide range of visitors with what felt like an even wider range of cameras. We were able to assist most in putting their cameras into fully manual mode as required by this type of photography, but one or two did stump us (for now).

Richard, our guide, then took us through a range of tools from Christmas lights, to shampoo bottles and other home made devices (plenty of gaffer tape on show!). We also used to more specialist equipment, such as fibre optic brushes and light tubes. These are some images captured by the club, but most were taken away to be enjoyed by our guests. As it was an introductory session, these aren’t all “the best” but should be a launch onto further adventures!

Projected Images – Round 1

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The first competition of the year was judged by Pat Begley.

At the end of the day, Colin McInnes was winner with “Water Ballet”, new member Kieron Keller took second place with “Brighton Beach” and Chris Bennett was third with “Surprised Red Grouse”. Check out these great images here.

Studo Practical

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Studio Practical

This week Chris Drury arranged a number of setups for some studio work, including some professional models to sit for us. We had high key & low key sets ups using flash and a simple fixed lighting setup. With everyone using their own camera and sharing a number of flash triggers there was at times a bit of confusion, but everyone seemd to enjoy themselves and most people learnt soimething useful to take away for their own portaiture work.

Remember ISO 200, f11, 1/125th, flash on!

Big thanks to Chris for putting in a lot of work in organising the models, setting up, helping us al get the right settings, and then dismantling again.

Projected Images Round 1

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The first round of the Projected Images Competition was held on Tuesday the 4th of October. The judge was Chris Forster who is well known for his honesty and wide range of marks. However he does add a lot of value so if you get good marks in this one then you can believe them.

The new laptop seems to be performing well and certainly has enough memory to drive the software better. Previously more than one of two images on the light-box could cause problems/crashes which no longer happen. The judge did make me run through hoops a little but hopefully the resultant fumbling was not too bad.

In session A the first, second and third places were given to Gareth Richards, Brian Doble and Chris Drury respectively.

Gathering Nectar by Gareth Richards

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Collecting the pilot at Amber Cove Dominican Republic by Brian Doble

dark-caress

Dark Caress by Chris Drury

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Session B the first and second places were given to Geoff Clinton and Ehud Eliasher respectively

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I Will Catch You Next Time by Geoff Clinton

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Munching M&M by Ehud Eliasher

London Underground Stations, the First 120 Years

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Last night’s talk from Mark Purdoe took us on a trip around the architectural styles of the stations on the london underground network.

Starting with the near surface stations from the “cut & cover” era, we were transported down through temporary, functional, art deco, suburban house and modern styles, finally ariving at a few abandoned or long since demolished locations. Clearly the favourites were the art deco stations, but it was also interesting to learn of the “house style” of the various companies that became the lines we know today.

Mark’s quirky style raised many a wry smile, espeically once we started to see 60’s architcteure raise it’s (very) ugly head! As a one-time london resident, I learnt a few things that I had never noticed about locations I have passed many a time, and will look at the tube with a more discerning eye next time I am up in town.

Flat Art Photography & Walking in The “Stans”

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We had a very interesting club evening yesterday. One of our members who photographs artwork for catalogues and prints took us through the problems that photographing flat artwork has. Secondly Emma Rosen presented on her 2 month trip to the Stans.

Flat Artwork
Firstly you can’t edit the photograph after it’s taken, the quality of the printing means that any editing always shows up. You have to have adequate lighting and that will cause reflections off any glass that may protect the art and off any gilt work on the frame.

The solutions are ones that I wouldn’t have thought of. To take the photograph so there is no need to edit means you have to line the camera lens exactly parallel to the artwork. The way to do this is to identify the centre of the artwork this can be done be tying strings to the corners, where they cross is the centre. Then get a mirror and hold it flat against the artwork. Go to the camera and look through the viewfinder and reposition it so the reflection of the front of the lens is central and appears flat.

To remove any reflections from the glass hide everything but the front of the lens under a black sheet. To remove reflections from the gilt frame turn the frame and the camera through 45 degrees then the reflections are lost in the frame corners.

The Stans
This was one of the best travelogues I have seen. It covered 2 months travelling through the 3 Stans between Russia and China. These aren’t generally places where tourists go and in one in particular there were stories of bugs being everywhere and guides telling people not to ask “those sorts of questions”. While some people may find this threatening the group felt that it actually increased their safety. Some of the photographs were excellent, landscapes and interesting weathered faces of the population, as well as beautiful tiled buildings.

Steve Ransom (originally provided on 21st Spetember)