This week we hosted the first 4-way inter-club competition of the 2015/2016 season. Members from Edinburgh Photographic Society, Haddington Camera Club and Stirling and District Camera Club visited us. 60 digital projected images (15 from each club) were judged by Dougie Allen of Beeslack Camera Club. Whether to crop was the most common comment: Do you need that extra piece of sky? Does that stick on the left hand side add or detract from the image? The artistic merits of each image were compared: Are those gravestones dark enough? Is the subject sufficiently distinguished from the background? Musselburgh’s entries held up well against the competition, but Stirling clinched it with some stunning, top-mark images. Joe’s action shot of the motorbikes was our highest marked image. Well done, Joe. The final result was:

• First place: Stirling and District Camera Club.
• Equal second place: Edinburgh Photographic Society and Musselburgh Camera Club.
• Fourth place: Haddington Camera Club.

Thank you to Jennifer Davidson, George Todd and Liz Sowler for arranging the catering (and to my wife, Elizabeth for baking brownies for the occasion).

This was the last meeting at the Fisherrow Centre until the New Year. Next week, 17th December, we will be meeting at the Ravelston House Hotel in Musselburgh for the MCC Christmas social evening. Dinner is booked for 7:30pm, but we will meet in the hotel bar from 7pm onwards. Here is the location of the hotel on a Google map.

On Tuesday, 29th December, some members will be meeting at 3:30pm at the Scottish Cafe in Princes Street Gardens to photograph the Edinburgh Christmas lights. Details in Liz’s recent post.

Things to think about over the Christmas holidays:

• Please send your digital images for the “COAST” set subject competition to George before 7th January. Jennifer will judge the competition on 14th January 2016.
• The submission for the Black and White print competition is on 14th January 2016.
• There is a WINTER SCENE digital knockout competition on 11th February 2016. A fall of snow, or a frosty morning over Christmas could be a good opportunity to collect some images.

For any members not coming to the social evening, I wish you a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, and I’ll see you at the next meeting at Fisherrow on 7th January 2016. (I am volunteering to make the tea that evening.)

Our meeting on 3rd December didn’t happen as planned. To start with, we learned of a mix-up with the intended venue for the meeting when it was too late to tell everyone in person. Thank you to Liz for sending out the change of venue notices. Apologies to any members who came to Fisherrow and discovered too late that the venue had been changed to Beeslack in Penicuik. You didn’t miss much, though, because the poor weather, and an accident on the A701, conspired to prevent most of us reaching Penicuik. I heard that some members were stuck in the traffic for several hours. I hope you all managed to get home safely. Thank you for trying. A big “thank you” to Anita for warning us of the traffic, and to Gavin for driving Liz, Iwona and me out of the traffic in his 4×4 through the snowy streets of Loanhead. I expect we will all have stories to tell the next time we meet up.

I heard from the Beeslack club secretary that only 8 members made it to Penicuik, but they were treated to an outstanding presentation by Ron McCombe and his wife (who made it from Hawick despite several of the roads through the Borders being closed). Beeslack wished all our members a safe journey home and said they would keep the pile of uneaten sandwiches and cakes for the Audio Visual night on 28th January!

I hope everyone who would like to go to the Christmas social evening on 17th December has signed up with Joe and paid their deposit.

I am assured that this Thursday’s 4-way competition will be at Fisherrow. We are hosting Edinburgh, Haddington and Stirling camera clubs. It starts at the usual time of 7:30pm and will be in the large room at the back of the Fisherrow Centre. Walk down the corridor past the room where we normally meet and turn left. Besides the competition, there will be a chance to share cakes and sandwiches with members of the other clubs. I look forward to seeing you all and exchanging our stories.

This week Steve McGonnell of the Edinburgh Photographic Society judged the MCC Human Portrait print competition. Steve had written a detailed set of notes for each image, and gave each one a comprehensive critique. Distracting backgrounds were a common theme (watch out for background lines which cut through the subject’s head). Plain backgrounds or backgrounds which compliment the subject were preferred. Steve felt that eyes were an important part of a portrait, and the position of the eyes in the frame, the direction of the gaze, the expression in the eyes or the brightness of the eyes were often mentioned. There were some otherwise good images which, unfortunately, suffered from printing faults or had distracting colours. The top image was a beautifully-presented, silky-textured portrait with a great contrasting background called “Jasmine”. The top three images were:

• Jasmine (Charlie Briggs)
• Cheeky Face (Jennifer Davidson)
• Tuyet (“Snow White”) (George Todd)

When the scores were added up, the placings were:

• 1st Place – Charlie Briggs
• 2nd Place – Jennifer Davidson
• 3rd Place – George Todd, Steve Williams, Alan Fitchie, Steven Beard

Thank you to everyone who entered, and well done to Charlie, Jennifer and the other winners.

Our next competition will be the “Coast” set subject competition, which will be judged by Jennifer Davidson on 14th January 2016. The syllabus says that images must be submitted by 10th December, but Jennifer is happy for members to submit their images by 7th January 2016. So we all have the Christmas holidays to capture some more images.

Next week we have a presentation on wildlife photography by Ron McCombe. Ron gave us a presentation last year that was so good that we decided to ask him back. This time his presentation is being held at Beeslack Camera Club in Penicuik. Meet at the Fisherrow Centre at 7pm if you would like a lift. If you have your own transport, go to Beeslack High School, Edinburgh Road, Penicuik, EH26 0QF and aim to be there for 7:30pm. Come along and be inspired.

What a great evening we had yesterday. Lee Howell enthralled us with video-based presentations showing how he creates the most amazing digital art using Photoshop. Art that is sufficiently innovative that Adobe chose his work to advertise their Creative Cloud! Anyone who missed the evening can see his work on his web site (www.leehowellphotography.com). The videos he showed us are available here (and on YouTube). Lee describes himself as an “image maker” as well as a professional photographer. He uses his photography to build a collection of shots with which he assembles his digital images. Lee uses photographs and Photoshop in the same way an artist uses paint and a paint brush. Models are given elaborate hair pieces made from feathers copied from photographs of birds! Stark African scenes are conjured from plain-looking portraits taken in Edinburgh. The most impressive part of Lee’s work for me was seeing how he made a consistent lighting pattern by carefully dodging and burning, paying careful attention to tiny details.

Lee is inspired by the work of Annie Leibovitz, Romain Laurent and Irwin Olaf. He took up digital image creation as a way of recovering “the one that got away”. If you see the perfect shot in front of you but miss it, remember the moment and digitally recreate the elements that made that shot work. Lee revealed some of the Photoshop techniques that he uses in his work:

• Photograph a light subject against a black background. If you add this shot as a Photoshop layer and use “screen” blending mode, the black background disappears and only your subject remains. This technique works especially well for smoke.
• Non destructive dodging and burning: If you add a mid-grey layer above the layer you want to modify and change the blend mode to “soft light”, you can then paint the layer with white to lighten the underlying image or with black to darken the underlying image. (Note: “overlay” and “hard light” blend modes also work but give a harsher effect.)
• To add a shadow, select your subject and convert the selection into a black shape. Add the shape to a new layer and distort into the shape of a shadow. Change the blend mode to “soft light” and the shape makes the image look darker where the shadow falls. Lee blurs the shape and feathers the edge to make the shadow look more realistic. He builds a better effect by adding several shadow layers.
• Add a texture to a surface (such as a model’s skin) by applying a new layer in “overlay” mode. This is how a lot of the feathery head-dresses were created.

Photoshop Workshop?

I will be giving a Photoshop presentation on 31st March 2016. If anyone has been inspired by Lee’s work and would like to learn more about Photoshop earlier than then, I would be happy to start a Photoshop workshop on a mutually convenient evening. If you are interested, please let me know.

Musselburgh Riding of the Marches

The Club has been invited to participate in the exhibition of “Musselburgh Life” at Loretto Primary School as part of the 2016 Musselburgh Riding Of The Marches. We need to collect about 40 images connected with Musselburgh or Fisherrow. The display is scheduled for July 2016, but we need to tell the RoM commitee what we intend to display by the end of January. Please look into your image collections, digital or prints, or perhaps be inspired to take some new photographs in and around Musselburgh or Fisherrow. We may display some pictures of Club members in action !

Diary Dates

• Saturday, 21st November 2016: There will be another “Girls’ Day Out” (open to any member of the club, not just girls) to explore Cockenzie/Port Seton. Tell Liz if you would like to go, or otherwise meet at 10:30am in the lounge of the Wemyss Hotel, opposite the Co-op store in Port Seton.
• Sunday, 22nd November 2015 around 10am. SPF Digital Image Championship at the Stirling Court Hotel, Stirling.

NEXT WEEK

Joe Fowler has the unenviable task of following on from Lee Howell. Joe will show us how to turn dull and unexciting shots into good images. Joe’s presentations are a must-see for newcomers, or anyone wanting to improve their photography skills.

This evening we were entertained by Nadin Dunnigan, who described her journey from from photography student and interested amateur to successful professional, specialising in wedding photography, portraits and advertising shots, while maintaining her interest in photographing landscapes and nature.  Nadin has been inspired by and compared with Michael Kenner, Jill Greenberg and Ray Collins. She prefers to photograph in natural light and uses a technique known as “top shade”, where subjects are photographed just inside a doorway. (I found this video introducing the technique.) She also prefers a shallow depth of field, and normally uses aperture priority mode with the camera set to f2.8 or f4, applying exposure compensation to adjust the exposure. Nadin is an inspiration to those amongst us who don’t like photographing people, and she showed us it is possible to make money from a hobby that you love.

HUMAN PORTRAIT ENTRIES

We have had a disappointing number of entries for the human portrait print competition. Our judge, Steve McGonnell, has said he can accept our prints later than he originally planned, which means we have more time to enter. If you have any portrait prints you would like to enter please let George Todd know, and you can bring them along next week. Any print where the main subject is a person or a group of people is eligible for the human portrait competition. It isn’t restricted to one-on-one portraits.

DIARY DATES

• Sunday, 22nd November 2015 around 10am. SPF Digital Image Championship at the Stirling Court Hotel, Stirling.
• Tuesday, 24th November 2015 at 7pm. Night Photography Workshop at the Royal Observatory, Edinburgh.
• Thursday, 17th December 2015, MCC Christmas Social Evening at the Ravelston House Hotel in Musselburgh.
  • Please sign the sheet on the noticeboard, and pay Martin the £10 deposit, if you would like to join us.

NEXT WEEK

Next week we have a talk on Photography and Creative Retouching by Lee Howell. (Check his web site for some amazing creations.)

Thank you everyone who brought their prints in tonight. I hope you found the advice helpful and inspiring. The most useful advice I heard was to keep trying. If you didn’t come along this evening and would like advice on a print, bring it along some other evening and we can discuss it during the tea break.

INTER-CLUB COMPETITIONS

We have two 4-way inter-club competitions coming up on December 10th and January 19th, and a 12-way competition on February 14th. If you have any other good digital images, or images you are saving for the set subject competitions later in the year, do please send them to George. The bigger the selection we can build up early in the year, the better our chance in the inter-clubs.

PRIZES FOR THE SET SUBJECT COMPETITIONS

Our first speaker, Jason Cowan, has offered a prize for the highest scorers from each of the 3 set subject competitions: coast, dereliction and abstract. The winner of each night will receive an A0-sized poster print of their favourite image (or two A1-sized prints if you prefer).

TEA DUTY

I forgot to mention that we need some volunteers to make tea on 29th October 2015.

LOST PROPERTY

Someone left behind a small, black Westfolio folder after the digital images competition. There were also some prints left behind after the advice night. If these belong to you, I have stored them safely and you can pick them up next time you come along.

FORTHCOMING EVENTS

• Sunday, 18th October: Liz has arranged a “Girls Day Out” at the Edinburgh Botanical Gardens. If you are interested in going (men are invited as well), please email Liz and meet at 10:30am at the East Gate Coffee Bar.
• Tuesday, 24th November 2015: Galashiels Camera Club are arranging a night sky photography workshop at the Royal Observatory Edinburgh. If you are interested, please email Alistair Peacock at aip1039@btinternet.com. Also, please write your name on the list on the MCC noticeboard. N.B. The list of for transport arrangements only. You need to email Alistair if you would like to go.

NEXT WEEK

I am away for the next 2 weeks. Next week we have an International Inter-Club Competition, where members of MCC will be invited to comment on the images submitted by  Mölnlycke Fotoklubb in Sweden. Joe Fowler will be leading the session. I am told they have submitted a really interesting collection. Enjoy. 🙂

This evening a technical glitch made us start the evening with the tea break instead of finishing with one. Thanks to a heroic dash by our competition secretary, George Todd, our images were recovered in time for the competition to go ahead as planned.

The competition was judged by Gordon Scott, currently secretary of Mid Calder Camera Club. Cropping images to cut out blank areas or distracting features at the edge, cutting out distractions in the background, and recomposing images from a different angle were common comments. The competition was tight, and there were several good images. The top scorers were (in reverse order):

• 5th place (47 points)
  • Mike Clark
• 4th place (48 points)
  • Anita Nutter
• 3rd place (49 points)
  • John Fowler
• 2nd place (50 points)
  • Jennifer Davidson
  • Charlie Briggs
• 1st place (52 points)
  • Steven Beard

The top images were:

• Dahlia (Steven Beard)
• Paper Kite (Charlie Briggs)
• Trial by Fire (Jennifer Davidson)

Well done everyone.

NEXT WEEK

Next week is Photo Advice Night, where we share and discuss our images, and offer advice. Please bring along one or two prints. They don’t have to be mounted. Something interesting to provoke a discussion, a new idea, a place you have discovered, or something you would like advice about, would be ideal. This year I would like the discussion to be more balanced, so we talk about what we like as well as what we don’t like, with the aim of sharing our knowledge and helping everyone to improve their photography, inspire new ideas or discover new places.

Sometimes we don’t need an external speaker to make an entertaining evening. This evening Alan Fitchie and Mike Clark showed us some of their work. Alan showed us some impressive images of sunsets, landscapes with contrasting colours, and lots of spectacular firework shots taken during the Edinburgh Festival. Alan introduced us to a novel technique for balancing the exposure while photographing fireworks – place your hand in front of the lens while the shutter is open. Mike gave us a “Mike Clark Unplugged” presentation, since the short notice meant that most of Mike’s images were straight out of the camera and hadn’t yet been post-processed. Despite this, Mike still showed us some high quality images, showing what can be done if you “get it right in camera”. Mike took us on a tour of the club outings so far during 2015 (and made me realise just how many of these I had missed!), and also presented some of his stunning macro and diving photographs (one of which was recently published in a newspaper).

If any new members are reading this, Mike is the club webmaster and a stalwart of the club’s Flikr page. Mike’s images can be viewed here. If you would like to join the club’s Flikr group, ask Mike (or another member) to invite you onto the group.

NEXT WEEK

Next week we have the Digital Images Competition, our first competition of the year. Good luck to all who have entered their digital images.

At the same time, next week is also the date for submissions to the Coloured Print Competition. Please bring your three mounted prints next week and give them to George Todd, or put them in George’s portfolio folder. The rules for colour print entries can be found here. Charlie Briggs has kindly offered to show new members how to mount their prints.

See you all next week.

Last night we had a fascinating presentation by award-winning photographer, Billy Currie, who showed us how post-processing with Lightroom or Photoshop can turn a dull-looking image into a first-class photograph. The first important thing is to get the image right in camera. Billy uses the following techniques to achieve this:

• Camera set to manual exposure mode.
• Images saved to RAW files.
• Camera set to ISO 200.
• Lens aperture set to the middle of the range (f8 to f13).
• Camera set to autofocus with a single focus point for wildlife and sports photography, or set manually to the hyperfocal distance for landscape photography.
• Use of a tripod and a timer or remote release to prevent camera shake.
• Image evaluated using the histogram, not the preview on the camera screen. The exposure is adjusted until the highlights just touch the right hand side.

Billy then explained how an image can be greatly improved by adjusting the brightness, contrast and white-balance settings, correcting for lens distortion and vignetting and appropriate cropping. After making these basic corrections, an image can be turned into a work of art with techniques such as applying a different white balance to different areas, applying brightness gradients to darken skies or make flat surfaces more appealing, and making fine adjustments by dodging and burning. The before and after images at the end showed what can be achieved.

LATEST DIARY DATES

• The demolition of the Cockenzie Power Station chimneys has been scheduled for 12:00 on Saturday, 26th September 2015.
• The Edinburgh Doors Open Days take place this weekend (26th and 27th September). The weekend includes open days at the Royal Observatory Edinburgh.
• There will be a total lunar eclipse, starting at 1:07am on Monday, September 28th. The total phase lasts from 2:11am to 3:23am.
• The closing date for entries to the coloured print competition is in 2 weeks, on 8th October 2015.

NEXT WEEK

Mike Clark and Alan Fitchie have kindly offered to show us some of their work.