What is It? Quiz Evening
We had a really enjoyable evening at Thatcham Photography Club. We managed to win the Photo Quiz by one point, having lost last year. A great result! There were some really good images, that kept us enjoyably bamboozled.
We also at really enjoyed photographing the Thatcham Phoenix machine, a wonderfully Heath-Robinson device that produced some really striking images. We then moved outside to photograph light beams and fireworks.
Thanks go to everyone at Thatcham Photography Club for organising the evening and making us all feel so welcome.
Click image to view the gallery
Reading Night Photography Walk
We were joined on our Reading Night Shoot by members from Thatcham Photography Club and a great evening was enjoyed by all.
This was enhanced by the families celebrating Diwali with some wonderful fireworks.
Click image to view gallery
Motion Panning Workshop
Members enjoyed a workshop practising their “skills” of panning moving objects. It was quite tricky, and results were varied!
Many thanks to Vernon for training us.
A fun evening was had by all!
Click images to enlarge
Mortimer Transport Rally
Club member Mary Auckland visited the Mortimer Transport Rally held on Saturday 22nd June. It was superb. The weather held out and the vehicle procession was most successful, exhibiting an incredible range of vehicles, some of which are shown here.
Click to enlarge images
Photographing Holy Trinity Church, Theale
Despite the dreadful weather, club members enjoyed photographing around and inside the church: a Grade 1 listed building.
Thanks to Sue Totham for organising the trip and to the Rector Martin Davy & Church Administrator Marjorie Burrington for allowing the visit.
Click image to go to the gallery
Aldermaston Lock Evening Photography
We recently spent a damp evening photographing at Aldermaston Lock. The brief was to focus on an item and take three shots gradually moving back from the object, but keeping it in view.
Despite the rain, it was an enjoyable evening, ending up at The Butt Inn for a well-earned drink!
Click images to enlarge
Click images to enlarge
Mortimer Community Hall Exhibition
We’ve just changed over the Mortimer Hall exhibition with the selections from some past showcases. Four Autumn colours prints and four abstract images.
The pictures here don’t do them justice (sorry taken with mobile!). They look really good in the flesh and are vibrant and arresting – thanks to Graham Bowley’s brilliant printing.
The original images can be seen in the Programme Activities Gallery here and the Fireworks & Lightpainting gallery here.
Congratulations!
RPS Digital Imaging specialist group competition winner.
Club member Mary Auckland was joint winner in round 3 of the RPS Digital Imaging competition ‘People’, with the entry (right), entitled ‘Walkway Man’.
‘I spent a day photographing in Oxford (by invitation of the Reading Camera Club). We eventually went to a shopping centre, and looking down from a walkway, I saw a hoard of people passing by on a lower walkway, with one solitary man busily texting, apparently oblivious. A sign of the times? I took several images with a slow shutter speed, but none of the individual images depicted quite what I felt I saw. So I blended three of the images to give the movement of the constant flow of people, contrasting with the stationary figure texting. Fortunately he was wearing a white shirt, which helps him to stand out amongst the crowds photographically, replicating the situation.’
Olympus OM-1. Handheld, but rested on a handrail, 1/3 sec at f/14 ISO200 32mm (35mm equiv. 64mm).
Click image to enlarge
Portrait Photography with the South Berks Concert Band
On Thursday 21st March we were afforded a great opportunity by six members of the South Berks Concert Band, to photograph them with a variety of their instruments. The band members were very generous with their time and patience enabling us to have a relaxed fun evening and to make some wonderful portraits. See the images in a gallery here.
Workshop: Small Objects Still life.
At our last workshop, small object still life (08.02.24), beautifully organised by Iain Buchanan, we had the opportunity to photo a variety of objects in different settings: black backdrop, light tent, light pad and reflective surface. An enjoyable opportunity to try something different.
Light Painting and Fireworks
The annual light painting and fireworks evening took place later than usual because of the weather. This year, on a crisp late November evening, club members enjoyed taking pictures of a range of lighting effects, with some interesting results. The fireworks also worked well, as can be seen from the image in the gallery.
The frames are up and ready in the Mortimer Community Centre!
With many thanks to Alan Harding and Iain Buchanan, we fixed eight frames in the Mortimer Community Centre.
What a team. after slow start (the maths involved in measuring the wall and equal spacing etc was somewhat challenging), we gathered speed as an efficient team and I’m happy to say we will shortly be displaying our first exhibition photos.
…And now the photos have been installed for our first exhibition in Mortimer Community Centre.
Many thanks to Graham Bowley for printing and mounting them so well (and despite mount problems of non-standard photographic thickness and size etc). The lighting is not marvellous of course; but the prints do look impressive and will be seen by many who use the hall.
Currently, the frames display the images for the Hands panel.
Click images to enlarge
Workshop: Oil & Water; Water Droplets on Hot Glue Strings
Members recently enjoyed experimenting with these two methods of macro photography. For many of us, this was the first time of trying these methods and it was a great way of learning about different aspects of photography.
Mary Auckland has written two documents out lining the techniques used: Oil & Water here; Water droplets here.
Thatcham Nature Reserve
On a beautiful Summery evening, club members met for a walk round the lake at Thatcham Nature Reserve: with resulting waterfowl and the odd (very odd) human depicted. 08.06.2023
Burghfield Camera Club comes second in the Yateley inter-club panel competition, despite being the smallest club.
BCC more than held its own against fierce opposition to gain a well earned second place. BCC’s entry was a highly collaborative even. An evening was held to photograph members hands with suitable props and a single light, with a view to producing black and white images. The results were placed on their forum, where members can advise on improving, changing or editing images .
The selected images were all beautifully printed and mounted by Graham Bowley, to give the panel a cohesive look.
The image of the potter’s wheel, by Iain Buchanan, rightly drew the judge’s eye and was awarded best image from all the panels.
14.05.2023
Reading Night Shoot
In March members braved the elements to try their hand at some night shooting. Starting at ‘blue hour ‘on the pedestrian bridge (Christchurch Bridge) over the river Thames, the group then strolled through Reading. Shoot sites included, through the rail underpass, down Broad St, the corner of West Street and the Station; where rain stopped play.
An evening of light painting and fireworks
In November BCC members had a wonderful evening of fireworks, light painting and food.
The evening started with light painting using an led torch and diy tools
plastic bottle with coloured gels
plastic transparent tube with luminous vinyl inserted
stick with coloured LED strip attached
and then moved on to using some light painting tools from ‘Light Painting Brushes’ (https://lightpaintingbrushes.com)
A break to partake of some wonderful pulled pork rolls with trimmings was then followed by a firework display .
A great time for photography and socialising was had by all.
With thanks to Carole & John Wood for use of their light pollution free grounds for the event.