Set Subject - Portraiture 4 April 2011

The very last competition of the season focused on Portraits. This was the culmination of a series which stared with a talk back in February from Bill Stevenson designed to inspire members and make everyone think more about portraits in photography.

A workshop followed in March which allowed members to try their hand at portraits using the club’s studio lights.

There were some interesting interpretations on this theme which were entered into the second of our Set Subject competitions for the season.

After an initial display of each photograph for about 15 seconds members ranked their three favourite pictures over coffee while the slideshow looped continuously.

“Man with Stick” taken by Alastair Ruffman at Muscat Fish Market was  selected by members as the winning photograph.

Second was the seasonal shot “Cuddle in the Snow” by Ole Gunnberg and equal third “Carnival” by Frank Thomson and “Chris” by Kath Guellard

Socond place Ole Gunnberg Cuddle in the Snow

Projected Images 7 March 2011

This year’s Projected Images Competition was judged by Lynda Parker from Blyth Photographic Society.There were a total of 79 images submitted by members, mostly via email, to the Competition Secretary

On the night Lynda ran through every photograph describing her likes and dislikes with some good constructive pointers and useful advice for members - a hard task with the size of the entry in the limited time available.

Lynda selected Veronica Congleton’s “Painted Lady” as the winning entry while Ole Gunnberg was second with “End of Carnival Season”. Veronica’s “Street Dogs’ Life” was placed third. Congratulations to Veronica for producing two widely different first class photographs and also to Ole for not only second place but also two more pictures in the Commended category.

Commended Bill Norfolk Derwent Water Fence

Commended Ole Gunnberg Sisters of Joy

Commended Hank Craggs Ghosts

Commended Ian Woodrow Rainbow Pencils

Commended Ole Gunnberg Weird Guy

This year's A/V Competition attracted a record 12 entries reflecting the hard work put in by members to try out what for many was a new way of presenting their photographs.

Congratulations to first-time winner Michael Balfour whose images of "Ushonga Beach" appealed especially to our judge for the evening, Ron Henry ARPS. A big thank you for Ron's constructive advice to each contributor and his general guidance on using this medium.

Runners up were Ken Godfrey's "Big River" with a great selection of local images and Doug Hogg's "My Little Whippet" with it's clever sporting theme.

An image from “Big River” by Ken Godfrey, placed Second.

Doug Hogg’s “My Little Whippet” was judged Third.

Set Subject - Landscapes 8 November 2010

The first set subject competition for this season was entitled Landscapes (Sunrise/sunset)  and drew a bumper entry of 90 photographs from members. The winner was selected by members voting during the coffee break and Andy Reilly came out top with his shot of a highland view “Loch Assynt”

With such a huge number of entries our Competitions Secretary Ian Woodrow really had his hands full but managed to show each image twice for members to make their selection. Andy also featured in 4th place with “Sunset Water”. Another good showing from Frank Thomson and another picture from Scotland - “Glencoe” was selected as runner up. Gordon Bennett’s old fashioned “Ploughing” came third with the final places a tie - “Cragside” by Suzanne Alderson and “Sunset Catch” from Marjorie Wilkinson.

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Second place Frank Thomson Glencoe

Third place Gordon Bennett Ploughing

Fourth place Andy Reilly Sunset Water

Equal Fifth place
Suzanne Alderson Cragside

Equal Fifth place
Marjorie Wilkinson Sunset Catch

This year’s print competition presented a bumper crop of 65 images for our judge, Dave Richardson APAGB from Ryton & District Camera Club, to decide over. This is another competition at Ponteland where the standard of entries has increased dramatically over the last few seasons. Dave mentioned several times that photographs which would have won or been highly commended in previous years are now becoming the ‘norm’ and the bar is continuing to rise.
The winning print selected by Dave was Frank Thomson’s “Cornered”
Here’s Frank’s notes on taking the photograph;
“I was staying at Yew Tree Farm near Coniston, when a young untrained collie jumped into the walled paddock and chased the Herdwick lambs. They took a very dim view of such goings on and retreated into a corner.
I had my Canon 40D to hand and captured the image : 1/200th at f/10, ISO 400 taken at 59mm on the EF-S 17-85 image stabilised Canon lens.”
Second place went to Alastair Ruffman with his “Fairtrade” print of a cup and teapot together with the hoard of coins he keeps in it!
Mike Sadler claimed third place with “Common Blue” which had impressed the judge because “they never stay still long enough for me to photograph.”
Mike and Frank also had entries selected as Highly Commended, “Garden Visitor” and “The Altar” respectively. Also Highly Commended was “Victory” by Ole Gunnberg one of his expertly captured sporting photographs.

Second place Alastair Ruffman Fairtrade

Highly Commended Ole Gunnberg Victory

Third place Mike Sadler Common Blue

The first competition of the new season was won by one of this year’s new members Jess Keating with her equine photograph “Horsey Kisses”.

There was a very high standard of entries this year in the Knockout competition which made voting very difficult in many of the rounds. Thanks are due to Veronica who kept score by counting the show of hands with re-counts necessary during much of the evening!
With 50 entries into the competition from 25 members the knockout aspect required a degree of juggling! Ian had decided to advance the highest scoring losing picture from the first round into the second round to produce a total of 26 pictures. After the second round the 3 highest scoring losing pictures where again advanced to give 16 pictures and a straight knockout to the final two entries. Again a re-count was required with Jess’s horse just beating Gary’s “Gateway to the Garden” - two excellent pictures to begin the new season!

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Second place Gary Smith Gateway to the Garden

Equal third Ole Gunnberg Flirty

Equal third Steve Helm Bedouin Camel Boy, Oman