CAMERA CLUB: Photography lecturer and course developer selects 'best of the best' images
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East Sutherland Camera Club have held their annual competition which was based on the top four images from each of their monthly competitions – the best of the best!, writes club secretary Andy Kirby.
This year they were very fortunate to have Matt Sillars as the judge. Matt taught photography at Inverness College UHI for around 25 years, developing photography as part of the art and design curriculum.
He developed the stand-alone Higher photography curriculum at Inverness and helped establish the UHI Fine Art Degree. He has taught practical photography at all levels.
Matt’s approach in critiquing the images was to focus on composition and how an image can be composed and processed to convey a story, emotion or particular point of view.
In particular, he demonstrated how going in close to the main subject can make an image more effective. The message was to think about what you want to achieve before pressing the shutter, or do it afterwards by removing extraneous elements and cropping in to what really matters. Try and take the viewer’s eye to where you want it to go.
It was an excellent learning evening for all the club members.
First in the colour section was Rob Zywietz, from Dornoch with “Kelpie”, an imaginative composite image which left the viewer plenty of scope for imagination and interpretation.
Second was Martin Ross, from Golspie with “The Gap”, a beautifully toned image leaving little doubt where the focal point was intended to be, but also one which encouraged visual exploration.
Zoe Grey from Portmahomack came third with her colourful capture of “Edinburgh Festival Fireworks”. Firework bursts are not easy to capture, but Zoe managed this along with just the right amount of detail of the Edinburgh townscape. Louise MacKay from Brora got in close to show the gritty atmosphere of maintaining a steam locomotive with her fourth placed “Spit and Polish”.
Alan Butcher from Golspie certainly captured the decisive moment – a concept enshrined in the work of the famous French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson. His first placed monochrome image “I see you” also had a lovely tonal range which drew the viewer’s eye in to the stag. This image was also selected by Matt as best overall.
Zoe Gray was back showing her storytelling skills with “Jen - Back on the Road”, which was placed second. Third was Andy Kirby from Dornoch with his “Waiting for the Snow Plough”. A real life story of being stuck at Dalwhinnie!
Snow is always difficult to photograph well since the camera’s automatic metering system tends to reduce bright white towards a mid-grey, but here the light, shade and texture of the snow were all accurately caught.
Alan Butcher was again among the winners with his dramatic fourth placed “Chasing Pack”.
The club hopes to return to its base in Brora Community Centre at the start of next season in September and during the summer there will be publicity about what will be on offer. It is hoped to attract back former members who, for perfectly understandable reasons, felt that joining in with Zoom meetings was not for them.
For more details about the club, visit www.eastsutherlandcc.org.uk
