Retford and District Photographic Society members have provided the great majority of the interest at meetings since the return after Christmas. The second half of the season began with the first print competition, which had no theme. David Hollingsworth judged and was pleased with the standard. As any judge, he had his own views on how the composition could be improved in many cases – usually by cropping but also by changing the orientation. He selected joint winners in the colour class: ‘Alesund From Above’ by Alistair MacDonald and ‘Vanishing Point’ by Alan Burkwood. Gee White won the monochrome class outright with ‘Towards the Light’.
Reflections are a very popular element in many photos, and they were the theme of the digital competition. Judge Dave Gibbons said this is actually one of the hardest themes for both judge and photographer. When the reflection is the topic, it must be the key element in the image. For the most part people present both the subject and its reflection, and the subject can easily dominate. David felt that some entries which would have fared well in open competitions suffered in this way; in particular, foreground items obstructing part of the reflection, while the subject remained clear, detracted from the score.
There was a strong entry for both colour and monochrome classes and Dave held back more than usual to enable him to make his final decision. The result was good news for colour class joint winners: Joyce Bell, whose ‘Powerful Reflections’ was one example where both subject and reflection worked well together, and Alan Burkwood with ‘Skeletal’. Geoff Stoddart won the monochrome class with his striking image of a ballerina ‘Encore’.
This meeting also included the good news that the Covid-impacted trip to hides in Kircudbrightshire will go ahead in March.
The last meeting in January was the popular Show and Tell evening, where a small number of members show a selection of images and talk about them. It was a very varied evening going from a Retford back garden to Buenos Aires and from steam engines to rare birds.
There are more competitions to come in March as well as a speaker. For the full programme of weekly meetings, visit www.retford-photographic.co.uk – just go along as a guest if you are interested!