Due to the weather forecast, we are going to cancel the February 1st meeting.
We will hope to resume our meetings on February 15th.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Deconstructing Light
Deconstructing Light
by Darren Rowse
Light is fundamental to our existence as human beings. Light – electromagnetic radiation, is also fundamental to photography and the creation of the image.
Learning to visually deconstruct light, its qualities, its temperature and direction can help you to better develop your photography skills. As light makes up such a fundamental part of our lives we tend to become used to it as it becomes part our subconscious understanding of the world. To develop your photography skills and your ability to identify suitable photographic situations, settings and composition, begin to deconstruct the light you see around you, and the light in other peoples photographs.
What is the light like in the morning?
What is the light like as a thunderstorm rolls in?
What unusual and creative light sources do you have around the house that could be used in creating interesting and unusual portraits?
Take a look at your favorite photographs – where is the light in relation to the subject and the photographer?
What kind of mood has been created by the light in the photograph?
One of my all time favorite examples of an unrivalled understanding of this fundamental aspect of photography is Elliot Erwitt. Erwitt is heralded as a photographer whose skill extended beyond the ability to expose a perfect silhouette or window lit photograph, to being able to capture the decisive moment as it happened before his eyes.
Erwitt’s photographs served as a great influence when I first began to engage with photography, and continue as a great source of inspiration both technically, and in his ability to capture the essence of his subject. In the fraction of the second his images were taken, Erwitt had the ability to compose his images with a great sophistication and elegance.
Erwitt’s photographs were shot on black and white film; While the technology that we use to capture light has changed, the nature of light itself has not. The same rules apply when deconstructing and analysing light.
Consider some of these lighting and textural characteristics next time you head out with a camera. Hopefully you will uncover something that had previously existed simply as part of your subconscious that suddenly becomes part of your conscious considerations of the world.
January 18th meeting notes
Hi all!!!
Judd called the meeting to order this evening with 14 members present. He talked about our field trip to Branson to the Ice Sculpture Event that 9 of us went to. There were some really good pictures taken there and we had a good time. Jerry brought a DVD of some of the pictures that he took there for all of us to view.
Next we had Show & Tell with Marty, Katie, John and Judd showing us what they had been doing of late. The picture that Katie showed us is one that she entered in a contest with Digital Photography Challenge online and placed in the top 10. The catagory was to take a picture facing into the light (backlight). GOOD JOB KATIE!!!! If you would like to check that site out go to Digital Photography Challenge online. You don't have to be a member to enter some challenges but can join for $25.00 a year and be able to join in on the challenges for members only.
Next we showed our pictures for the Light Trails challenge. Judd is 'challenging' us to use our cameras. (and for some of us, and we know who we are, we need that challenge) Katie, Larry, Rosalie, Connie, Wade, Marcia, Jerry, Judd and John all had pictures to share. This was really cool to see all the different interpretations that we came up with. Some of you really went 'out of the box'.
We have a weekly challenge going on also for every week of the month. (I told you Judd is really going to 'challenge' us to use our cameras.)
Our first subject was 'COLD' and John, Katie, Marty, Rosalie, Connie, Wade, Marcia and Judd all had pictures to share.
Our next weeks challenge subject was 'BREAKFAST' and John, Katie, Marty, Rosalie, Connie, Wade, Marcia, Jerry and Judd shared in this catagory. This one really made you hungry! Good job to all who participated in these challenges!!!!! Keep up the good work! Like Judd says, to become a really good photographer you have to use your camera!
Our next meeting will be February 1st. Our challenge for this meeting is DECONSTRUCTING LIGHT. Judd had a handout for everyone on this subject to help us out. This one should be fun. Also our weekly challenges for this meeting are 'MACRO' and 'TIRED'. If you don't have a macro lens as a lot of us don't, just do a close up for this one. We will also be starting a DVD on Composition.
Next we had Q&A time. Toni posed a question on Depth of Field. She has been having trouble with this with her camera, a Canon Powershot G11. Some of the group suggested she put her F stop down as low as it would go, F2 or thereabout, get her telephoto lens out as far as it would go, set the camera to Manual and pick her ISO, 100 or 200, suggested she use her flash, and focus up close and far away and see if any of these suggestions help. She is going to play around with this and let us know at the next meeting how she is doing.
Judd also talked about using the Dioptic adjustment knob on our cameras to clear up our vision. He showed us where to find it on our cameras and how to use it. I know from experience that this really works. When I did it on my camera what a difference it made in what I was viewing through that eyepiece! If you have any questions on this please feel free to talk to Judd or anyone else that was at the meeting tonight.
The meeting closed a little early tonight as the Steering Committee met after the meeting.
Well until next time; use those cameras and most of all - Have fun with it!
Marcia
Judd called the meeting to order this evening with 14 members present. He talked about our field trip to Branson to the Ice Sculpture Event that 9 of us went to. There were some really good pictures taken there and we had a good time. Jerry brought a DVD of some of the pictures that he took there for all of us to view.
Next we had Show & Tell with Marty, Katie, John and Judd showing us what they had been doing of late. The picture that Katie showed us is one that she entered in a contest with Digital Photography Challenge online and placed in the top 10. The catagory was to take a picture facing into the light (backlight). GOOD JOB KATIE!!!! If you would like to check that site out go to Digital Photography Challenge online. You don't have to be a member to enter some challenges but can join for $25.00 a year and be able to join in on the challenges for members only.
Next we showed our pictures for the Light Trails challenge. Judd is 'challenging' us to use our cameras. (and for some of us, and we know who we are, we need that challenge) Katie, Larry, Rosalie, Connie, Wade, Marcia, Jerry, Judd and John all had pictures to share. This was really cool to see all the different interpretations that we came up with. Some of you really went 'out of the box'.
We have a weekly challenge going on also for every week of the month. (I told you Judd is really going to 'challenge' us to use our cameras.)
Our first subject was 'COLD' and John, Katie, Marty, Rosalie, Connie, Wade, Marcia and Judd all had pictures to share.
Our next weeks challenge subject was 'BREAKFAST' and John, Katie, Marty, Rosalie, Connie, Wade, Marcia, Jerry and Judd shared in this catagory. This one really made you hungry! Good job to all who participated in these challenges!!!!! Keep up the good work! Like Judd says, to become a really good photographer you have to use your camera!
Our next meeting will be February 1st. Our challenge for this meeting is DECONSTRUCTING LIGHT. Judd had a handout for everyone on this subject to help us out. This one should be fun. Also our weekly challenges for this meeting are 'MACRO' and 'TIRED'. If you don't have a macro lens as a lot of us don't, just do a close up for this one. We will also be starting a DVD on Composition.
Next we had Q&A time. Toni posed a question on Depth of Field. She has been having trouble with this with her camera, a Canon Powershot G11. Some of the group suggested she put her F stop down as low as it would go, F2 or thereabout, get her telephoto lens out as far as it would go, set the camera to Manual and pick her ISO, 100 or 200, suggested she use her flash, and focus up close and far away and see if any of these suggestions help. She is going to play around with this and let us know at the next meeting how she is doing.
Judd also talked about using the Dioptic adjustment knob on our cameras to clear up our vision. He showed us where to find it on our cameras and how to use it. I know from experience that this really works. When I did it on my camera what a difference it made in what I was viewing through that eyepiece! If you have any questions on this please feel free to talk to Judd or anyone else that was at the meeting tonight.
The meeting closed a little early tonight as the Steering Committee met after the meeting.
Well until next time; use those cameras and most of all - Have fun with it!
Marcia
Thursday, January 13, 2011
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
World Class Ice Sculptures in Branson
They start with a 250 pound block of ice and carve beautiful creations.
Starts at 10am and goes till 4pm.
Free to the public.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Thursday, January 6, 2011
January 4, 2011 Meeting
Hello to all and a very happy, safe and prosperous New Year to all!
Our first meeting of the new year had our new officers in place: Judd as President and Jerry as Vice President. Marcia retained her position as Secretary. A big welcome goes out to all of you! Judd and Jerry presented their ideas and views for taking our club forward in the new year. Judd thanked Debbie and Rosalie for the tremendous job they had done for the past 3 years.
We had Show & Tell with Kelly, Larry, Debbie and Jerry participating. Kelly had pictures of the eclipse that she took and we were so proud of her; she is using the manual settings on her camera!!!! Good job Kelly! Larry showed us a picture that he took where he stitched 12 photos together to create a panorama. It was a wonderful picture! Debbie had some light trail pics and some that she had taken at the Christmas party with Anne storytelling. That was fun.Jerry is on a quest for sharpness and brought his new toy, a head band magnifier that he is using. It will really come in handy for him and we had fun trying it out.
Judd and Jerry formed a new Steering Committee with Larry, Debbie and Connie as the new members. They will be meeting on Tuesday, January 18th for a short session after our meeting that evening. Good luck to all of you and we are excited to hear what ideas you come up with.
Judd passed around a paper and will do so at our next meeting also to get ideas from everyone of things you would like to discuss or do at our meetings this year. He also is going to have a Q & A section at our meetings to answer any question that someone might need help with. If you are having trouble with something or just need a question answered throw it out there. Many heads are better than one!
Our first field trip will be Saturday,January 15th. We are going to Branson for the Ice Sculpture event that is held in the parking lot at the Titanic Museum. It is a free event and is held from 9-4 that day. Bring a tripod and your camera or just your camera. There will be a lot of people roaming around this event but we should still be able to get some good pics. Just let someone know that you want to go and you can always call Judd or Marcia at 933-5450. We can carpool for this. So far Debbie, Jerry, Judd, Wade, Connie and Marcia are wanting to go. The more the merrier so all are welcome!!!!
Judd also asked Larry if he would be in charge of field trips. Larry has some good ideas for this; he would like to have a monthly field trip and then quarterly have us do a big field trip. This should be a lot of fun.
Our Challenge for the next meeting is Light Trails; Judd handed out a guide for doing this to help us. If you weren't at the meeting and would like a copy of this please let me know; 933-5450 and I will make sure you get one. The pics for this challenge must be new; no archived ones; get out and use your cameras!
Judd also handed out a January calendar to each of us for a 52 week challenge that we will be doing this year. Each month we will receive a new calendar. For January we have 5 weekly challenges; the first week we are to take a picture of your interpretation of cold. The second week is breakfast, the third week is macro, the next is tired, the next is sleep. Take your pictures (new, not archived) and bring them to the next meeting. For our meeting on January 18th we should have cold and breakfast done. This should be a fun challenge and make some of us (ME), use our cameras. Also, put your camera settings on the back of these pics.
Judd also wants us to do a 1 year challenge: He wants you to go out and find a spot that you can go to in every season and take a picture in the same spot. Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall. Then we will bring those pictures to club, say, our last meeting of the year???, and show them. Larry had a good idea; mark the spots where your tripod legs are so that you are in the same spot for these pics.
It was also discussed that we enter contests and that there are contests that we can enter as a club. We are checking on that also and will have more info on that.
Rosalie is going to call and have a representative from the Marshfield Mail come to talk to us about the club signing up for N2Marshfield. This will get the club out there in the news and let people know what we are about.
Dean let us know that the Lions Club is having a spaghetti supper on Saturday, Jan. 8th at the Lions Club building at 210 Maple St. from 4 to 8 p.m. The charge is $5.00 per person and 6 and under is free. You can pay at the door. The food is always good at these events and what a great organization!
Larry let us know about an art gallery in town called Local Unique. You can take your pics there to display for sale or anything for that matter, he says they have a lot of different venues there. There is a 20% commission fee on anything sold. The gallery is open Wednesday through Saturday.
We again talked about having another Workshop like we did in January 2010. This venture will take a lot of work and Judd is wanting to find out if anyone is interested in doing this; he will be bringing this up again as there seems to be a want to do this again. We gained members by the last one and the community really seemed to enjoy it.
Tom will be letting us know about a contest that is going on right now pertaining to a steam engine of the Union Pacific RR. If the Kansas City to Little Rock one wins it could be close enough for us for a field trip. (did someone say field trip?) He will let us know more so that we can vote too and maybe help this one to win.
On that note Judd closed the meeting. Welcome Judd & Jerry; you guys are going to make a great team!!!
Til the next time,
Marcia
Christmas Party
December 21st we had our annual Christmas Party and the food of course was wonderful. We had a great story from "Granny Annie" our very own Anne Stokes. The ones who want to participate in the gift exchange brought a gift and we rolled a die to pick the gift. We also watched a DVD slideshow of all our photos that members wanted to share. We are all geared up for next year, with a new President and Vice President.
Judd Harris will be president and Jerry Wilson will be vice president. Marcia will continue doing the wonderful job she has done the past few months.
Judd Harris will be president and Jerry Wilson will be vice president. Marcia will continue doing the wonderful job she has done the past few months.
Sunday, January 2, 2011
December 7 minutes
Hi to all!!!!
Debbie called the meeting to order this evening with 17 members in attendance and 1 guest, Isabella Lauderdale, who attended with her parents. Debbie told us of Elmer Vittitioe's passing; his son Trey will inform Debbie of the funeral arrangements. Elmer's passing is sad to all of us; he was a great contributor to this club and he will be sorely missed.
Debbie bought a DVD on composition and we will be viewing it in a meeting in the near future.
We held the election for new officers of the club this evening:
JUDD HARRIS was elected President with Ron making that motion and all were in favor.
JERRY WILSON was elected Vice President with Katie making that motion and all were in favor.
MARCIA HARRIS was elected Secretary-Treasurer with Connie making that motion and all were in favor.
These officers will take over their positions with the January 2011 meeting. We wish all of them good luck and are looking forward to what they have to offer.
The annual Christmas Party will be held at the Jubilee theater on December 21st at 6:30 p.m. Bring a dish to pass and a $10.00 photography related gift for the game that we will play. (only bring the gift if you plan on playing the game)
DUES are being collected now for 2011. See Marcia for that. $24.00 for adults and $12.00 for students. (we only pro rate for new members)
Judd informed us that Captain Kimmo has a new e-book out that is about HDR Photography and is 210 pages long. He said the cost is $29.95 and he is finding it very useful. If you are interested in this you can go to Captain Kimmo's website and find it.
If you didn't bring your DVD of your 20 favorite pics you can call Debbie and drop it off to her; she has a lot of work to get this together for the Christmas party so don't delay; get it to her as soon as possible! (what! you haven't called her yet?)
We had Show & Tell with Rosalie, Jerry, Connie and Ron participating. Rosalie's pics from the Fort Worth Zoo were awesome! Ron showed us pics from his trip to the Badlands. Two of his are even going to be on the COVERS!!!! of two magazines very shortly. One is Cowboys & Indians and the other is Roundup. You'll be able to get these magazines at Wal Mart in March. (if I have those wrong Ron please let me know) We are very proud of him; his photography is amazing! Jerry is taking pics of bugs and cataloging them and finding out just exactly what they are. He has about 100 done so far! Connie had entered the Seymour contest also and brought her TWO ribbons to show us! She got 1st place in Urban and an honorable mention in Nature. Good job! to all of them.
Marty brought a DVD for us to watch; the Ultimate Photo Guide; digital photography series by Karl Taylor. It was very informative; he covered Light, Optics, Subject, Aperature, Medium & Composition. It never ceases to amaze me that just when I thought I knew a subject pretty well I still had more to learn. That is why these subjects are so important; we really do pick up something new each time we review a subject. THANKS for sharing Marty!!!!
Here's hoping we see all of you at the Christmas Party! It should be a lot of fun and who can't use some good food in their bellies! Remember to bring your spouse or friend!
Until next time!
Marcia
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