Mary Luckham Trophy 2008

The subject of this competition has now been set by out Chairman Tony Oliver.
The subject will be Summertime 2008.
To see the details and rules see HERE

1908 and Time Development

In this weeks Salisbury Journal there was a report form 1908 of a lecture given to members that is of passing interest. To see this see HERE

I have also found from 2006 the report of John Sutton's death. He was a former Chairman of the club. This can be seen HERE

Beth's Success!

I am delighted to let you know that "Outdoor Photography " is publishing one of my photos. It is one that I submitted in the judging 2 weeks ago at the club which rated a "7" from the judge


I am told it will be in the June edition and will go on sale in around May 15th.

Beth Jacobs

PAGB Print Competition & Exhibition

Dear Club Secretaries & Competition Secretaries,

Ian Bigg our President has asked us to help organise this years Southern Federation entry to the PAGB Print Competition & Exhibition. It is a great opportunity for your members to showcase their work at a national level.

We would be grateful if you could arrange for your club rep to bring a selection of your members colour and monochrome prints to the SF AGM on the 16th of May, at Littleton Millennium Memorial Hall, The Hallway, Littleton, Winchester, SO22 6QL at 7.45pm

If you are no longer in either of these roles at your club, we would be very grateful if you could forward this email to the appropriate member.

This years judges will be Rikki O'Neill FRPS MPAGB, Arnold J Hubbard FRPS APAGB EFIAP, and Roger Reynolds Hon FRPS APAGB. Normal PAGB rules, (one photographer, one club) apply, maximum mount size - 50cm x 40cm.

We will also be looking for slides/digital images to represent the Southern Federation, in October, so we will need to receive them by the the Autumn Club Reps meeting on the 15th September.

Any questions please contact us,

Kind regards,

Chris & Terri Neill-Griffin

PAGB Print Competition & Exhibition

Dear Club Secretaries & Competition Secretaries & Members,

I know for many of you this is a busy time of the season, but please don't forget to arrange for some colour and mono prints for the PAGB Print Competition & Exhibition, without your support and your prints the Southern Photographic Federation cannot be represented in the PAGB competition. It's a great opportunity to have work shown nationally, and it would be an immense shame if the Southern Fed were unable to take part, due to a lack of prints, all you need to do is send your club's rep to the AGM on 16th May with a selection of prints.

So please, help us to show the superb standard of work produced by photographers in the Southern Federation, and bring us some prints.

Many thanks in anticipation of your entries.

Kind regards,

Chris Neill-Griffin

Mount Cutter

Absolutely fantastic. I had a couple of responses at the camera club on Monday, and a suggestion of a couple web sites to try. I was told that what I really need is a Logan Team System. I tried Art discount, Amazon and Hobbycraft. The last one is a shed type retailer, and I had to phone them as the website wasn't up to much. Little to choose between the other two, so I went for the cheapest. artdiscount.co.uk Over a tenner cheaper than Hobbycraft. Ordered Wednesday, delivered Friday morning. Problem solved. It could well be a site that others may find useful in the future.

Now, back to the job............................................

Phil.

Mount Cutter

Wouldn't you just believe it. I stopped mending the fence because it started to rain. In fact, it was hailstones!! So, rather than waste the day, I got out my prints for the exhibition. Prints are printed, frames are ready, mountboard waiting to be cut. Just needs me to put the whole thing together. Afternoon job? I don't think so. On its second cut, the cutter slipped, and on further inspection, the clamp has lost it's thread. It has died. Terrific. It was a Logan one and has served me well. My reason for this post............. Well I need a new one, and I was kind of hoping that one or more of our members would like to recommend one that I absolutely must buy, or just as importantly, one to avoid like the plague. Your thoughts on this would be gratefully appreciated, but please hurry, or Tony will get the hump with me if I don't get my prints in on time!!!

Only joking Tony.

Many thanks.
Phil.

PAGB Awards for Photographic Merit

PAGB Awards for Photographic Merit - Copythorne Parish Hall, Pollards Moor Road, Winsor (Southampton CC meeting place)

Dates Sat/Sun 26/27 April 2008

Tony [our Chairman] has put an entry in to get his CPAGB. So why not go along and support his endeavour? You need a ticket and Tony can tell you how to get one.
Again I am unable to find any information from the SPF web site about this important event.

More Salisbury CC Archives

Today I have scanned a few more archives.
There is a scan of a complete International Exhibition catalogue for 1957 for instance.
Plus a Newsletter, some Accounts and a list of the Trophy winners for .
There are some familiar names amongst these.
Click the link for more.

Cheap Epson Premium Quality Glossy Paper A3+

You can get Epson Premium Quality Glossy Paper 20 sheets for £19.85 with free postage (next day recorded delivery) - it is the real thing - if you can only print to A3 then it is worth buying to cut to size - £1 per sheet - can't be bad!

Happy printing
;-)

Exposure 2009

During 2009 there will be an exhibition devoted to digital imaging for the general public. It will take place at Olympia. More can be found HERE.

Photoshop and Print Size

Have ever noticed that when you click on the Print Size button when you have the Zoom tool selected that if you measure the screen the dimensions are wrong?
Well I find this irritating sometimes. It would be nice to get this correct. Recently on Ben Willmore's site I found out to put right this Photoshop error.

First understand that Photoshop assumes that your monitor screen has a resolution of 72ppi. Well this was the case years ago but now screens are almost never like this. I found mine to be 91.64ppi for instance.

So how do we correct this?

1. Start by making a new file from File > New. Set the Width and Height to say 7 inches each and the resolution to 72ppi. Other settings do not matter. Click OK.

2. Now go to View > Actual Pixels.

3. Now hold up a ruler across the width of the screen and check what it measures. Say 6.2 inches i.e. wrong.

4. Adjust the percentage setting shown in the lower left so that the ruler reads correctly. To adjust the percentage just click on it and type in a new number. Press Shift + Return or Enter. This allows the percentage to stay highlighted to enable you to change it quickly and easily.

5. Once you have done this use the percentage and multiply by 72. When I did this on my screen I got 127%. When multiplied by 72 I got the answer of 91.64 [i.e. 1.27x72].

6. Now so that all our photos show correctly open up the Units and Rulers found under Edit > Preferences > Units and Rulers.

7. Set the Screen Resolution to the calculated number [91.64 for me] and click OK.

8. Now measure the 7 inch square. Is it right? It is possible it could still be wrong by a large amount. Now try select the Zoom Tool and from the Options bar click on the Print Size button. Does this make it correct? It should be right now. Any slight error could be because of the difficulty of measuring with a ruler on a curved screen and the thickness of the glass. But it will be much better than before.

9. There is a point to note that Photoshop has another error in that the View > Print Size gives a different size to the Print Size button for the Zoom Tool. This has been corrected in CS3 more or less. But in general the Zoom Tool Print Size is the one to use for most versions of Photoshop.

Peter Read

Digital Imaging Course

The Aims of the Course

So you want to know how to produce a satisfactory print from your film or digital camera?

The course is aimed primarily for people who want guidance in the control of digital images from the very start. Maybe you have just acquired a digital camera and wish to get successful results from it. Or perhaps you have lots of old prints, negatives or slides and want to know the right way to deal with these in the new world of Digital Imaging. The course will also be useful to people who have been conventional photographers and want to move into the digital domain.
We will not be showing you how to take photographs or how to use a camera be they of the digital or film variety.
This course will show you how to use the Lightroom (formerly a Darkroom!). We will explore how to load photographs into your computer and how to deal with them using Image Manipulating software. We shall be using the Adobe Photoshop Elements [2, 3, 4, 5 and/or 6] to co-ordinate the instructions. This is an interactive course in which you will use supplied images to learn various techniques as outlined in the units. You will then e-mail your results back to us for evaluation. Basic advice on equipment will be given.
The course will consist of an introductory unit and 8 units each covering various aspects of DI. They will be interdependent units so that what you learn in unit 1 will be needed for unit 8 for instance.
The Units
1. Getting Pictures into your computer.
How to save, size, sharpen and print your images. How to e-mail images.
2. The 4 C’s – Cropping, Cleaning, Cloning and Controlling your Image.
3. Essential Picture Correction – the use of Levels for Tonal and Colour Correction.
4. Further Colour Correction Ideas – the use of Colour Variations, Auto Colour Correction, Quick Fix and Hue & Saturation controls
5. Selections. The how and why.
6. Filters, Effects and Painting.
7. Why Layers and Blending Modes? Also putting Words onto your Picture.
8. Having Phun with Photos. Making Cards, Calendars and Montages.



To partake in this course you will need to have the following equipment;
1. A computer with Internet connection – obvious of course! Dial-Up or Broadband is OK. Your computer will need to have Windows 98/ 98SE or 2000 or XP or Vista or even a MAC. You should have a minimum of 16Mb of hard disk space. We think you will need a lot more than this however; say 1000 Mb or 1 Gb of memory.
2. A Printer – photo quality A4 minimum.
3. Adobe Photoshop Elements 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 or 6.
4. Possibly a Scanner. Probably Flatbed scanner is sufficient.
Please take some time to read advice on buying computers, peripherals and software on the LINK below.
By kind permission the U3A (University of the Third Age) has agreed to allow us to run this course. The course is based on one written by us for the U3A.
If you join our course we are sure that you will enjoy it and will learn a lot. It will be great fun too!
The modest charge to take part on this course will go into the Club funds.
Ask Peter Read for further details.

Leonie's Baby

I have finally made a small gallery devoted to Leonie Maclay's baby born last year. Have a look HERE

Archives

I have just started a section that preserves some of the Club's archives. There are pictures of members from the past and a selection of old programmes and Exhibition catalogues.

Take a look [click on this link] and ask if you want to see more.
Peter

Honoured by the SPF

Both Sheila and Peter Read were honoured on Friday 4th January 2008 at the opening of the SPF Exhibition at our Library.
Besides Sheila getting a Highly Commended for Dahlia Dance and Peter getting Third Place for his monochrome print Train at Chama they were also presented with the SPF Roll of Honour. This was a total surprise to them both but they suspect that Tony and Richard may know something about how it was organised.

Presenting the awards is Ian Bigg President of the SPF who was also given the Roll of Honour again much to his surprise and delight.

The two photographs mentioned can be seen on the 29th November 2007 news item below here.

Success for two members in the SPF Exhibition

Sheila and Peter Read have both had success in the forthcoming Southern Photographic Federation Exhibition.

Sheila got a Highly Commended for her picture of Dahlia Dance.

Whilst Peter got Third Place for his photograph called Train at Chama. This photograph is also being used in the Viewfinders of Romsey Camera Club entry and for the poster to advertise the exhibition.

New Gallery

See our new Photographic Gallery from recent images of our members.
Click on the link below.

The Great British Cup for Projected Digital Images

At the October 2007 executive meeting the PAGB Executive agreed to host a new competition for Projected Digital Images. The competition is open to all member clubs of PAGB affiliated federations. Download the PDF flyer notice for further information about the closing date and how to enter the competition.

Click to download
PAGB Digital Cup

This is for our whole club to enter. So we shall need at least 8 members offering their images for inclusion. We could use some images from the competition entries of the 26th November possibly. So this competition would be a good introduction to this sort of photography. But the exact image specification will not be known until after 1st November.

Club what do you think? Add comments here.

STUDIO PORTRAIT LIGHTING

Fiona Alison FRPS FMPA FBIPP is starting a series of Portrait Lighting Workshops aimed at photographers with little or no experience. The one day courses will be held at a venue in the Ringwood area. It will concentrate on the production of high quality work with the minimum of equipment. It is suitable for those aiming to produce portraiture of a professional standard.

Learn the basic groundwork on which to build and improve.

Fiona is currently President of The Master Photographers Association.

Fee £95
More detail can be obtained from 01425 471 489