For our last meeting before the Summer break, we held a competition for printed images on the theme of “Simplicity”.

It is very easy to try and over complicate a photograph and so this, the fourth round of the Society’s five-heat cumulative competition, aimed to keep things simple.  This could be a reduced colour palette, just one or two subjects in the frame; the choice was up to the photographer.

External judge, Naomi Saul, had 52 pictures to judge in a busy evening.  Each member is entitled to enter three images and marks were awarded out of 20.

Fifteen pictures received either 19 or 20 points and shows the quality of images that members of the Society can produce.

Of her pictures, Fiona Adamson said:

“Bear” taken in April up on the side of a fjord in Northern Svalbard as the polar bear made its way along the ice shelf looking for food. The image shows the bear giving us a last look before heading up into the hills. I converted the image to monochrome to fit our brief for the competition.

“S Curve” is a cropped portion of a Whooper Swan that had just had a quick wash, hence the droplets on its feathers.

Lesley Alsford’s explanation of her pictures were:

“A drop of water”, I enjoy the challenge of capturing drops of water , especially with coloured backgrounds but for the theme of  ‘simplicity’ I liked this single droplet with a more subdued tone.

“Daisy”  I photographed this daisy using ‘multiple exposures’ and putting them together to give the softness of the petals and a sense of movement.

Helen Frost’s “Moonfield” I had this photo of a full moon sitting on my computer for a while, not sure what to do with it. I finally got the idea of adding grasses from a TV farming programme!

Chris Gilbert’s picture “Eggcentric” – “this was an attempt to make a simple image out of two unrelated items, an egg and a sheet of rolled up paper. It was shot in a light tent and resulted in a high key image depicting form and shape”.

“Ornamental Grass Flower” The actual structure of this flower or more correctly seed head (picked from my garden) was itself fairly complex but the image itself shot  diagonally against a white background helped to simplify the overall effect.

Of his picture “Roman feet” Richard Litherland added this was taken in the British Museum, it is of a statue of a young athlete in an inverted position while performing acrobatics. I just photographed the feet which have been beautifully carved from the stone and form an attractive and unusual composition, the marble glowing against a dark background. With a shallow depth of field the front foot is in sharp focus while the rear foot is softer.

Bob Scarlett said “A touch of green” – I saw this wall in Porto and was attracted by the unusual and random shapes of the stones. The plant growing out of one of the joints between the stones made an ideal focal point.

Terry Day “In motion” I saw this dog bounding towards me along a path by the river Ver, so had to take the image.

Yve Paige – “A gift from above” On a wet February day, the feather took my attention and the rain scattered on the table in the garden with a unique opportunity  to take a series  of photos of the patterns it made.

“Single flower at superbloom at Tower of London”.  Out of hundreds of photos and many visits I chose to enter this photo of one poppy representing a fallen solider at this iconic historic building.

Tony Mead’s picture “Stamen” – “is a macro shot hence shallow depth of field taken of a stamen in a lily in my garden”.

A drop of water

Single flower at superbloom at Tower of London

In motion

Daisy

A gift from above

A touch of green

Eggcentric

Moonfield

A padlock preventing us getting through

Something super simple

Bear

S Curve

Ornamental Grass Flower

Roman feet

Stamen

Jonathan Lennon – “A padlock preventing us getting through” is an image worth taking because of the appearance of dirt on the object. It is likely that builders use this padlock to close up the area that they are working on. There is a good amount of simplicity in this image because there is a focus on the object, the warm coloured background and nothing else.

“Something super simple” the rusty look of the drain cover to indicate how long it may have been used.  It is a visually pleasing picture because of the level of contrast between the warm and cool colours. This a simple picture because there is a focus on the WATER drain cover and nothing else.

Although we are currently on our Summer break, we would be very happy to see any potential new members when our meetings start again on 23^rd September in Wyllyotts’ Alexander Wilding Suite from 7:30pm.

In the meantime, more information can be found on their website  pottersbarphotosoc.org.uk or on Facebook.