May 2011

5th April
Members Evening-Print Mounting Demonstrations

With the falling off of the number of Print Competition Entries from members, it was thought that some of the more experienced members should show how they set about mounting their prints. Four members were persuaded to show their skill. Each set up in a corner and groups of members were able to spend time at each seeing how it was done.

First up was Bob who showed how he trimmed his mounts and print using a sheet of glass as a cutting board. He then showed hi technique for using the adhesive spray mount and disposable rubber gloves for handling the print after spraying.

Andrew concentrated on showing how he cut mounts, particularly producing bevel edged mats to frame the picture.

Norman brought along his professional mount and mat cutter, showing how easy it was to use. He generously helped some of our less experienced members to have a go at mounting their prints.

Tony on the other hand had four late entries for next week’s heat to mount and he showed his technique of trimming and positioning the print on the mount. He also used a glass cutting board. Emphasis was given on safety in handling the cutting blade and the spray adhesives.

Members were advised that a write up was available on all the techniques in print mounting and some copies were handed out at the meeting. Should any other member require a copy, E Mail Bob or the Webmaster and request a copy.

The feeling among the members was that it had been a very productive and interesting meeting and Andrew hopes that he will receive more entries for the print competitions.


Saturday 9th April
Outing to the London Museum

Nine members travelled by train to London Bridge and then on to Moorgate to visit the Museum of London, near London Wall, to view the London Street Photography Exhibition. As entry tickets were for set times, a reviving coffee was found in the café until our booked slot. The exhibition covers the period from the early days of photography to modern times. Most images were monochrome, some being originals while many were more modern copies from the original negatives or plates. There were a small number of historic film clips to watch too.

The changing fashions and modes of transport were particularly evident. Whilst many images were not what we might now consider as 'competition winners' in terms of composition, they all contributed to an enormously valuable history of street life in London over the years.

After lunch, the group walked towards Smithfield Market with the aim of capturing some street photographs of our own. A short bus ride then took us on to St. Paul's Cathedral precinct from where we walked across the Millennium Bridge and back to London Bridge station for the return journey.

The exhibition was well worth the visit. Entry is free and it is open until the beginning of September 2011.




Report and Photos by Martin Ridout.


12th April
Print Heat 4

Bob introduced our Judge for the evening, David Wood ARPS, DPAGB, who then told members that he had been coming to West Wickham to judge our competitions for over forty years. His judging was punctuated by various anecdotes of his experiences whilst on the judging circuit. The evening was started with the colour prints of which there were 27 entries from 10 members. David was critical of some of the record and natural history pictures where the author had not used a sufficiently small aperture to ensure an adequate depth of field. Other comments concerned some compositional issues some of which could have been corrected by tighter cropping. He also thought that some images were let down by having too many ‘centres of interest’. Similar comments were made on the monochrome entries of which only 12 were received from 6 members. David decided not to award any Honourable Mentions. The results were:

Colour Prints

Place	Title	Author
1st	Silhouette	John Hill
2nd	Airborne	Mike Spurway
3rd	Flamingo Preening	Tony Deller
4th	Daffodil “Serena Beach”	Andrew Herbert

Monochrome Prints

Place	Title	Author
1st	Hayley	John Hill
2nd	Beguiled	Mike Spurway
3rd	Lincoln Cathedral	Tony Deller
4th	Queen’s Head Passage, St Pauls	Andrew Herbert

David concluded the meeting by showing some of his recent work.


Saturday16th April
FSLPS Finals Day

The Society was well represented by its members at this event and so it should be since this has been the best year the Society has had in these competitions for a very long time. The first session was the play off of the semi finalists starting with Carshalton against Selsdon for the Alex Falk Trophy for Colour Prints. Carshalton won with 74 points against Selsdon with 71. Judging was by Bob Webzell. Next the Mono Prints for the Holroyd Trophy for which Beckenham beat Selsdon 72.5 to 70 points, judging by Chris Shore. Then came the Vic Smith Trophy for Digitally Projected Images where West Wickham was pitched against Old Coulsdon. Unfortunately our moment of glory was not to be. Judge, Roger Force, gave Old Coulsdon 70 points and West Wickham 67.5. West Wickham’s entry did not get awarded a single 10 points but we did get two 9.5 points which went to Hilary Walker’s Honey Bee and Tony Deller’s Metropolitan Peace. So West Wickham get the runner’s up cup.

After the tea break those pictures awarded a Honory Mention in the heats were pitched against each other for the appropriate trophy. Among those selected by the judges for special comment was Tony Deller’s colour print ‘The Gathering Storm’ and among the DPI images, Martin Ridout’s ‘Lime’ and Bob Richard’s ‘Red and Green’.

In the open competitions, Joyce Bernard won the Colour Cup for the best colour slide entitled ‘The Other Side’, well done Joyce.

It is gratifying to see so many of our images doing well in these competitions, images that have been produced by some of our newest members.

A comment that was made with some force by one of the judges was to the effect the producers of the pictures were ‘PHOTOGRAPHERS’ and not Authors. A point duly noted and acted on by everyone present!


19th April
Larter Cup Competition

Once again this annual friendly between three of the clubs in the area was well attended. Our Judge for the evening was Paul Adams DPAGB. The competition consists of two rounds, the first with Monochrome Prints and the second with Digitally Projected Images (DPI). Each club enters a panel of six images. The Judge awards points for each image and the club with the highest total score wins the cup.

The mono prints were first to be judged and it was soon apparent our judge was going to be critical in awarding the points. At the end of this first round only two images were awarded the maximum of ten points and couple were scored as low as six points. In the DPI round only one image got the maximum points but the lowest mark was three images with seven points.

The final scores were:

Beckenham CC	Bromley CC	WWPS
Mono Prints	48	54.5	44
DPI	49	51.5	51
TOTAL	97	106	95

As can be seen it was our Mono Panel that let us down, another three points and we would have been second.

My thanks to Martin Ridout and Andrew Herbert for help in preparing this report.


26th April
A Presentation by Alec Mahood

Alec started his presentation by describing how last year he went to Iceland just after the infamous volcano had erupted. His presentation was to show the pictures and to describe the adventures he had whilst driving around the coast of the island. After arrival in Reykjavik, their party were taken a few miles east to their first Hotel which happened to be surrounded by geysers. After exploring the area they continued eastwards along the South Coast to see a large waterfall which dropped into a ravine in three stages. Also from this area they saw the clouds being generated by the erupting volcano. The further east they went more and more the countryside was covered in black volcanic ash. Alec showed us pictures of plants surviving and growing up through the ash. As the party continued east they entered the ‘Darkness’, an area which the volcanic cloud shut out all sunlight. Some dramatic pictures were shown of sunlit mountains against this jet black sky.

Once past the ‘Darkness’, the party visited some glaciers and a sea lagoon. We were shown pictures of blocks of ice that were able to reach the sea to form small icebergs. They then went on a minor road which took them over a pass well above the snow line where the road had walls of ice on each side. The journey then swung westward to run along the north coast. We were shown more glaciers, abandoned farm houses, a small fishing harbour finishing with an electric power station which drew its energy from thermal wells. Our trip was interspersed with shots of the wild life, mainly birds and some sea lions together with botanic specimens. The trip ended more or less where it began with views of a sixty metre high waterfall.

We thank Alec for an interesting evening and no doubt some of his pictures will appear in future competitions.