The Group met at 3 p.m. on 8^th April with the theme ‘Motion’ hosted by Angie Sargean

5 people attended as Rosemary Crumplin had not recovered from a virus infection – partly the reason March’s meeting was abandoned. Angie Sargeant and Mike Liberson both had operations that precluded attendance.

Overall best picture was Angie Sargeant’s ‘Tree Surgeon’.

Angie is housebound and she was fortunate to see some tree pruning in a neighbour’s garden. Her garden windmill was also highly recommended as a good example of the theme.

The May theme is ‘Technology’. John Hawke encouraged members to discuss options for the theme as well as ideas for the June meeting ‘Bleak Landscapes’ – now was the time to take the photographs – one hopes that by June we might have better weather!

The Group met at 10:15 on 12^th February with the theme ‘Mood/Atmosphere’.

4 people attended as Mike Liberson had a hospital appointment.

Overall best picture was Rosemary Crumplin’s ‘Halo’.

Halos are a sign of high, thin cirrus clouds drifting 20,000 feet (6 km) or more above our heads. These clouds contain millions of tiny ice crystals. The halos you see are caused by both refraction, or splitting of light, and also by reflection, or glints of light from these ice crystals. The crystals must be oriented and positioned just so with respect to your eye, for the halo to appear. Rosemary’s photo was taken using her mobile phone – the phenomena is very transient, her husband John Clark was not quite at the same view angle and missed it.

The overall standard of the folios was very high (see Group Web page for individual samples) with different takes on the subject theme. The web page contains two pictures by John Hawke of the same trees that appear as one – a before and after following a recent storm – hence his title ‘Tragedy’.

The March theme is ‘Motion. John Hawke encouraged members to try various techniques such as panning, intentional camera movement, slow exposure, etc to create an impression of movement.

The Group met at 10:15 on 8^th January with the theme ‘Close Up’.

All 6 people attended.

Rosemary Franklin and John Clark did not submit a folio – for various reasons, they had a very busy December.

The theme gave members a great opportunity to play with the Macro settings (or Macro Lenses) on their cameras.

Overall best picture was Anjie Sargeant’s ‘Pussy Willow’ – again the overall standard of the folios was very high (see Group Web page for individual samples).

February’s theme is ‘Mood/Atmosphere’.

There was some discussion about further theme topics and John Hawke emphasised that members should look for photo opportunities during the next 6 months to fulfil future topics – noting, in particular, May’s theme ‘Bleak Open Spaces’ best taken in the Winter months.

Rosemary Crumplin reminded members that folios should only contain 1 archive photo to encourage people to submit new content – in response to the discussion that followed, John Hawke stated that the new content covered the period of all future themes.