Ashford Camera Club - Annual Projected Image Competiton.

The annual projected image competition was held on Tuesday, 23rd November.
The categories were

• Nature
• Portrait
• General

I submitted two entries. Bluebell Swirl, taken in Stroude last spring and Sun in Trees, taken in Bala with JLPPC last year. I should have put my Bluebell picture into the general category as the nature category does not allow any manipulation if even this is done by camera movement. It should be a true representation of what was seen. Oh well I know for next time. The picture was scored however and got an 8.

The judge really liked my Sun in Trees picture and gave it a 10,  yay!

Ashford Camera Club – Annual Print Competition

Tuesday, 16th November saw me make my first entries in a print competition at the ACC annual print competition. Having only just joined the club I have missed the quarterly competitions but the format is much the same. Prints can be entered in the following categories:

• Nature
• Portrait – monochrome
• Portrait – colour
• General – monochrome
• General – colour

I put forward my picture of cottages at Cuckmere Haven from Saturday’s annual show and a print of a pigeon in shallow water taken in Nottingham a few years ago.
The independent judge took a quick preview of the pictures then went through each one, displayed in a lightbox, and gave her comments and a score for each. The maximum score was 10 and a few pictures did achieve this.
My picture of cottages only scored 7.5 owing to a lack of recession into the distance over the cliffs and too much foreground in front of the cottages.

The pigeon however did grab the judges attention owning to the reflections and unusual setting. This was awarded 9.5 and so will go forward in the club’s entries for a Surrey Photographic clubs  Association  competition in the new year.

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Ashford Camera Club – Annual Exhibition 2010

The annual exhibition of the camera club took place in the St. Matthew’s Hall in Ashford. I arrived just after 9 A.M. to find a good number of members already in the hall putting up their photos. There was a wide range of subjects from portraits to landscapes and lots in between. There were some prints for sale and I noticed a few of these had scores from previous competitions so it was useful to see some that had scored highly and to try and work out why. I had named five pictures to go up so the name labels were ready and waiting.  These were either pinned or attached using Velcro tabs to the display boards.
The pictures were:

• Jackdaw
• Swans in Black & White
• Sheepdog
• Cottages at Cuckmere Haven
• Birdman

The show opened at 10:30 but there were few visitors in the first couple of hours but around midday a few groups of twos and threes arrived. The hall is off the beaten track so despite the plentiful banners and boards in the high street it is not somewhere passersby will stumble across.
I had to leave at 12:30 to get to Croydon so will find out on Tuesday (next club night) how the exhibition went in the afternoon. It was due to close at 4 P.M.
The morning was a good opportunity to meet and chat to other members of the club and see their work. It is always beneficial to do this to learn and get ideas to try different things with photographs.
The next club night is for the annual print competition so I’ll need to sort out a print or two for that and prepare a digital image (one to display on a projector) for the following week.

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Yay Waxwings over Bracknell

After hearing about the abundance of Wawings this autumn I headed up to a spot, near to the office, where I have seen these beautiful birds in previous years. The reports on the Berkshire Birds web site (http://www.berksbirds.co.uk) confirmed that there were birds present this week. The conditions were perfect with a bright sunny autumn day and few clouds. I had the car with me at work so drove the ten minutes or so to World's End Hill near the B3430. On arriving I saw an encouraging site as there were two people with binoculars and a telescope peering into the nearby trees. They had spotted 4 Waxwings high in the birch tree, Apparently the birds flew down to the nearby rowan tree when anyone went past and my arrival had the desired effect as right on cue they flew down and started to eat the berries. Unfortunately, I only had my Canon compact so not nearly enough reach to take any worthwhile pictures, However, the view in the binoculars was text book. Great views of the birds,  side on in full sunshine, eating berries with the deep blue autumn sky beyond.

A great sight for any lunchtime!

RSPB Dungeness

A little over a month after visiting Dungeness Spit in Washington State, USA I made my way to (the original) Dungeness in Kent to visit the RSPB reserve there. The aim was much the same; do a bit of bird watching and try to get some photos.

The drive down was made all the more enjoyable with all the autumn colour on show to all sides. Once near Dungeness, with the power station close by, there is an unmetalled trail of about a mile to the visitor centre. A welcome refuge from the mild but fairly strong breeze.

visitor centre

The visitor’s centre is a modern building holding a gift shop, reception area and a hot drinks machine. There are large windows looking out onto the reserve and telescopes set up for anyone to use.

The reserve consists of a circular trail with hides dotted along it. All these look out onto the lagoons (mostly old gravel works) and give good protection from the elements.

birds seen

Great views of female Marsh Harrier using the wind to quarter over the reeds looking for prey.

Many, many Coots, lots of ducks including a few Pintail but no Smew, Goldeneye or Goosanders as it is a little too early for most of them to be back from the Summer holidays.

About a dozen swans on Denge Marsh and several Little Egrets dotted about the place.

Once back at the visitor centre I returned to the car for late packed lunch (well a Cornish pasty). Then drove back to the main road and into the smaller car park on the other side of the road to take a look at the lagoons here. A further two hides are located here and give good views over the water.

The light was starting to fade so I made my way along the coast to Hythe and my accommodation for the night at the Castle Inn, Saltwood. 

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Staines Moor

A beautiful sunny day in October so I went for a walk on Staines Moor. Left the bike at the Two Rivers shopping centre and walked through to the moor. Once through the gate the loud squeak alerted the nearby group of horses that came over to me assuming I had food for them. A lack of oats and apples didn’t seem to dissuade them so they followed me for a while as I made my way across the moor. Unlike my last walk here, in high summer, there were no butterflies about and fewer birds. The obligatory Green woodpecker was feeding on the grass and small groups of Starlings swirling around, near the cattle. A pair of pied wagtails were bathing in the river and several Meadow pipits where nearby too.
In the trees, near the northern edge of the moor, a group of eight Fieldfare were chirping away, another clear sign of autumn.
I made my way back along the old railway line which blocked the low sun from dazzling me. No Jays, which usually frequent these trees, but lots of wood pigeons were spooked from an early roost as I made my way along.

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Conifers

This is just a record for me and will seem incredibly dull to anyone else reading this post!

Another session in the garden, making the most of the pleasant weather. I gave the two 'smaller' conifers a haircut and they are now much tidier. Managed to fill up 8 large sacks of the clippings so took these off to the local tip, along with some other garden cuttings from the weekend.