PUBLIC BLOG — NDPS | Norwich & District Photographic Society

Flowmotion by Rob Witworth

Well! There it was. The opening scene for the latest Planet Earth III programme with David Attenborough. On the screen at this evening’s NDPS meeting. And the man who took the film operating his laptop and presenting his flowmotion technique.

A packed house of members and guests watched in awe as Rob showed us examples of his finished work and examples of how the film was first shot. It’s difficult to find enough superlatives to describe his enthusiasm for his art, his attention to detail and his ability to capture scenes in an unforgettable way.

This was an evening of action and drama filmed in a style that could only be Rob’s. We were treated to many examples of this wonderful technique, not just Planet Earth footage but commercial footage for companies who have something to sell – now I want to fly to Greenland! I want to work in that centre of commerce in London!

Special PresentationMaurice YoungDecember 23, 2023flowmotion, timelapsed, bafta, emmy

The ‘Incomplete Circle’ bu Simon Ciappara FRPS

NDPS is a long established Society. Over the last few years, we have been able to raise our profile in the photographic world thanks in large part to our programme of events. Special Presentations delivered in person or via Zoom from experts around the world. So how will an ordinary member of the Society stand up alongside our normal Special Presentation experts?

Simon, our Vice Chair, and long standing member, proved to be easily up to the task. Presenting and explaining something very close to his heart. Enthusiasm, tenacity, and commitment to his art shone through.

Of course, he began by talking of the time, long, long ago in Jamaica, where he discovered how paper was made from plants and how he began small businesses producing handmade papers which continue to thrive today.

Members' EveningMaurice YoungNovember 2, 2023paper making, book binding, rps distinctions

Fishermen to Kings - the forgotten photographs of Olive Edis

A renowned and very accomplished photographer of the early twentieth century, who took portraits of nobility including politicians, prime ministers and kings was the subject of the talk at last night’s NDPS meeting.

What is surprising (for that time) is that the photographer was a woman and her work had been largely forgotten until recently. Olive Edis set up her first studio in Sheringham, her childhood holiday “home” but she quickly became recognised as a photographer of note by high society in London.

Clive Dunn, NDPS member gave an inspiring illustrative talk of Olive’s life and followed up with the film, “Fisherman to Kings, The Forgotten Photographs of Olive Edis”. The film, written and directed by Clive Dunn, featured Rankin, the renowned fashion and portrait photographer, tracing back the history of Olive Edis and some of her work, her design and patent of the Diascope and her innovative use of Autochrome printing based on red, green, and blue potato starches to produce colour images.

Olive not only produced portraits of the rich and famous but loved taking images of fisherman back in Sheringham. All subjects were treated with the same respect and attention to detail which brought out the personality of the sitter in the photograph.

Members' EveningMaurice YoungOctober 11, 2023short film, olive edis, pioneer, rankin

Tales of a Storm Chaser by Chris Bell

Chris is Chief Communications Officer and Forecaster at Weatherquest Ltd, a commercial weather forecasting and analysis company based in Norwich. He is also a Lecturer in Meteorology at the University of East Anglia, lecturing on meteorological topics across Year 1 and Year 2 modules in Environmental Sciences at UEA, specifically the Atmosphere and Oceans, first year module, and Weather and Weather Applications modules in second year. He is a part time weather presenter for BBC Look East and a public speaker for Meteorology and Climate related topics.

Chris came originally from Houston in the American south but now lives in Norfolk at Foxley.

He is a 'storm chaser' and weather photographer and it is those trips to the Great Plains of America which formed the kernel of his talk. There is no doubt that he is addicted to understanding and analysing the weather, he was quick to explain that as a child of 4 he can remember being fascinated by storms and vowing that he would spend his life working with meteorology!

Wildlife and Landscape Possibilities in Epping Forest by Peter Warne

Peter began his inspiring talk by describing the Forest which covers an area of 6,000 acres and is 12 miles north to south, 2.5 miles wide and represents the remains of an ancient royal hunting forest.

He began with descriptions of water features. First up was Highams Park, accessed from a train line from Liverpool Street or parking on the road. The drain from the lake provided photo opportunities with lots of water birds: black headed gulls, moorhens, coots, cormorants and herons. Lots of colourful birds also; parakeets and green woodpeckers. There are even lots of rats living in the area.

Then Connaught Water, on the River Ching. This area you have to drive to and it is very, very popular and there is a charge for car parking. Again, there are interesting birds - nuthatch, tree creeper, kingfishers (who fish the ditches), green and great spotted woodpeckers and grebes. In addition there are 5 pairs of breeding herons and, oddly, terrapins!

The third pond was Wake Valley Pond. From the Wake Arms roundabout the Wake Valley car park in Lodge Road is accessible. Here Peter mentioned dragon flies, the Downy Emerald, emerging in May/June. These form food for ducklings and wagtails. Also in this area is a piece of heathland, a great backdrop for dawn landscapes, grass snakes, adders and lizards.

Special Presentation, Wildlife, Nature, LandscapeMaurice YoungSeptember 20, 2023epping forest, landscape, atumn colour, birdlife, fungi

Undiscovered Essex by Justin Minns

Justin, a well-known photographer, long-time friend of NDPS and now a Society member, opened our 2023/24 season with a brand new presentation. Undiscovered Essex was based on his experiences gaining Licentiate and Fellow qualifications from the Royal Photographic Society.

Justin began with a short biography going back in time to when he began his career as a professional photographer. Interestingly he said that initially he wanted the qualifications only for him to be able to add letters after his name and thus gain not only kudos but an aura of professionalism which could, perhaps, further his career as a photographer. He described how ten years ago he put together his submission for a Licentiate qualification and how he achieved this through taking lots of advice. But now, with the qualification in the bag and the letters after his name, his view of the RPS qualifications changed. He found that the exercise had made him scrutinise his work more carefully. He saw that his photography was benefitting from his careful examination - there were added benefits to be had from those letters after his name!

Having achieved Licentiate he discovered that he could leapfrog the Associate level and go straight into Fellowship. And so he did. His Fellowship panel was entitled 'Undiscovered Essex'. The title of his presentation this evening.

Special Presentation, Photo-talkMaurice YoungSeptember 7, 2023essex, lrps, arps, frps, landscape, distinctions

It's Good to Share...

Edward Russell has become the third NDPS member to have a photo selected to be Amateur Photographer’s Picture of the week (Tuesday 25th July 2023 edition) so far this year.

To take part in the competition readers simply have to post their photos on AP’s social media channels from which the editorial team selects their weekly favourites.

CompetitionMaurice YoungAugust 2, 2023amateur photographer

Special Presentation by Inaki Hernandex-Lasa

This was the final Special Presentation for this season, and it was

delivered by Inaki Hernandex-Lasa, via Zoom, to 40 members in the Academy Studio. Inaki has been with us before, three years ago but this was a new presentation.

Inaki divided his lecture into two halves, the first about his style,

approach, and equipment and the second was a very practical

exposition of his post production techniques. It's always interesting to hear an expert talk about his tools and methodology but without doubt the post production demonstrations were riveting.

Get it right in camera! Inaki's first rule. Which means careful planning not rushing, understanding what you want the final result to be. Understand the hyperfocal distance. If you are taking several photographs set the Kelvin value to maintain consistency.

He then showed 20 examples of his work and used them to explain his processes up to the point of pressing the shutter button. Then post production using Lightroom. He began with RAW images and carefully demonstrated how he reached his objectives. A remarkable masterclass in small adjustments and short time spans to produce stunning finished images.

Perhaps the biggest lesson to learn here was: "if you get it as right as possible in camera, then the post part of the process will only take a few minutes”.

Everyone came away from this presentation with new ideas and new techniques to try.

Our thanks to Inaki

Maurice YoungJune 28, 2023

Photographer of the Year 2022/2023

In last Tuesday night’s final, the members of the Society elected Pat Stebbings Photographer of the Year 2022/2023.

In the first part of the evening all six finalists: Dave Balcombe, David Jordan, Joan Jordan, Clive Matthews, David Powley and Pat Stebbings - each showed and talked about the 10 images they entered in the five pre-qualifying rounds that took them to the final.

After the break, the finalists presented three new images in print format and Dave Balcombe (in digital format). A members ballot was then held to select the champion photographer.

We congratulate all the finalists on the quality of photography on display at the final and throughout the season. The high standard of photography presented by our members is increasing year on year, adding to the experience of how tough this competition is to succeed.

POTYMaurice YoungJune 12, 2023City AcademyPOTY2223

Light Sensitive and Landscape of Towers

This evening our presentation was from a comparatively new member of NDPS

Clive Dunn. Clive is an award-winning photographer from Norwich, specialising in creatively processed digital imagery for publishing, multi-media applications or as stand-alone fine art.

He began his working life as a Cartographic Draughtsman for the Ordnance Survey, which gave him the foundation for an enduring passion for topography and landscape. He then trained as a photographer before moving into television production, spending many years as a documentary filmmaker.

Clive's photography explores remote and under-visited areas of our countryside; forgotten, rarely trodden landscapes off-the-beaten track and beyond the obvious. He seeks out ruined dwellings and half-buried remains decayed with the passage of history while still retaining a magical atmosphere and an air of secrecy or mystery. His work also encompasses many techniques and abstract textures, shapes, and light dances. By adding distressed overlays and scratches, Clive attempts to achieve painterly digital impressions that awaken remnants of memory or fleeting glimpses of past experiences.

Clive devoted the first half of his presentation to his photographic journey and explained his love for black and white mono images which sprang from his early training in a wet darkroom and leading to an almost urbex existence seeking subject matter. All this leading, via an appreciation of the work of other photographers, such as Fay Godwin and Raymond Moore, to a book and a film about redundant churches in Norfolk - Landscape of Towers.

It was this Landscape of Towers that brought Clive to the end of his presentation. He was received with enthusiasm by members who were quick in showing their appreciation. Our thanks to Clive for allowing us to peep into his atmospheric world of images and history.

Maurice YoungMay 30, 202320230530, Pictorialist, Churches, Landscape

Project Photography by Stewart Wall

This evening at the City Academy we were privileged to receive a special presentation of Stewart Wall, Project Photography.

Stewart's antecedents are impressive, MA, ARPS, a degree in photography, a Post Graduate Certificate in teaching and he is in the midst of working on a doctorate researching The Design of Documentary Photography and Community resilience. In 2021 he was awarded the Fenton Medal and was made a life member of the Royal Photographic society. All this from his beginnings as a press photographer in the 1970s.

"What I feel, not just what I see".

Maurice YoungMay 23, 2023projects, 230523

Namibia by Bob Johnson ARPS

On Tuesday evening Bob Johnson presented his Namibia talk at our regular venue, the City Academy. This was Bob's third visit to NDPS but his first in person. His two previous presentations, Kingdom of The Ice Bear and Carnivores of the Serengeti, were delivered via Zoom during the pandemic.

How nice to have him in the room for the first time. He briefly mentioned that he had by now spent a year in Africa photographing wildlife, the landscape, and the people. He said that he now had a small fleet of drones as well as his usual cameras and lenses.

This was a travelogue of the visit made my Bob and his wife Peggy. A journey through the driest country in sub-Sahara Africa, Namibia. The country is named after the Namib desert, and that name, Namib, means vast place. Bob hired a land cruiser and driver for his trip and travelled from South to North in the country visiting not only the inland sand dunes and bush but also the coast, the Atlantic Ocean. And all the time he photographed amazing wildlife - enormous, fearless pelicans, colonies of seals (you could smell them before you saw them), Cape Sparrows, Egrets and Flamingos! But Bob also managed to capture lots of elephant, giraffes and took photos of both black and white Rhinos.

Not content with the wildlife he recorded the sand filled old diamond mines, the sand dunes in the light of dawn and some spectacular shots of people walking on the rims of the dunes and some lovely shots of local people from the villages with their lack of concern at not wearing much clothing and their rain dance.

A wonderfully entertaining evening of wildlife, nature, and community photography. We are once again indebted to Bob Johnson for a wonderful evening.

Photo-talkMaurice YoungMay 14, 2023namibia, wildlife, african culture, sand dunes, coast

Lightroom Live with Joe Houghton

Our images, Joe’s processing…!

Last night the well known Joe Houghton was given a collection of NDPS images from our last competition, both the original RAW file and the finished jpeg file.

The object of the evening was for Joe to work on as many of the images as possible during the presentation and to finally compare his end product with the member's final jpeg.

He selected nine of the images offered and carefully worked on each one, explaining his thought processes and explaining the tools used as he went. His explanations were carefully considered, clearly explained and watching him use the full suite of tools in Lightroom was an enlightening experience.

I believe that he left no corner of the Lightroom Development panel untouched. His use of the masking tools and artificial intelligence was, perhaps, one of the most useful parts of his presentation. The resulting final images he produced were exceptional.

Zoom, Photo-talkMaurice YoungMarch 29, 2023lightroom, masks, luminosity

Great result for NDPS in the EAF Print Championships

Sunday 12th March saw three members make the trek down to Fulbourn, just outside Cambridge to deliver our entries in the EAF Print Championships 2023 and watch the judging. This year there were only 18 clubs competing, whether this was still due to the after effects of covid lockdowns or photographers just cutting back on printing we don’t know but in the past there have been over 30 clubs entered out of 106 in the EAF. However, all but one or two of the clubs who normally finish in the top 15 were present so we suspected before the judging commenced that we were in for a tough time...!

This season all clubs entered 15 prints, to be marked by 3 judges who could each award a score up to 5 per images. The maximum aggregate score for any club being 225. The Judges were Dave Tucker DPAGB EFIAP/g BPE3*, Adrian Lines ARPS MPAGB AFIAP and Jane Lines LRPS MPAGB BPE5*.

After the formalities the judges got down to business and it quickly became obvious from the first round that it wasn’t going to be a high scoring competition with most prints scoring 11 or below and some mutterings from the Beyond members at the back of the hall after they received only 9 for their first print. As the rounds continued it also became clear that the judges didn’t favour any particular genre but were giving a fair spread of marks across all subjects but print quality was clearly important.

EAF Championships, CompetitionMaurice YoungMarch 13, 2023prints, external competition, fulbourn, eaf

Expect the Unexpected by Jo Bradford

This evening around 50 of us, including a visitor from as far away as Portland, Oregon in the United States, settled down to 'expect the unexpected'. And we certainly enjoyed the journey through Jo's work life and her photographic voyage with its unexpected twists and turns.

Jo spoke to us from her, living off the grid, Dartmoor home. She explained her early days making photograms and cyanotypes and her master’s degree in photography from Falmouth. While at Falmouth she produced images of stars and outer space without using a camera! She sprinkled meteorite dust onto light sensitive paper and used sunlight to expose the image.

She was awarded her master’s and reality kicked in when she had to repay her student loan. So, back to commercial photography and work for a production company in famous gardens, and faraway places, India, and the jungles of Bangalow. With the loan paid off she returned to her real interest as a colourist, making artwork without a camera. The Getty library asked if they could license her work and she began to look for a house on Dartmoor.

She bought a house that needed and awful lot of work and just to make life even more tricky she had two children!

Special PresentationMaurice YoungMarch 8, 2023smartphones, creative photography, dartmoor, projects

Wildlife Photography 2 by Tracey Lund

We finally got to see Tracy in person for part two of her story which followed on from her Zoom presentation during lockdown.

Alaska, Canada, Yellowstone, India, Zimanga and UK Hides. An inspirational evening with wildlife and nature photos from these areas as well as some anecdotes of her travels and trips.

Tracey Lund is from Hull. Her photographic journey began after an inspiring trip to Africa in 2004.

After returning to the UK, Tracey wanted to develop her photography and so joined three Photographic Societies and submitted her favourite images as entries to some of the major worldwide Wildlife Competitions. Tracey is also a permanent display as she is a ‘gallery photographer’ at the famous Joe Cornish Art Gallery.

Tracey's presentation was a whirlwind trip around the world calling at Alaska, Canada and Yellowstone. Then we moved to India where we were treated to a bewildering array of birds, squirrels and mongooses, not to mention the spotted deer - top of the fast food menu!

In Africa we were taken to Zimanga, the hotel and wildlife hides. Another whirlwind of birds, snakes, jackals and others. She even had a story about walking with cheetahs.

Tracey described the opportunities, Lagoon Hide, Bee Eater Hide, Scavengers Hide and startlingly the Overnight Hide! Into the hide in the afternoon and stay for 17 hours till breakfast.

But what a beautiful collection of wildlife photos Tracey showed to illustrate what was possible - eye to eye with water buffalo and a herd, yes a herd, of elephants.

Special Presentation, WildlifeMaurice YoungMarch 1, 2023alaska, canada, india, yellowstone, uk hides

NDPS retain the Alan Taylor Memorial Trophy

The annual Three-way Battle between Ciné Photo Club Nivernais in France, Foto-Club Koblenz in Germany and Norwich & District Photographic Society went right down to the ‘wire’ with NDPS winning the Alan Taylor Memorial Trophy by the smallest of margins - one point.
After the three rounds played out on separate nights in each contry NDPS scored 482.0 points from Koblenz with 481.0 points and Nivernais who scored 455.5 pints.
The Norwich round was judged by Naomin Saul ARPS ASINWP EFIAP DPAGB APAGB BPE4*

The theme chosen by Foto-Club Koblenz, who were the organisers of this year’s Battle was GRAPHIC. NDPS entries for the competition included images from 15 different member of the Society. Congratulations to NDPS member David Jordan whose image Staircase was awarded the highest aggregate score in the Battle - 29.5 out of a maximum of 30 points..

CompetitionMaurice YoungFebruary 14, 2023inter-club, international, battle, kck, cpcn, ndps

From Plant to Page – Norfolk Photographer’s inspired creation

Congratulations to NDPS member Simon Ciappara whose photography and much more is featured in an article published in the February edition of the Norfolk magazine.

After winning at 17 a Canon camera in a Sunday Telegraph competition Simon’s photography came to an abrupt end a couple of years later when a burglar stole both his camera and 160 rolls of film containing irreplaceable candid backstage shots from his time as a ‘roadie’ on the North American leg of Eric Clapton’s Slowhand tour.

At the age of 60 Simon returned to photography and purchased a Sony which in his words was ‘..so complicated..’ that he joined Norwich & District Photographic Society’ in the hope that he could learn how to use it.

Maurice YoungJanuary 31, 2023rps, fellowship, distinctions, achievement

Cambridge Digital Inter-Club Competition 2023

The regional club competitions start each year with the Cambridge Digital Inter-Club Competition and it’s always a good chance to meet up with old friends and photographers from other clubs and see some of the best images from around the region. This year was the first in person meeting for a few years because of the effects of covid and those effects were still evident. Normally 35 clubs compete with a waiting list and there have been up to 190 visitors but this year numbers were down with only 27 clubs entered and only around 60 external visitors, but it was still a good meeting.

The Cambridge club are very well organised the competition runs very smoothly, and their catering team provide very good cakes. There are five rounds, Mono, People, Landscape, Nature, and Open, each image is marked out of 20 and the highest scoring club is the winner.

Ralph Duckett MPAGB EFIAP APAGB, from Staffordshire had the hard job of judging this year. He has been a member at Burton on Trent Photographic Society for over 40 years. An experienced PAGB judge, he gave concise and useful comments with good humour on each image and awarded very high scores to many of them, his opinion being that the standard was very high. Ralph awarded 37 images with full marks of 20/20 and this gave him a very difficult job to select his overall winning image. He whittled these down to a final 7 images but then threw it out to the audience to help him select the winner – not the most conventional way to pick a winner but this ended the afternoon with at least the winning photographer happy!

Five members from NDPS went along to observe the competition. Two of our 5 images scored 20 and overall, we ended with 94 points, out of 100, putting us in equal 8th place slightly down on last year but still a result we were very happy with. Top club was Photographic Imaging Co-Operative (PICO) with 99, second was Welwyn Garden (98), third North Norfolk Photographic Society (97).

Next up are the St Ives Interprint and the EAF Championships. If you get the chance to go along and watch the judging it is recommended as it gives you a good feel for the standard of work in the region and will inspire your own photography.

Review by Dave Balcombe ARPS & Joan Jordan ARPS

CompetitionMaurice YoungJanuary 24, 2023cambridge, digital, inter-club, monochrome, people, landscape, nature, open

Discovering the Essex Coast

Leaving Norfolk very early yesterday morning (Sunday) no one expected the near perfect conditions that greeted the Landscape Group members who made the long journey down to Thorpe Bay on the Thames Estuary. We were able to enjoy nearly two hours out on the sand flats before the tide started to come in quickly photographing the many fishing boats on their moorings before a welcome breakfast in a local café and the chance to warm up...!.

Later we moved on to Shoeburyness and then Lion Creek before heading back mid-afternoon to Norfolk. Hopefully, everyone will have captured a few great images...?

This coming weekend it is the turn of the Nature & Wildlife Group who will be nearer to home out on the North Norfolk Coast photographing this season’s new population of seal pups.

Many NDPS members choose to join one or more of the specialist Groups which concentrate more closely on particular areas of photography and imaging. Visit our website www.ndps.info/overview-of-groups to learn more about our five Special Interest Groups that all meet about once a month.

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