September is the time of year when the Outlaws pack their camera bags, suitcases and embark on a journey to a location in the UK. We have visited many areas, from Norfolk in the east, Pembrokeshire in the west and Hastings in the south. This year we headed north to Loch Lomond and the Trossachs.
As British photographers we are used to all weathers but this year’s weekend weather proved very challenging. Whilst our home of Nottingham suffered a deluge of rain, we endured a blanket of grey cloud for the duration of the trip. It was great to be dry but any contrast for landscape photography was absent. Outlaws are made of strong stuff and were not to be defeated and worked a location to capture images all the same. Some members can claim to have seen the sun, a couple even a sunset. Typically, as we gathered for the group portrait in Balloch on the last morning the weather cleared and the sun appeared!
Every day we all headed out with hope that our empty memory cards would be filled with images, some starting very early as they had sunrises in mind, others with a full agenda of locations that needed to be visited and one or maybe even two members considering night-time shoots. But all had one thing in common and that was to see and photograph Scotland, ranging from its iconic castles, lochs and waterfalls to the stylish architecture and personalities of Glasgow.
There were plenty of opportunities for social breaks, lunches and dinners together as well as evenings where they could discuss the day’s activities over a beer, something the Outlaws looked forward to.
Some of the Outlaws tales of the trip will follow over the next few posts.
August sees the Outlaws completing their fourth Projected Digital Image (PDI) competition of the year and things have started to warm up. Following this month’s competition, the DPI leader board is now as follows, Malcolm Nabarro leads the way with 285 points, followed by Chris Holdsworth on 276 and Nigel Stewart also on 276 points. Lester Woodward and Ray Andrews both have 274 points, let battle commence. The evenings judge was Gary Langley, a NEMPF competition judge who some of the Outlaws had met on previous occasions. Gary offered constructive comments and liked to “tell it as it is” and score images in his own unique manner.
There were two categories for Gary to judge on the evening, the Open category and the Themed, which this month was “High Key/Low Key”. There were approximately thirty entries in the Open category and twenty-eight in the themed.
At last Thursdays club night the Outlaws refreshed their lighting techniques, model compositions as well as offering encouragement and direction to the all female sitters. There were three models on the night Maddie a professional model, Marion a firm friend of the club that has supported us in this role for the past three years and club member Christine who couldn’t resist the opportunity to strike a pose in front of the cameras.
The members installing the lighting equipment arrived in good time as setting up the equipment & creating scenes for the models takes some time and it all had to be in place ready for the eager Outlaws when the club night officially started.
It is late July and the third NOPS print competition of the year was about to take place. Going into this round Lester Woodward currently holds the top slot on 217 points with Lois Webb with a very close 215 points, so there is still all to play for & there are several other Outlaws that are challenging for the POOTY (print outlaw of the year title) tittle.
The judge for the evening was David Kissman who had visited at a similar time the previous year and on that occasion had really constructive comments/critique to offer the entrants.
There were two categories for David to judge, the Open category (a mix of various genres) and the Themed which was “Nature”. In total there were 23 entries in the open and 18 in the themed.
The Open competition again attracted a wide variety of genres of photography and the themed competition had many stunning images from the natural world. The prints were all worthy of hanging in any gallery.
June is already upon us and we have recently experienced a mini heat wave after some un-seasonally cold weather and things are starting to warm up for the Outlaws as they are now midway in their digital competition year. Malcolm Nabarro currently leads with 213 points, which is 6 points clear of second place Andy Gibbons, then the pack follows with only 1 or 2 points separating the next eight contenders, a very close competition and a further two DPI’s to follow in August & October.
This month as per usual had two categories one being an “Open” where members can submit images of their choice across a whole gambit of photographic genres, the other being the “Theme”, which was “Motion Blur”. There were thirty-three entries in the Open category and thirty-one in the themed competition.
The judge for the evening was Robert Falconer from Chesterfield someone who has visited the club recently on a number of occasions both as a judge and guest presenter.
We were heading towards the end of May and the weather had been somewhat disappointing for late spring, but moods and expectations were about to be lifted as the excitement of the second print competition was about to get under way this Thursday evening.
The judge for the evening was Dave Hollingsworth (Arnold & District Camera Club) who the Outlaws had met on previous competition evenings. Dave started off the evening by introducing himself and saying a few words about his style of judging. He mentioned that judging photographic images was very subjective and his opinion was not to be taken as the be all and end all, but he would offer detailed critique in a positive manner. Dave also mentioned size and scale, sharpness and detail as points he would look for and he often commented on the proportion of skies appropriate in an image.
Paul Summers was a talented photographer and valued member of Nottingham Outlaws. He was an enthusiastic landscape photographer and in later years explored shooting infrared photographs and producing fabulous images as slides, prints and digital images.
Paul frequently joined the club on the annual trip (KitKat) to a UK location and could always be relied upon to find the best place for us all to enjoy breakfast together.
The Outlaws photographic competition year is now in full swing and this is the second projected digital image (PDI) competition so far, with a further three to follow. Competitions are held every month and are alternated between PDI’s and mounted Prints.
This month’s competition had fourteen entrants all competing in both the Open and Themed categories.
The current Outlaws PDI league table has Malcolm Nabarro top with 144 points, followed closely by Ray Andrews with 140 and Lester Woodward hot on his heels with 139 points.
The judge for this evening’s competitions was Phil Taylor from Bolsover Camera Club.
Church Wilne reservoir in Derbyshire was the venue for the Jet Ski Racing Association (JSRA.co.uk) British JetSport Championship, round one competition. The event was scheduled for mid April, we had been regularly checking the JRSI website to gleam information on the location, protocols and how to access the venue.
