27th September 2022
We were delighted to welcome Tony North DPAGB, BPE5 to our evening meeting. Tony is a member of the South Manchester Camera Club and his main passions are macro and landscape photography. He has one many awards for his outstanding work and enters a variety of competitions, from the humble camera club competitions to the International Garden Photographer of the Year (1st and 3rd place), and the Amateur Photographer of the year in which he came 2nd overall in 2020. He also achieved his CPGAB in November 2019.
Following introductions Tony explained his approach to photography, which has a natural bias towards the pictorial, as his main aim is to depict the beauty of nature. He also feels originality and creativity are hard to achieve but feels he is ‘sliding towards’ them. Overall, he wants to ensure the subjects are sharp and well lit, well positioned in the frame, and all the wonderful details are clear.
The first part of the presentation included ‘flowers through the year’ in which Tony showed the most beautiful images of flowers he had taken month by month. During the presentation he described how each image had been taken, concentrating on the background, depth of field, aperture changes, angle of the flowers, lighting, etc. This was a superb presentation and members were able to ask questions throughout, gaining an insight into the techniques used as sell as picking up some hints and tips along the way.
This was followed by a presentation on ‘grass, leaves, and trees’, which can be found at different times of the year, and finally ‘funghi’, which included some very different aspects of photography. Tony explained his macro approaches, including focus stacking and soft focus effects, as well as the equipment used such as LED panels, reflectors, spray bottles, tripods and clamps. He also covered post processing and how to bring out the best in his subjects.
This was a truly inspiring presentation by Tony, which included a wealth of information that our members will take away with them. I am sure we will all be trying out his techniques and experimenting in new ways of enhancing our photographic approaches.
Our very grateful thanks go to Tony, and we will certainly invite him back in the future for another informative and inspiring presentation. Also grateful thanks to Kathie our programme secretary for arranging the evening, to Rob and Mike for arranging and hosting the zoom session, and to our club members for continuing to support our lovely club.
The Committee