GROUP MAGAZINE
NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
CREATIVE EYE
WELCOME A very Happy New Year to you all - let’s not dwell too much on 2020, and instead look forward a brighter year ahead! Thanks to everyone who entered this month’s cover competition and congratulations to the winner, Cliff Spooner. You can see just handful of the many brilliant entries on page 31. As ever, this issue is testament to the skill, imagination and huge variety of photographic interests of our members. Remember, we are always looking for contributions, so please get in touch if you have something that you think we should include. Steve Varman, Editor
CONTENTS
CONNECT
4
Beyond Still Life, Polina Plotnikova
7
Alice Through The Looking Glass, Nur Tucker
facebook Facebook facebook.com/groups/rpscg Or search Facebook for ‘RPS Creative’
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Astronomical Lensball, David Rutter
12
Separation, David Townshend
14
Exploring Churches, Mick Cant
16
Abstract Interpretation, Mark Cornick
18
Theatre Photography, Mike Kwasniak
20
A Continued Journey into the Pinhole, David Jordan
22
River Ice, Steve Geer
24
Alternative Viewpoints, Rob Kershaw
26
Moments in Life, David F Cooke
30
Pathway to Resilience, Mervyn Mitchell
31
Cover Competition Runners Up
flickr Flickr flickr.com/groups/3510780@N20/pool Or search Flickr for Creative or RPS Contact: David Ryland ARPS david_1@btinternet.com
Editor: Steve Varman creative.publications@rps.org
Website: rps.org/ceg
32 Diary © 2021 All rights reserved. Apart from storage and viewing in its entirety for personal reference, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form without prior permission of the copyright holder. The Royal Photographic Society, the Creative Eye Group and the Editor accept no liability for the misuse of any content or for any breach of copyright by a contributor. The views expressed in this magazine do not necessarily reflect the policies of the Royal Photographic Society or the Creative Eye Group. Unless otherwise indicated, all images are from, and copyright of, the authors.
COMMITTEE Chairman Moira Ellice ARPS creative.chair@rps.org Treasurer Vacant General Secretary Gillian Beckett ARPS CPAGB creative.secretary@rps.org Vice Chairman and Assistant Exhibition Co-ordinator Nigel Rea ARPS Exhibition and Events Co-ordinator Moira Ellice ARPS creative.chair@rps.org Exhibition Secretary Matthew Clarke BPE3* creativeimage@rps.org Membership Secretary Bill Coles LRPS creative.membershipsecretary@rps.org Publications & Web Editor Steve Varman LRPS creative.publications@rps.org Archivist Barry Freeman ARPS DPAGB APAGB bazfree.photo@gmail.com
Cover: Doha Distraction by Cliff Spooner LRPS
Contribute an article
Tell us about your stories, projects and distinction successes. If you would like to submit something for consideration, for either the eNewsletter or Creative Eye magazine, please contact Steve Varman at: creative.publications@rps.org Next issue: May 2021 (Exhibition issue) Submissions (for Sept 2021 issue): 31st July 2021. Image requirements: At least 2400px on the longest edge, Adobe RGB, TIFF or JPEG.
The Royal Photographic Society, RPS House, 337 Paintworks, Arnos Vale, Bristol, BS4 3AR, UK t +44 (0)117 3164450 www.rps.org VAT Registration No. GB 753 3057 41 Registered Charity No. 1107831
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CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
FROM THE
CHAIRMAN
I
t is time to celebrate the Pearl Anniversary of the Creative Eye Group and our Editor, Steve Varman, with help from our Archivist, Barry Freeman, will be publishing an eMagazine reflecting the Group’s activities over the 30 years since the Group’s inauguration in 1991. If you have memories of any special events, please get in touch with Steve. Pearl symbolizes wisdom, loyalty, calming and serenity, while being able to strengthen valuable relationships and carry on a sense of safety – perhaps an apt description of some attributes possessed by the Group’s members from the outset? An ancient Persian legend – pearls were created after a storm when a rainbow came down from the sky and met with the earth – a wonderful image to provide optimism for a better year ahead. Online talks have continued to be very popular, attracting members throughout the UK and overseas. I am delighted to welcome Jan Harris ARPS to our volunteer team as online talks organiser and we can look forward to a series of enlightening events in the coming months. Many thanks to Steve Varman, who, once again, judged the competition for the front cover of the magazine, and congratulations to Cliff Spooner LRPS for creating the fabulous image. Our AGM this year will be online on Sunday 21st March. The AGM will be followed with an address by our President, Dr Alan Hodgson ASIS HonFRPS, ending with a showing of the 2021 Projected Image Exhibition with the announcement of the awards by its selector, Roger Ford FRPS. I do hope you will join us. In November 2020 members were notified by email of the governance review and recommendations, posted on the RPS website rps.org/about/governance-review-2020/ triggered by Trustee election issues which arose in 2019. Members were also invited to join an online discussion on 5th December 2020 ahead of the Board drafting revised By-Laws, for which members’ approval will be sought at an EGM in February 2021. By the time you read this, it’s likely that you will have been made aware of publication of the draft By-Laws on the RPS website and of the scheduling of a further online session in January which I urge you to attend if it hasn’t yet taken place as it will provide an opportunity to ask questions of the Trustees, prompted by the draft By-Laws. If the session is yet to happen and you will be unable to participate but have questions to ask, you may email Trustee, Janet Haines, at janet.haines@rps.org with your questions. As these By-Law revisions reflect significant changes to the management structure and communication channels within the RPS, which are important to all of us and to the future success of the RPS, I recommend that you study the report and proposed changes and in readiness to vote at the EGM. Finally, members will be sad to learn of the passing of Alan Turner ARPS, after a long spell of ill health. Not only was Alan a fine photographer but he had been a keen supporter of the Creative Eye Group, acting as Treasurer from 1999 until 2017 when the loss of his wife and the onset of his own health issues prevented him from continuing in the role. Our thanks are due to Barry Collin LRPS who replaced Alan as Treasurer and remained in the post until deciding to step down in October 2020. Our Vice-Chairman, Nigel Rea, has been co-opted by the Committee to oversee the finances until a new treasurer is appointed. I thank you for all your support during the past months and I wish you and your family and friends well, after what has been a very difficult year.
Moira CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
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BEYOND STILL LIFE POLINA PLOTNIKOVA FRPS
M
y two favourite photographic subjects are flowers and still life, but - as with most of my fellow creative photographers out there - I am always on the lookout for new interesting avenues to explore. The pandemic has severely narrowed photographic horizons for everyone, including me – no more trips to markets to get flowers and vegetables, no more trawling of antique shops looking for exotic props. All this made me actively think of other possibilities, and it suddenly dawned on me that I can try my hand in photographing Ball-Joined Dolls - often referred to as BJD - which I knew of as collectable objects, and also as something that, at the high end, is created by 4
CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
remarkable craftsmen and is effectively a real work of art. BJDs are normally made from polyurethane resin - although a wide variety of other materials can be used. One of the key features of BJDs is very precise movements of head and limbs, achieved via a sophisticated mechanical design. They are also highly customizable, with interchangeable wigs, eyes, and other body parts, and with sophisticated makeup. And in addition to that, there is a whole universe of custommade accessories including clothes, shoes, furniture and so forth. For the avoidance of any doubt - last thing that BJDs are meant to be is mere toys. In more ways than one, the approach I took is a natural extension of what I do with both my flower photography and still life photography. The genesis of an image can be almost anything - a colour, a texture, a shape, a mood, a memory. I then start with composing an image in my head, all the time trying to think of the right light and the right gear, while looking for objects and accessories that I would need. And then the process of taking an image can last anything from a minute to several days. The dolls proved to be remarkable models for me: hugely inspiring, with lots of stories to tell. An added bonus is that, unlike some human models, they are extremely obedient and hardworking; they don’t get tired or hungry, and are not at all obsessed with checking their Instagram accounts every five minutes! I am often told how life-like the dolls are in my images. I will let you on to a little secret – It is never my aim to deceive my viewers, to pass a doll as a human. What I am definitely trying to do though is achieve what is known as CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
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“suspension of disbelief” – it is when everything in the image looks so natural that you simply refuse to accept that what you are looking at is NOT a real person. When I fully achieve this effect – it is truly magical, and it’s often the smallest of details that have to be changed - a tilt of a head, a drop of a shoulder, a fold of the cloth, a light shining through the hair. As with most things in photography, one’s creative approach has to be fully supported by adequate gear and technique. Choosing the lens with the right focal length is important, as you need to avoid distortion. I tend to use Canon 100mm macro or 50mm with the full-frame
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mirrorless Canon R. The light source is often critical, as well as using reflectors and diffusers. And of course, every time I get it right, and the magic works – I feel extremely grateful to the wonderful artisans whose work I am lucky to use. A huge thank you to the doll artists.
FIND OUT MORE polinaplotnikova.com @photoartitude Doll artists: @EslynsDolls @lutsenko_dolls @dolly_johaun @isolda_little_dress
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ALICE THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS NUR TUCKER LRPS
Nur was the winner of the September 2020 issue’s cover competition with Alice Through The Looking Glass (right). We invited Nur to tell us more about her photography how she created the winning shot.
I
am a fanatic diver and an underwater photographer. Normally I would take photos of large whales or some tiny invertebrates that you can only photograph with special lenses and dioptres. I love entering competitions. For me, this is the way to keep myself on my toes all the time and keep up with the advances in photography. I learn to be
self-critical. In order to win, one must create something out of the ordinary. I strive to produce something unusual all the time. I never look at the previous year’s winners and try to imitate them. This is not a path to win. Before each dive, despite the fact that nature is unpredictable, I would still have a plan in my head about what I would
CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
be doing. I am interested in different techniques and also different genres in photography. For example, I try to use a technique that some people have used photographing bugs and I would apply this to underwater super macro photography. Sometimes for a particular shot, I prepare for months, mentally – this includes its choreography and its technical details such as special effects, lighting, new lenses. Last year I had a health scare and I was not allowed to dive for a year, for a fanatical diver like me, it was a very harsh ask. So, I decided to take photos in a pool using models without the additional atmospheric pressure and the nitrogen bubbles in my blood stream that depth brings. I did
a series of sessions that produced very interesting and surreal shots without employing any Photoshop. All I had to do was to cleverly use the reflections, and refractions of the sun beams, and other lighting equipment above all, my imagination. Photography in pool sometimes even requires me to brush up my skills in Physics (from optics to Archimedes principles). ‘Alice through the Looking Glass’ took a long time to accomplish. For this shot, the outfit was essential. It took me several weeks to prepare the costume including the dress, apron, stripy-tights and shorts under the dress, school shoes and the ribbon. Then I had to prepare a background for which I used 7
a thick fabric to cover the mosaic of the pool, and on top of it I used some floaty fabric for the drape effect and reflections. I carefully placed a silver gilded empty frame upside down in water floating. Then Alice entered the water. Both of us had to withstand the cold water as the pool was not heated and after some time the body temperature falls very quickly. Both my model and I were shivering as we had to stay there for a long time. The rest was correct positioning of everything and lighting. For this shot I timed it around 2 pm, I wanted the sun to be still quite up but at a slight angle for reflections. Details were very important here: All of the body, limbs, hair, dress and the silver frame had to be in the shot (without being cut) and look proportional (I used a 10-17mm fish-eye lens). Underwater, nothing stays put - Alice’s long hair falls off looking like a stick; hem of her dress ends up on her head and the frame wanders off. I do not have an assistant, so I have to keep fluffing up the hair, bring the frame back to its original position, and give directions to my model while trying to defog my mask and go back to my original position before everything moves back again. Doing all this while getting the lighting and exposure right was a challenge. Surface wind created another challenge: the background materials were flying and puffing up, frame was sailing in the pool constantly and the surface of the water was losing its reflective qualities. I had to create an impression that Alice was going through the mirror and finding the right moment for reflections of the water was paramount.
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CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
For this shot I used a Nikon D500, Tokina 1017mm fisheye lens, Subal underwater housing, Inon Z240 Strobes, off camera SUPE Video lights and Sea and Sea slave lights to fill the shadows. F11, 1/250th, ISO100. The shot was taken in Bodrum, Turkey in an outdoor pool. My model was a local 13-year-old schoolgirl called Aleyna Var. She was ecstatic to hear that she become a cover-girl for the Creative Eye Magazine.
FIND OUT MORE nurtucker.com
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ASTRONOMICAL LENSBALL
The Planets
DAVID RUTTER ARPS
S
o following in the footsteps of many other subject
nomadic photographers before me I was seduced by those magical images of golden sunsets shot through a Lensball to such a level of photographic envy that I made my purchase of a pair of slightly cheaper – as you do - Amazon versions and waited patiently for delivery. They arrived in perfect condition and I could not wait to get out to create my own unique brand of dreamy seascapes. However a bout of slightly chill weather (it doesn’t take much to keep me indoors) threat of COVID-19 also mixed with a realisation that we live nowhere near
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The Suspension
mixed with the continuing
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a beach had me heading for a bout of experimentation in our home studio. Having recently been turned on to using a torch coupled with long exposure to create that lovely old fashioned feel for still life images along with having recently experimented with water diffraction I had a plan immediately in mind.
“
I waved my 8 bulb LED torch around like a fly on hallucinogenics. The Cross
So the images you see before you are my “knock-off” Lensballs exposed for a few seconds at anything from F8 to F18 as I waved my 8 bulb LED torch around like a fly on hallucinogenics. I soon found out that two points were important for the best images; 1) keeping the lights within the frame which means guessing where the edge of the frame is in mid-air when shooting, and 2) making very smooth movements of the torch to give a “rings of Jupiter” feel. So the failure rate was significant but when it all came together I was super happy with my astronomical Lensball exercise and as for those
The Wave
elusive golden upside down beach scenes – well they will just have to
The Curl
The Jellyfish
wait their turn.
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SEPARATION
DAVID TOWNSHEND ARPS
12
New Dawn
D
and despondency at the imposition of lockdown. The shapes and colours are harsh and warning, full of threat. The first image Chaos reflects the uncertainty and anxiety over the implications of a lockdown. The second Blocked means no contact with my grandchildren – the motif is blocked from view. Danger - This is apparently a simple, literal image saying
No! and Banned!, but it is full of ambiguities. There is an apparent conflict and contradiction between the gentle pink background and the graphic cross – a harsh message, which conveys the danger to life – yet, as we know, not so for children. This also echoes the confusing information we have all received during this crisis. The image
conveys not only danger but also exclusion. The middle line conveys both acceptance and some hope of an end to separation. The images are less aggressive, less strident in mood, with softer tonal values. The lines and colours become softer too. This brings a glimmer of light suggesting the hint of a way forward. From the middle
Separation Panel
o you take images ‘of’ something or ‘about’ something? Do you try to tell a story? I would like to show how the latter approach can be a particularly rewarding. My normal approach to creating images tends to be serendipitous – just see what happens. But during a Bailey Chinnery Cultivating Creativity online workshop baileychinnery.com/ workshops the participants had to produce a panel of images on a given theme. I chose ‘An emotion’ – a challenge for me as I don’t normally do emotions, and rarely do I consciously start with a topic and then take images to tell a story. The course took place in May/June 2020 and my project ‘Separation’ was about my feelings following the loss of personal contact with my young grandchildren during the coronavirus lockdown. The series of images expresses my changing emotions from initial despair through acceptance to hope and finally the joy of renewed personal contact and a return to normality – an end to enforced separation and spending happy times with my grandchildren again. To make the project even more challenging I decided that all the images had to be created in my garden and edited in Lightroom only. The images were created on a single day, which perhaps creates a sense of coherence. The recurring motif of an oval/double oval represents my grandchildren. The top line of the panel represents my feelings of despair, exclusion
CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
Chaos
Blocked
Danger
line onwards, the grandchildren motif gradually becomes more visible and accessible. Perhaps we see the Mist clearing but the lack of full clarity also represents our sometimes stuttering contact via smartphones and computer screens rather than face to face. The bottom line reflects my feelings at the prospect of light beyond the gloom, a new sunrise and the joy of renewed contact, and finally the calmness of us all being together again. The colours are happier; the harsh lines have been replaced by soft curves and a dancing rhythm. I hope by the time of publication normality will indeed finally have returned.
Glimmer of Hope
Cuddles
Fun
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Calm
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EXPLORING CHURCHES MICK CANT
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Little Whelnetham
I
difficult. Photographing abandoned churches in infrared can be very effective in evoking a sense of mystery. Also outside are gravestones, many of which, especially those from earlier centuries, have fascinating details on them. For instance, at Great Livermere in Suffolk is the grave of
William Sakings who was the falconer to Charles I, Charles II and James II. When photographing churches I spend the majority of my time inside for this is where there is such a wealth of details to capture - monuments, woodwork, glass etc. - and where the light can often be
breathtakingly beautiful. It also has the advantage of being dry although when photographing in the church at Thompson in Norfolk during a thunderstorm I realised that the roof needed repairing as water cascaded into the nave! Another advantage of church photography is that
Figures, Dennington
cannot do better than to introduce this article with a quote from one of my favourite photographers, Edwin Smith. In the introduction to English Parish Churches by Graham Hutton and Olive Cook with photographs by Smith he wrote “for me, photography in a good village church is unalloyed bliss”. I feel the same. I hesitate to mention myself alongside such a giant of English photography, all I can say is that in many ways he inspires me. I don’t remember how or why I became interested in churches but for many years now I’ve delighted in exploring them. Some, like Long Melford in Suffolk and Fairford in Gloucestershire, are grand examples of medieval architecture but, much as I love such places, it’s the smaller country churches that fascinate me. In these churches it is possible to feel a connection to the countless generations of people who have passed through their doors. One great advantage of church photography is that there is no shortage of subjects. Suffolk (where I live) and Norfolk have over 1,000 medieval churches between them, more than enough to keep me occupied. Within the environment of a church there are numerous avenues of photography to explore. Where possible I like to take an infrared image of the whole building from the outside although constraints of space can make this
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North Gasthorpe Long Melford
can be dark and often exposures are measured in whole seconds. Another advantage of using a tripod is that I can frame my compositions precisely, meaning that I rarely have to crop images. Although I photograph in colour I prefer to see my final images in monochrome. Maybe that’s the influence of Edwin Smith?
Kedington
Long Melford
I rarely encounter anyone else in them. This means that I can devote 100% of my concentration to my photography without being distracted. As for equipment I use micro four thirds cameras with lenses ranging of 9mm to 300mm (equivalent to 18-600mm on a 35mm film camera). A tripod is essential as churches
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ABSTRACT INTERPRETATIONS
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of my images, sometimes combining both in-camera or in post production. For me, effective use of colour is crucial in creating successful abstract images. In my work, I use colour to create mood and atmosphere. When shooting at the Coast, there is an abundance of colour to take advantage of - in the sky,
the sand or the way the ocean interacts with light. Golden hour colours are spectacular, but so are winter storms! The City, and urban environments come to life at night, or they did before 2020! Shop windows, bars and neon signs create endless opportunities for making abstract images.
Fathom 1
E
ver since I discovered the work of Doug Chinnery, Valda Bailey and Joshua K Jackson, I knew that I wanted to express the way I see the world in an abstract way. I often find that I have a far stronger emotional connection to the abstract images that I make, and also to those made by other photographers. I love abstraction in photography, as for me, it is one of the key techniques that can be used to create mood, mystery and beauty in our images. The ability of abstraction to challenge the viewer to make sense of what they are seeing, or to find their own interpretations and connections with an image is something that greatly appeals to me. The locations I like to photograph are all distinctly different - the coast, the city, or exotic leaves and plants at botanical gardens - but I believe the techniques used to create them ties my different portfolios of work together. I use Intentional Camera Movement and Multiple Exposure to create the majority
Fathom 3
MARK CORNICK ARPS
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Soho Nights 2
Soho Nights 1
Hidden Arteries 4
Hidden Arteries 1
Fathom 4
All you need to do is to experiment and have fun with the surroundings you are photographing. I am writing this piece during the second national UK lockdown, and as such, have had to adapt my own shooting style. Unable to visit the Coast or City, I have taken to shooting macro abstracts of Autumn leaves, using both ICM and in-camera multiple exposure. It has been a great exercise to keep the creative juices flowing. Although controversial to some, I have never enjoyed using tripods. I much prefer the freedom of shooting handheld, and being able to move around a location quickly and easily. That is why ICM photography is so appealing to me. It allows me to play with time and motion, and on a practical level, work with minimal kit. Whether shooting at the coast or the city, all I need to have with me is my camera, and for shooting during the day or golden hours, a six and ten stop filter. I have always been jealous of people who can paint - It just so happens that I have found a way of doing it with a camera instead of a paintbrush.
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THEATRE PHOTOGRAPHY MIKE KWASNIAK ARPS
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Chorus
I
Mk IIIs, one with a 24-70 f2.8 lens, the other with a 70-200 f2.8. For when light levels become really challenging, I also carry a 50mm f1.2 and a 24mm f1.2. The use of flash is, of course, forbidden. There’s never time to change lenses during a dress rehearsal, so I ‘wear’ two cameras most of the time, and as there’s no light in the
auditorium, it’s essential to know your camera insideout so that, for example, moving from aperture priority to manual exposure can be achieved without lowering the camera. After more than 30 years it remains a thrilling experience that relies heavily on instinct - and every show is a one-shot, seat-of-your-pants ride
with no opportunities for retakes. No theatre ever restaged a dress rehearsal for a photographer! Forward planning is impossible as no matter how well known a play might be, you never know how a clever director will interpret it. I think a good theatre photographer learns to pre-empt the moment, and knows
Ragnarok
recorded my first images in a professional theatre in 1983. The Wolsey (in Ipswich) was opening a production of ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ and needed some pictures of the understudies in action, so that at matinees, when they took over the main roles, the front of house pictures would mirror what the audiences would see on stage. The main cast had already been photographed, and there was no budget. It went well, and the following year I not only took over as house photographer, but also took a full-time job in their marketing department. There’s never enough light on stage, and I think every theatre photographer in the world has a reputation for complaining about light levels! In 1983 the fastest film you could buy was rated at just 400 iso. You could up-rate and push-process to 800 iso, but the results were very grainy. No surprise when I tell you that I was a very early adopter of digital. Suddenly the walls of monochrome prints front of house were replaced with glowing colours, and I had the luxury of viewing images immediately after shooting them. The availability of high iso shooting became practical and in 2012 I was able to shoot the Dr Who adventure, ‘Crash of the Elysium’ in the lowest light levels imaginable, at 25,600 iso, creating images that were far less noisy than the push-processed images of the ’90’s. I work with 2 Canon 5D
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Untitled
was performed in a huge concrete structure designed for testing jet engines on the site of USAF Bentwaters in Suffolk. Cold, creepy and cavernous, it provided some of the best photo opportunities of my life. Outside of theatre, fifteen years ago I formed Suffolk Mac User Group, here in Ipswich - a busy, friendly self-help group for Apple computer users (many of them photographers). We have around 120 members and if you’d like to learn more, do visit www.suffolkmug.co.uk
FIND OUT MORE mikekwasniak.co.uk Look out for Mike’s photography talk organised by the Western Region in collaboration with the Creative Eye Group on 13th June 2021
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Ragnarok
how to take advantage of punctuation (the brief moment when an actors mouth isn’t moving). Once a dress rehearsal is up and running there’s no time to worry about anything, and you need to watch everything through the viewfinder or risk missing important events. I’m expected to be as inconspicuous as possible, but moving around the auditorium and dashing between rows is essential. Only once have I created my own drama - climbing between rows in a raked auditorium I caught the back of a seat with the toe of my shoe and performed a perfect (noisy) forward somersault in to the row below! Not all venues are comfortable permanent auditoriums, and I’ve included a few images from an Eastern Angles Theatre Company show called ‘Ragnarok’, which
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A CONTINUED JOURNEY INTO
THE PINHOLE WORLD DAVID JORDAN FRPS
20
with the lack of definition, to create an interesting ‘texture’ in the images. Cloning skills had to be frequently practised, as any small spot of dust on the sensor was reproduced with great fidelity at f180! One of the more interesting flaws of the pinhole body cap is its dramatic lens flare patterns, when the sun is directly in or near to the edge of the frame, but if it is used carefully it can add an interesting graphic texture to the image. Subjects that seemed to work well in my case were church interiors, modern architecture, landscapes and detail shots. Overlaying a monochrome image on top of the colour image and using the Luminosity blending mode created some wonderfully grainy and richly coloured images. The images usually print well on a quality matt art paper, so long as they were between A5 and A4 size.
Arundel Cathedral
Blue Car 1
I
n March 2017, I entered the dark and mysterious world of digital pinhole photography, by purchasing a pinhole body cap for my Canon EOS M3 camera. This modest and rather simple purchase has transformed my photography in many ways, but primarily it made me concentrate upon composition, lighting and texture, the basic tools of photography. With a pinhole camera there is no control of the focusing or aperture setting (in my camera’s case it is approximately f180), so by setting the camera to Aperture Priority and Auto ISO you then end up with an interesting ‘point and shoot’ camera. I wrote a brief article for the Creative Eye in May 2017 about digital pinhole photography a couple of months after I had obtained the pinhole body cap, so it now seems a good time to look at what happened next. There were some significant technical issues to address when using the pinhole body cap on the Canon camera, the main ones being a lack of absolute sharpness in the image and a considerable amount of vignetting in the corners. The lack of sharpness actually gave the images a ‘pleasing lack of definition’ and ambiguity, the vignetting could be managed with careful post processing. The other issues to deal with were image noise due to the high ISO settings needed for hand holding the camera, but with careful post processing the image the noise worked well
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Davis Alpine House Kew Gardens
images that a pinhole can create, well they can be seen as rather ‘arty’ and esoteric images. This means that if entered into camera club competitions they run the risk of being ‘judge bait’ but occasionally they can be appreciated by sympathetic souls. My greatest success
with a pinhole image so far was having an image selected as a Finalist in the ‘Abstract Views’ category in the 2018 International Garden Photographer of the Year Competition. Some people may think why do I want to use a ‘lens’ that gives me inferior results,
my answer is sometimes ‘perfection’ can be boring and there is often beauty in imperfection. What of the future? I have recently had an old Canon EOS M3 converted with a 720nm infrared filter, so infra-red pinhole images are the next challenge.
Spring Time Growth
Spinaker Tower Portsmouth
Some of the American car colour images that I created work well on a metallic paper, especially with the wonderful Hahnemuhle Photo Rag Metallic paper. Eventually I went down the road of full frame photography, first with a Canon 6D mark 2 and then a Canon EOS R, needless to say a pinhole body cap followed me! The images created by the larger format were quite different to the ones created by the APS ‘C’ camera, they seem to have gentler contrast range and suffer from less vignetting and therefore need a different post processing technique. I then obtained a 28mm wide angle pinhole body cap (pinhole body caps normally have the same field of view as a 50mm lens) and my old friend heavy vignetting came back, but this time I knew what to do with him! So, what about the
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INTERNATIONAL MEMBERS
RIVER ICE
CELEBRATING WINTER CHICAGO
River Ice 11
STEVE GEER ARPS
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River Ice 9
D
eep in the winter, after the water has lost its summer heat, the river that flows through the center of Chicago freezes. Not the whole river, just the top layer which becomes decorated with broken ice. This cold finger pokes into the heart of the city from Lake Michigan. Sunlight and city lights are reflected from the ice and, when it’s newly washed and wet, the frozen water also reflects the cityscape. Skyscrapers are transformed into two-dimensional geometric forms with occasional splashes of glowing reds and greens and yellows captured within the blue-tinted ice floe. It’s magical.
CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
Opposite: River Ice 8 River Ice 5 River Ice 4
in the Art Institute of Chicago by the Dutch-American abstract-expressionist painter Willem de Kooning – work in which the picture-plane is divided into large irregular shapes and the surface is decorated with splashes of color. I had seen these paintings before but with my river-ice trained eyes I could now see and appreciate de Kooning’s paintings in a new way.
Find out more Steve is represented at the Perspective Gallery of Fine Art Photography in Evanston, a town just north of Chicago. To see more of Steve’s work, visit www.stevegeer.com
River Ice 1
River Ice 12
Each year I look forward to this transformation of the River. It does not freeze often, and when it does, it does not remain frozen for long. Usually just a few days before the water warms by one or two degrees and the ice melts. While it lasts, the floating ice is always in motion, and the compositions formed by its broken sheets and irregular polygons are forever changing. The appearance of the textured surface also changes with the light as clouds come and go and, as the day progresses, the color palette varies from fiery-heat to frigid-cold. I could spend the whole day photographing the varying colors and abstract forms of the frozen river. In fact, I have spent much of several winter days doing just that, giving up only when the cold has penetrated too far into flesh and bone. I began the project River Ice in January 2017. Since then I have revisited the frozen river each season. Every year the ice-cover, its appearance and its extent, is different. To observe and communicate just how varied the spectacle can be has therefore required more than dawn until dusk photography in a single day, or even for several days in a single year. It has required a multi-year project. The resulting series of images is, for me, a celebration of the phenomenology of winter. It’s a celebration of the natural world reaching into the center of the human world, and of things that are novel because they are ever changing and brief. Photographer Dorothea Lange famously noted: “The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera.” A photographic project is particularly satisfying when it changes the way we see things. I recently came across some paintings
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ALTERNATIVE VIEWPOINTS
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Light Talk Tabletop
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or several years now I have had a project taking photographs in high end furniture shops, here in Switzerland. The photos were taken with the consent of the shop management. Usually handheld and working in mixed ambient light, the pictures are not intended to be records of the objects in the shop or ‘marketing’ shots. The idea was to look for interesting visual juxtapositions or subjects that lent themselves to a creative process, be that in camera or in post processing. Patterns, shapes and shadows often came into play. With the images in this article I am illustrating some of the concepts I have pursued. My initial inspiration for this work was the modern lighting on show and its juxtaposition with other art in the background. Target is an example of this as are both Light Talk which takes advantage of a shadow created by the shop lighting and Marilyn which has been manipulated to produce the final image. Heartlight presents an interesting lighting concept with the light patterns enhanced by post processing. Choice of Light contrasts two lighting designs that were actually next to each other on display, whilst Linear Patterns was produced with Fractalius software to enhance the colours and lines. The same software was also used to intensify the rings in Tabletop, featuring a glass table and also as part of the creation of Lightstorm, the central sphere of which was a globe shaped lighting structure. Flood & Fire however, took advantage of the light reflecting onto a patterned ceramic vase and was created by a triple exposure in camera. I hope that seeing my exploration of what is perhaps an unusual subject will encourage you to consider alternative locations and subjects for your photography. Clearly it has not been possible in 2020 to continue with the project but I hope to be able to resume work in the near future and perhaps put a panel together.
SWITZERLAND
Choice of Light
ROB KERSHAW ARPS
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Marilyn
Target
Heartlight
Fire & Flood
Linear Patterns
Lightstorm
DISTINCTIONS MOMENTS IN LIFE
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THE FRPS My Fellowship panel is based on a body of work which I built up between March 2009 and April 2014. Most of the images were taken on holiday as this was the time when I had most opportunity to spend time in situations where I was likely to capture useful images. Sometimes, I saw a scene which I thought would make a good background for a successful image and I waited for something to happen. For example, in ‘Lifestyles’ where I saw the shop and the bike leaning against the window and I stopped in a shop doorway opposite waiting for the right juxtaposition of people coming down the street, and ‘The Man in the Passageway’ where I waited in the passageway. At other times, it was a matter of seeing a fleeting moment and capturing it before it was too late as,
for example, in ‘Down’ and ‘The Man on the Bus’. To do this, I set up my camera as a ‘point and shoot’. Normally, I shoot using a focus point in the centre of the screen. I try to leave enough space around the subject to allow for cropping to get the final
composition. I use aperture priority, normally with an aperture of f/2.8 to f/4 to help to isolate the subject from the background. The ISO is set to Auto with a minimum shutter speed of 1/250 and a maximum ISO of 3200. I use matrix metering but I set the
The Encounter
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one of the images in my FRPS Panel is posed. My work is ‘street photography’ in the sense that I go out with a camera and take candid photographs of people doing what they do rather than posing for the camera. I find this kind of photography very engaging. It is challenging and exciting to go out with the camera and not know if you are going to capture anything worthwhile. As nothing is set up or prearranged, you are completely dependent on chance. However, my aim is to take candid shots which tell a story and I want to create images with an ‘artistic’ feel to them which could be considered as ‘Visual Art’ images. For me, the image I get in the camera is almost a working drawing or a sketch, which then needs to be developed into the final work.
The Bartender
Man in the Passageway
DAVID F COOKE FRPS
CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
STATEMENT OF INTENT
My main photographic interest is in making images of people going about their everyday activities, rather than posing for the camera. I find this kind of photography very engaging. It is challenging and exciting to go out with the camera and not know if you are going to capture anything worthwhile. As nothing is set up or pre-arranged, you are completely dependent on chance. I try, though, to produce images with an artistic flair rather than just being records of existence. To achieve this, I use digital manipulation to help produce the feeling that I want in them. My panel aims to show moments in the lives of different people presented in an artistic way.
A Man and a Tree
A Woman and a Man
CHALLENGES The main challenge in presenting my images as a Fellowship panel was to make it cohesive. The people in the pictures were different and the situations were unrelated. It is also a very loose project, not like others I could have chosen. For example, my ARPS project on the Church of St Thomas the Martyr in Bristol, which was more clearly defined as it involved exploring the play of light and shade both inside and outside a specific building. One of the ways I achieved the necessary consistency for the Fellowship panel was in the processing and presentation.
DEVELOPMENT I worked on images on an individual basis – doing what I thought that image required to make it as I wanted it to be. This is not the best thing to do for a cohesive panel but there is a common theme in the filters that I ended up using. One I used a lot is Nik ‘Glamour Glow’, which I used to give a slightly ethereal feel to many of the images. Another was Nik ‘Viveza’ to change the lighting to the way I wanted it. Also, I used textures if I felt that they enhanced the image. For example, in ‘The Couple’, I included a texture created from a photograph I took of a damaged wall in the Church which was the subject of my ARPS submission. The Texture was positioned so that the crack down the wall ran diagonally between the couple to indicate a lack of communication between them. There was also uniformity in presentation: the colours are muted, and there are often textures applied. All the images are square in format. Many images have been retoned from their original
The Baker
Function Button to centre weighed so that the metering can be changed quickly, if necessary. As is normal in developing the panel, I went through several versions from that submitted to the Initial Advisory Day I attended in December 2012 to the final successful panel. My Fellowship in Visual Art was awarded in May 2015.
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version to help the cohesiveness, for example, ‘The Lady in White’. ‘The Escape’, was reworked and retoned as the feedback I had was that the treatment was inconsistent with the other images in the panel. I didn’t always sit down and say ‘this is what I need to do’. Sometimes it was obvious but more often than not the images developed as I went along. An example of this is ‘The Encounter’. This was taken in a store in Florence. There was a beautiful staircase made of steel and glass and I really liked the reflections and being able to see the people going up and down the stairs. I took several shots and chose this one because of the way the woman was framed in the gap and the because of the legs of the man coming down the stairs, which I thought made a good composition. As I was working on it, the title ‘The Encounter’ came to mind as it implies a relationship between the man and the woman, which may or may not exist.
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Hanging Plan
CONCLUSION This was not an easy project because it is rather loose and something tighter, like my ARPS project on a Church, would have been easier. I chose it, though, because I was particularly interested in capturing these transient moments and I felt passionate about meeting the challenge of making a consistent panel out of disparate subjects. Fortunately for me, the panel was accepted but even if I had not succeeded, despite the undoubted real sense of disappointment I would have felt, I learned so much and my photography developed so much that it would have been well worth it.
Down
Find out more You can see details of David’s distinctions and many of his international acceptances, together with the original images and notes of how the final images were created, on his website: www.davidfcookephotography.co.uk CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
The Escape (before reworking and retoning)
Opposite page, clockwise from top-left: Down, Gelateria del Teatro, Grumpy, Silence Please
The Lady in White (before retoning)
Clockwise from top-right: The Lady in White, The Escape, The Man on the Bus, Lifestyles, The Couple
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PATHWAY TO RESILIENCE MERVYN MITCHELL MA ARPS
Nottingham Photographer’s Hub (NPH) Pathway to Resilience Project (2016 to 2019)
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n 2010, I co-founded the NPH and our aim was to give a voice to marginalised people and communities, through bespoke community-based photography courses designed around beneficiary needs. Funded by the Big Lottery Community Fund we provided free photography courses to adults with mental ill health. From the beginning we taught camera skills and a range of other personal development skills. Such as verbal / visual communication, Team building, Negotiating, Decision making and Interpersonal skills. This was accomplished by the learners developing a group photobook which comprised a series of images that provided a sequential step-bystep guide to coping with stressful situations and which they kept as an aid aide-mémoire to help them deal with challenging situations and in so doing help build their resilience. Each course concluded with an exhibition and Awards Ceremony where learners
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showcased their work to a wider audience and received their framed photographs alongside a portfolio of their images. We believe that the learners wellbeing had improved after the 10 weeks course, but it was only anecdotal evidence. Such as; “If you are looking through the camera lens you can divorce yourself from the situation and look at it in a different light, so it’s not just photography but wellbeing” Therefore between 2016 to 2019 (final year of funding) we asked the Research Support and Consultancy Service at the Institute of Mental Health based in Nottingham to carry out an empirical evaluation of the learners wellbeing. The key findings of the evaluation were:
improvement in WEMWBS scores relating to feeling close to other people. • Participants reported increased confidence, demonstrated by the improvement in WEMWBS scores relating to feeling optimistic and useful. • Participants reported increased resilience, demonstrated by the improvement in WEMWBS scores relating to dealing with problems well and thinking clearly. It has been well documented for sometime how art can benefit people with mental ill health and as an organisation we are pleased that we have contributed in supporting adults over the past 9 years.
• Participants’ overall mental wellbeing improved when measured by the quantitative wellbeing scale (WEMWBS).
Please contact me at mervynmitchell@ntlworld.com if you wish to read the full report.
• Participants reported feeling less isolated, demonstrated by the
Mervyn Mitchell MA ARPS & Director Nottingham Photographer’s Hub
CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
Esther 旗袍1 by Shjing Kit Lee
Skegness Pier by Mervyn Mitchell ARPS
Autumn Impression by Jan Harris ARPS
RPS by Jim Bennett
In Remembrance by Nicola Bolton ARPS
Ornamental Cherry Blossom by Pat Frewin LRPS
Lisianthus by Mary Auckland ARPS
Sophie With A Pearl Earring by Brian Flemming
Untitled, Nur Tucker LRPS
Purple Glaze by Neil Milne ARPS
COVER COMPETITION RUNNERS UP Just a small selection of the fantastic entries that we received for this issue’s cover competition.
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DIARY ABSTRACT PHOTOGRAPHY AS FINE ART
THE ART OF METAMORPHOSIS
An inspiring and educational overview of principles and methods for creating and marketing abstract photography as fine art. In collaboration with the Digital Imaging Group South East.
Andrea is a National and International award-winning Photographer and Digital Artist. Her digital artworks are composed entirely from photographs, including all textures and overlays. Her photographs and Digital Artworks have been exhibited widely throughout the UK.
NAT COALSON ARPS
When: Saturday 9th January 2021
ANDREA HARGREAVES
When: Saturday 27th November 2021
Time: 16:00 Cost: CEG and DIG members FREE, non-members £3.00 Where: Online talk
Time: TBC* Cost: CEG members FREE Where: Online talk
WOODLAND WAYS PAUL MITCHELL FRPS
ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
This talk centres around some of Paul’s favourite woodland locations including Burnham Beeches and Savernake Forest. He will talk about his thought processes whilst looking for woodland composition, his influences and briefly touch upon some of the equipment he uses. Paul’s talk is fully illustrated with images made throughout the four seasons.
Notice is hereby given that the Annual General Meeting of The Royal Photographic Society’s Creative Eye Group will be held online on Sunday 21st March 2021 at 10.30am.
When: Saturday 17th April 2021
Agenda
Time: 15:00 BST (14:00 GMT)
1. Apologies for absence
Cost: CEG members FREE
2. Minutes of the 2020 AGM (please see the Creative Eye Group’s website)
Where: Online talk
ABSTRACT WITH A BIT OF LANDSCAPE LINDA BEMBRIDGE FRPS
3. Matters arising 4. Chairman’s Report 5. Treasurer’s Report
Linda’s work varies from representational to abstract, moving along a continuum between the two, using a combination of in-camera techniques such as multiple exposure, and the embellishment of prints. When: Saturday 14th August 2021
6. Secretary’s Report 7. Committee Members’ Reports 8. Election of Officers and Committee Members 9. Any other business** 10. Date and venue of the 2022 AGM
Time: TBC*
** Note: Items for discussion under “Any other business” must be sent to the Secretary, Gillian Beckett ARPS, at creative.secretary@rps.org by Sunday 21st February 2021.
Cost: CEG members FREE
Broken Rays Of Light by Linda Bembridge
Where: Online talk
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This will be followed with an address by the Society’s President, Dr Alan Hodgson ISIS HonFRPS, finishing with a showing of the 2021 Projected Image Exhibition.
A Committee Nomination form is enclosed. Nominations, properly signed by two proposers and nominee, must reach the Secretary, Gillian Beckett ARPS, by Saturday 6th March 2021. A list of nominees will be published on the Creative Eye Group’s website. Proposers and nominees must be members of the Royal Photographic Society’s Creative Eye Group. This agenda and Committee Reports will be available by selecting “Documents and Downloads” on the Creative Eye Group’s website from Sunday 21st February 2021 at www.rps.org/creativeeye * For further details regarding events please visit the Creative Eye Group website: rps.org/ceg CREATIVE EYE GROUP MAGAZINE NO. 84 JANUARY 2021
THANKS FOR READING ...and a big thank you to this edition’s contributors. We welcome submissions from Creative Eye Group members, so if you have a distinction success, story, image or a project that you would like to share, please let us know. Feedback is very welcome and gratefully received. Please send your comments and suggestions to the editor.
CONTACTS Steve Varman (Editor) creative.publications@rps.org Website rps.org/ceg Social facebook facebook.com/groups/rpscg flickr flickr.com/groups/rps-creative
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