Visual Art Magazine No. 159/2021/Issue 1

VISUAL ART COMMITTEE

Andreas Klatt ARPS (Chairman & Editor) visualart@rps.org

David J Wood ARPS (Vice Chair & Programme Secretary) wood.david.j@virgin.net

John Cavana ARPS (Honorary Secretary & Headline Event Organiser) visualartsec@rps.org

Andrew Leeming LRPS (Honorary Treasurer & Co-ordinator of The Stephen H Tyng Foundation) andrewleeming@googlemail.com

Michael Butterworth LRPS (Group Web Editor) visualartweb@rps.org

Mark Deutsch LRPS (Membership Secretary) mrkdeutsch@aol.com

Gill Dishart ARPS (Circles Secretary) gill@dishart.plus.com

Wendy Meagher LRPS (Exhibitions Lead) wmeagher@gmail.com

Robert Herringshaw ARPS (Exhibitions Co-ordinator) robertherringshaw@me.com

Claire Carroll claire@clairecarrollphotography.com

Michael Kitchingman LRPS m.kitch@sky.com

Martyn Pearse martynpearse@gmail.com

SUB-GROUP ORGANISERS

Rollright

Andreas Klatt ARPS rpsva@klatt.co.uk

South West Di Wilkins ARPS diwilkins@hotmail.co.uk

If you are interested in having or organising a Visual Art Sub-Group in your area, please contact:

Andreas Klatt ARPS visualart@rps.org

CONTENTS

NO. 159 / 2021 / ISSUE 1

4. A View from the Chair

Front Cover Image: by Catherine MacBride ARPS

Inside Front Cover Image: by Isabel Curdes

4. Editor’s Comments

Nicki Gwynn-Jones FRPS

5.

13. Picasso Calling Isabel

18.

24.

30.

Paul Bather ARPS

33.

GUEST EDITOR: Nicki Gwynn-Jones FRPS (flychick110@googlemail.com)

DESIGNER: Paul Mitchell FRPS (paul@pmd-design.co.uk)

Visual Art is The Magazine of the RPS Visual Art Group and is provided as part of the annual subscription of the Group. © 2021 All rights reserved on behalf of the authors. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder. Requests for such permission must be addressed to the Editor. The Royal Photographic Society, RPS Visual Art Group and the Editor accept no liability for any misuse or breach of copyright by a contributor. The views expressed in this magazine do not necessarily reflect the policies of the Royal Photographic Society or of the Visual Art Group.

Printed by Henry Ling Ltd, The Dorset Press, Dorchester. DT1 1HD

Andreas Klatt ARPS

Birds of a Feather Kathleen Packard & Larry Monczka

Curdes

If the World Was Made of Paper Catherine MacBride ARPS

Where Selkies Swim Ally Moore

Paper Shapes

Creeking, Groaning & Scraping Andy Holliman

A View from the Chair

ANDREAS KLATT ARPS

To be the harbinger of good news these days is not so easy. I’ll try. So much of what we do has been thwarted by the need for social distancing, but things are beginning to look a little bit more promising.

Circumstances permitting, the 2020 Members’ Print Exhibition - mounted, framed and neatly boxed - will come out of hibernation to present itself with an early summer run at Patchings Art Centre in a belated, but all the more

welcome first showing. It will move on to Leamington Spa in August and Banbury in September and October.

The 2021 exhibition is trying to avoid the pitfalls of public health risks by offering an alternative format. In this, our centenary year, we will shortly invite all members of the Visual Art Group to submit three high-res digital images, one of which may be selected to appear in a special edition of this magazine. In addition to the usual feature of the top

Editor’s Comments

Greetings from Orkney!

As you will all be painfully aware, over the course of the last year our wings have been severely clipped. Since travel has been all but impossible, I am delighted to feature a selection of work from both the UK and abroad in this edition of Visual Art.

I came across Canadian photographers

Kathleen Pickard and Larry Monczka on Facebook a while ago and was immediately taken with their way of working. Their wonderfully informative article provides a fascinating insight into their photographic partnership and proves what I have always believed to be true - that if you send a group of photographers to the same spot, they will all bring their own ways of seeing.

Isabel Curdes is from Denmark and is a truly intuitive artist. Her website tantalizingly states, ‘I dream, I explore, I create - I tell stories’, and her article is a bewitching Alice in Wonderlandesque journey into her rich imagination. Like many of us she thrives by being in nature, using photography, art and writing to explore and convey her

feelings. She has many sources of inspiration, drawing on amongst other things, literature, music and philosophy. Continuing our offshore theme, Catherine MacBride, photographer and paper artist, hails from Dublin. In January 2011 she started a 365 project - which is still going strong 10 years later! I urge you to take a look at her incredibly inspiring website; as well as her 365 images you will find other treasures, such as the book covers that she has designed, and examples of her beautiful, whimsical paper art, including her successful Irish Photographic Federation Fellowship featured in this magazine. I am in awe!

Ally Moore - just like yours truly - is an incomer to Orkney. She has a background in geology and is now a successful jewellery designer with a thriving business. Having overcome her fear of swimming in the sea she quickly realized that here was a world where much inspiration and beauty was to be found, and soon found herself snorkelling and diving in the pristine coastal waters. She decided to teach herself underwater photography so that

ten pictures there will be a full page devoted to each selection. And to move us out of our comfort zone, all images will have to be in square format. The result will be this year’s print exhibition, just not as we know it.

As for the return of our meetings, we hope to go ahead with a Rollright day in August and the residential weekend in Buxton as planned for October. Altogether, some things to look forward to.

Andreas

she could share her sense of wonder, and I think you will agree that the results are extraordinary, so extraordinary in fact that she recently placed 1st in the Sea and Coast category of the Scottish Nature Photography Awards!

And finally back to the UK mainland for our final two contributors. Paul Bather and Andy Holliman both produce stunning non-representational work. Paul photographs paper, showcasing wonderful abstract forms and colourways; as he says, working with a limited toolbox in controlled conditions is a great way to learn about light, texture and colour. Even before lockdown Andy loved to explore his home turf, and in his quest to produce images that are truly his own he discovered the joy of experimenting with ICM and multiple exposure techniques.

I do hope that you enjoy this edition - as always, a huge thank you is due to everyone who makes the magazine possible.

Nicki

NICKI GWYNN-JONES FRPS

Birds of a Feather

KATHLEEN PICKARD & LARRY MONCZKA

Who we are.

Larry and I have had a lasting affair with photography for almost 40 years now, both separately and now, for the past 20 of those years, together.

We followed different, but parallel pathways into photography. In the late 1970s Larry, a newly minted dentist, was inspired by an Eliot Porter retrospective he happened upon in the Metropolitan

Museum of Art in New York. Shortly thereafter, on a whim, he sneaked into the back row of a talk being given in Toronto by the pre-eminent Canadian photographer Freeman Patterson, who was on a book tour promoting his first book ‘Photography for the Joy of It.’ He thought, ‘I can do that.’ Having no lack of confidence, but a total absence of experience, he bought a camera and signed up for a week-long workshop with Freeman.

That very same book was given to me as a gift shortly after it was published, somewhat surprisingly, as I had not expressed any interest in photography - my fascination lay with birds and the natural environment. On the suggestion of a fellow birder I did buy a ‘real’ camera to document my birding travels, and, as it happened, at a dinner table in Churchill, Manitoba, I met someone (not Larry) who had just returned from a workshop with Freeman Patterson. His enthusiasm was voluble...and contagious. I decided right then that my next trip would be to a photographic workshop with Freeman in New Brunswick. And so it began.

This somewhat lengthy history is to explain why our photographic styles harmonize. We had the same mentor, one who still perches on our respective shoulders when we photograph. Freeman did not teach us how to use our cameras, he taught us how to see. Over the next 20 years, we continued on our individual paths. The small amount of time that could be wrested from our busy professional lives was devoted to photography. More workshops, more travels, more museum visits, and much more looking at and thinking about photography. During that time we each developed a strong sense of our personal photographic identities.

our creative lives. With the exception of this virus-ridden time, it is rare that we are not out photographing within an hour of home at least three times a week in three seasons. (Summer is too hot and much too green.) Later, at home, after the downloading, sorting and processing, we have the fun of discovering where each other’s ‘eye’ has landed during that particular session. We found that to be so entertaining we thought other people might enjoy it too, so we started featuring pairs of what we call He Saw/She Saw shots on our website and, more recently, on social media. There is just one ground rule for the selected pairing: the images must be taken during the same shooting session.

How it works.

We set out for a session of photography together - same car, same time. Sometimes we have a target destination in mind, but it is not unusual for us to get distracted and never get there. Either or both of us can decide when and where the car is stopped and the gear gets taken from its bag. If only one of us has had their interest piqued, they will photograph while the other enjoys their cup of coffee. If both of us have had our attention captured we wander off separately to explore, only returning to the vehicle when the last one is finished shooting. There is little conversation, much less consultation in the field - mostly companionable silence. This process probably does not sound much different from what happens when any photographer is out in the field in the company of other photographers. The difference for us lies in how often it happens and how closely our photographic lives are entwined.

Once home, we each work through our images from the day’s session, making personal selections of the images that we feel merit further processing.

We each have different shooting styles; Larry shoots copiously, I more sparely. It has been this way since film days and shows no sign of changing.

Looking back, it seems inevitable that we would meet at a photographic workshop. We did. And now it is 20 years on. We are still as passionate about photography as we ever were, and now that we are both retired from the obligations of professional life, we are free to further develop

We have each worked out our own peculiar (and incomprehensible to one another) cataloguing system, using Bridge and Photoshop. Neither of us is inclined to work Lightroom into the mix. We have also become aware quite recently that although we learned the basics of Photoshop together, our routines have diverged over the years. If one of us discovers a previously unknown technique, we share that with the other, having no expectation that it will be made use of. In a broad

generalization, Larry’s processing leans into high key and gauzy, and mine into saturated and graphic. Of course, when looking at the accompanying photo pairs you will find exceptions to that. People do like to make a game of guessing which photo belongs to each of us and sometimes we confound them. We have noticed that over the years our styles have begun to converge, something that is likely unavoidable given that our strongest influence is each other.

Once each of us has made our selection we review them together for the first time, to see if there is a pairing that is companionable and therefore suitable for posting.

Why it works (we think...).

It is a lot of togetherness, yes, but it has never felt like too much, and we have a few thoughts on why that is so. First, there is no ‘senior or junior partner’.

FEATURED PHOTOGRAPHERS

FEATURED PHOTOGRAPHERS

By the time we got together, we had both been photographing for close to twenty years. We had had the opportunity to independently develop our photographic competence and confidence. We have viewed the relationship as two photographers working in parallel, albeit in close proximity.

Then there is the fact that our interests, photographically and otherwise, abundantly align. We came together both having had a long-standing curiosity about, and appreciation for, natural history and the environment. Equally shared is a love of music, theatre, and art. Travel destinations (when we could still do it) are easily agreed upon and usually centered around photography.

As mentioned previously, during our very earliest days of photography, we figuratively sat at the feet of the same master, Freeman Patterson, a fine photographer and a consummate teacher. His workshops, though we experienced them separately, have informed our photographic thinking to this day. You might say we have shared photographic values. Respect for one another’s images is key. Unsolicited advice is seldom offered and, even when requested, it may or may not be acted on. We are well aware of each other’s relative strengths and weaknesses but, most of the time, refrain from pointing them out. Competitiveness is disallowed. Though we both shoot with Olympus cameras and lenses, we do not ever use or ‘borrow’ one another’s equipment. Ever. Photography is our shared joy. We do take it very seriously indeed. On the other hand, not taking ourselves very seriously is fundamental to the preservation of harmony.

www.RaraAvisPhotos.com

Picasso Calling

ISABEL CURDES

The journey begins…

Something strange was happening. While she felt confused, she was not afraid. Rather, it all felt unexpectedly familiar.

How did she get Here, and where was Here, or was it perhaps There? This made her laugh out loud, and she could hear an echo, an echo that seemed to come through time. Out of nowhere a nearly forgotten memory surfaced in her mind about how she had always understood the frustration of the little monster in Sesame Street that wanted to be There but could never make it, because whenever it thought it had reached There someone told him that now he was Here again. Maybe she had finally found There - but how?

A moment ago she had been sitting on the ground under the apple tree in her garden, looking through the viewfinder of her camera…and then suddenly she was falling right into and through the viewfinder…

She looked down. The camera was still in her hands.

This had never happened before. So why now? What had changed? What had she done differently? She looked around the place, or was it even a place? She noticed that she was holding her breath - she always did that when she wanted to reduce camera shake for macro images. Maybe the clue to how she got There was in her latest photographs…

FEATURED PHOTOGRAPHER

She flipped through the images on her camera screen.

First there were realistic landscapes, portraits of trees, closeups of flowers - all easily recognisable - images she had taken hundreds of times before.

That was how her love for photography had started.

Then there were rather impressionistic and even slightly surreal images - multiple exposures, ICM (Intentional - or, as she called it, Intuitive Camera Movement) and selective focus images using tilt and swing - also nothing unusual for her.

That was how her love for photography had developed...

But what was that...where was that...when did she...and how?

Someone tapped on her shoulder.

It was Pablo Picasso. He looked at her with his dark, intense eyes and those eyes seemed to talk to her. ‘There is no abstract art. You must always start with something. Afterwards you can remove all traces of reality.’ Then he disappeared, his eyes lingering just a second longer, looking deep into her soul, and she felt that something, or rather someone inside her, was looking back.

She blinked a few times and then pinched herself. ‘Ouch.’ Definitely not dreaming...so what now? She took a closer look around. It was a mysterious place and there was a feeling of magic all around her - it was changing, transitioning, slowly but with a constant flow.

She suddenly realised that the place looked very similar to the last image on her camera screen. What was it that she had photographed? Oh yes, there had been those feathers and she had taken the image experimenting with a simple

lens which she had held in front of her regular lens to get closer...and then looking through the viewfinder, it had happened.

But what now? Should she try and explore There, or find a way back home, or both?

Anyway, staying in the same place did not seem to make any sense so she lifted her foot to take a careful step ahead - and the whole place moved. The distance came nearer...she was climbing now, or rather, the ground below her feet was falling. Maybe it would be good to reach a higher place to get a better overview.

The second she was done thinking that thought the ground stopped moving, and she saw two sharp golden eyes looking at her.

‘Why are you sitting on my beak?’, the giant pheasant asked. She only managed to say, ‘Sorry’ and, ‘Lovely to meet you,’ before he sneezed and she flew through the air screaming, ‘Goodbye!’

While she was falling she heard Picasso’s voice talking to her again. ‘I paint objects as I think them, not as I see them.’

And she thought herself as wings…at first they were pheasant wings, but the higher she flew, the more transparent

and fragile they became, and she only just made it to a small cloud before they dissolved completely.

In the middle of the cloud was a small door, just large enough for a child. There was no handle, so she tried pushing it. It did not open.

Maybe knocking would help? Knock, knock, knock... The door opened its eyes. It yawned and said sleepily, ‘What took you so long?’

‘Erm, were you expecting me?’, she replied, and the door nodded. ‘Sure I was, but since you are so late it is going to be difficult. Have you talked to the child yet?’

‘Which child?’ By now she was really getting confused.

The door was losing patience. ‘That will take too long. Lean in closer,’ it said, so she did. Knock, knock, knock. ‘Are you still there?’ it asked.

And, if she had not been surprised before, she definitely was now, as a very faint and muffled voice called back from inside her, ‘Yes, still here but I can’t find a way out - we need to bridge the gap...’

‘Okay, let me help,’ the door replied - it seemed to know exactly what to do. ‘We don’t have time for explanations, the child will do that later. Just try to remember if there was something you loved doing as a kid but which you have not done since. And don’t overthink,’ it added quickly when it saw her facial expression turning into a big question mark with a large dose of panic. ‘The first thing that comes into your mind!’

‘Painting!’ She nearly screamed with relief. ‘I always loved to paint!’ Her expression changed into a wistful smile and before she could start wondering if that was the right answer the door said,

‘Perfect.’ Then it looked at the camera in her hands and continued. ‘Now combine your photography with painting, and you are good to go,’ and it handed her a sheet of paper, a brush and some paint.

And, as if she had known all along what to do, she started to paint, and then combined that painting with one of her recent photos, and all the time the voice of the child inside her grew louder, talking to her about all the things they could do together. By the time she was done, the door had grown bigger and she could enter, or rather...they could... and when they did, they heard Picasso again. ‘Every child is an artist. The problem is to remain an artist once they grow up…’

www.isabelcurdes.com

If the World Was Made of Paper

CATHERINE MACBRIDE ARPS

I have always loved pictures, stories, books and paper.

As a child I would sit, scissors in hand and cut out chains of people, free elaborate snowflakes, and make countless fortune tellers and little pop-up cards, all from sheets of paper, just to entertain myself.

When I started a 365 photography project back in 2011 it didn’t take long to run out of things to photographfinding new or exciting subjects to take pictures of every day is impossible. Life can also get in the way, but on a really hard day I always have a blank sheet of white paper to fall back on so that I can craft something to use as a prop. I have made everything from homes to spaceships, creating little worlds

that my imagination can escape too. My project ‘is now coming up on a decade long,’ and I am still making at least one new image every single day. Making objects from paper has become my ‘thing’, and along with my camera and some lights I try to tell a story or set a stage. Lighting and composition are vitally important - I do not want merely to produce a record of my paper craft, but rather, to come up with a scene that the viewer can imagine themselves walking into. My hope is to create an image that would not look out of place in an illustrated children’s book.

Photography is in my blood.

I never set out in life be a professional photographer, but I have always taken pictures. As a child I watched my father

take and develop his own 35mm film, so for me, photography always had a magical, whimsical quality to it. I loved his old Praktica camera and the black and white shots he developed in the dark room. As a teenager, most of my pocket money was spent buying film and getting it developed. There really has never been a point in my life when I didn’t have a camera. It was not until I got a decent digital camera in 2007 (a Canon 300D from my father-in-law when he upgraded) that I found the joy of processing my own images. This was probably the trigger for me to see photography as a real creative art form.

Ultimately, photography overtook my day job and I was lucky enough to be able to give that up, allowing me to concentrate on photography full time.

I now work supplying images to a number of agencies and working by commission for a varied client list.

I still often feel guilty that I get to do something I love so much as a job. What I have learned after a decade of making images every day.

For me, creativity comes and goes in cycles. I seem to have times when I can knock it out of the park on a daily basis and be so happy with the images that I create, and yet there are times when I feel as if I am never going to come up with another decent idea. Either way, I still turn up to take the shot and post it online (all my images are posted to Flickr daily).

If I cannot get something to work as planned it is not a complete loss; this knowledge is very useful the next time I go to take a shot, and I have learned how to think on my feet. The 365 project has taught me to look for different angles, possibilities or ways of doing something, and very often this results in some of my favourite images. Sometimes you just have to accept that the shot is rubbish - failure is always an option and tomorrow is another day. Post it anyway, perfection is overrated. Keeping a notebook of ideas is such a useful tool and is often overlooked; early on in my photo-a-day project, I began sketching out ideas for shots in a little storyboard notebook as they occurred to me. Having a record

can act as a trigger on days when you are short of ideas, which keeps shooting on a daily basis much easier. Pushing myself to make an image every day really gives my creativity a boost - you start to see everything as a possible picture and I take a camera with me everywhere. The regular midnight deadline pushes me to take photos that I just never would otherwise. It has been a huge challenge, but it is a great learning experience and I feel that both my photography and paper craft have improved dramatically. This project is easier when you aren’t doing it alone - my husband, Scott, started the 365 challenge with me back in 2011, and since then I think we have been playing an extremely long game of chicken, both unwilling to give up and let the other win. We even went for our Irish Photographic Federation (IPF) distinctions, the Licentiate, Associate and Fellowships on the same days, and thankfully we were both successful on all three occasions. It would have been a very awkward drive home had we not been! Scott and I do talk about photography all the time - we are constantly bouncing ideas off one another and I have come to realise that creativity is both contagious and collaborative. It is always so much easier to be inspired when you can spend time with people from the same or different disciplines and I believe that having a creative outlet in life makes life much more fun.

FEATURED PHOTOGRAPHER

It is important to try new things, so I am now teaching myself the basics of video capture and editing, as that seems like a natural progression for my photography. It has been a fairly steep learning curve, but I have really enjoyed it. I think pushing myself to learn different skills keeps me creating, and that keeps me happy.

The images printed here come from my ongoing photography project and represent a glimpse of how I imagine the night might look if the world was made of paper.

www.catherinemacbride.com

Where Selkies Swim

ALLY MOORE

The cold water lapping at my feet was as far as I had ventured into the sea for over forty years - the fear of the unknown was immense, and it kept me firmly landbound. Even when I moved to the Orkney Islands, which lie off the north coast of Scotland, it was nine years before I dared go in beyond my ankles; I would stand and watch the waves and wonder what lay beneath, but I was never brave enough to find out. That was until a friend started swimming in the sea in water temperatures of 50C which seemed absurd to me at the time, but she waxed lyrical about how much she was loving it, and within a few

months I found myself in a swimsuit, on a cold wind-swept Orcadian beach, tip-toeing my way into the water. Once my shoulders are fully submerged, a feeling of euphoria comes over me. A flock of birds skims the surface of the water and almost touches me. From that moment, I connect with the sea in a way that I never have before. But I am still nervous; dark ominous shadows lurk under the waves and the only way that I am going to overcome my fear of the unknown is to muster all my courage and see what lies beneath. I put on my goggles, and clutching my waterproof action camera

I take a deep breath and plunge my head in. In that moment I know that I have discovered my happy place. I am completely unprepared for what I find - it is like looking into a secret garden that only I can see. Seaweeds, swaying gently in the water, look like exotic plants, the colours and textures stunning - delicate deep reds, translucent bright greens and palm-like golden leaves. Upon my return home, I quickly hook up the camera to the computer screen so that I can revisit that beautiful world. The adventures in the sea become a daily routine. Each day brings new

sights and throughout the course of the year I watch the changes at each location. Seaweed season starts early in the year, and summer brings an explosion of marine life. The colour and the clarity of the water changes too, as the sea fills with life and then empties again. I collect seaweeds washed up on the shore, press them, and start to study each variety, learning the type of environment in which they thrive and to what depth I might find them growing, and my search for new underwater seascapes leads me to new places to explore.

The action camera is soon replaced with a mirrorless camera in an underwater housing. My swimsuit is gradually replaced by a wetsuit so that I can have more time in the water, and my ability to hold my breath for longer periods increases as I learn to dive down deeper under the surface.

Photographing underwater is a real education; there are so many variables to consider with shifting light conditions, the movement of seaweed and of myself as I am pushed and pulled by the tide. Finding the sweet spot on the settings is a challenge in the first few months of owning the camera - I had never operated a camera on full manual settings before. I realise that the ethereal qualities of the seascapes I am capturing are not documentary style images, but are more like pieces of artwork.

Summer sees new creatures entering the water. Earlier in the year, and in my swimsuit, I would have been horrified at the sight of jellyfish, but clad in neoprene and now fearless in

the face of the stinging tentacles, I start to watch them up close. I become mesmerised at the way they pulsate through the water; with my dome port pushed up close to them, they allow me to record their beautiful translucent bodies as I dive down into the water, following them as they get deeper. The peace and quiet under the waves is hypnotic.

In the shallow waters around the Orcadian coast lie numerous shipwrecks. They intrigue me and entice me closer as I look for new locations. Some are over a hundred years old and the marine life growing on and around them is well established. I start to explore the structures with my camera, fearful at first of the unknown, but, as I begin to study them, I realise that they are just objects providing a reef, a home for sea creatures and seaweeds. They start to feature in my images - the sight of an underwater wreck is intriguing and, paired with a jellyfish, a very ghostly combination.

I discover how much I enjoy this challenge; in one image a rusty old barnacle-covered shipwreck above the surface is shown under the water to be covered in life, seaweed and starfish thriving beneath the waves.

To try and give people a feel for some of the mysteries of the underwater world, I attempt to take images in which the bottom half of the picture is what I see under the surface and the top half, the world above that everybody can see.

FEATURED PHOTOGRAPHER

I discover that water and light make a magical combination. Sunshine and flat-calm conditions make the most incredible mirror-like reflections on the underside of the surface of the water. The images that I capture can be confusing, but they are always beautiful; when I am under the water looking upwards, the light from the sun splits as it hits the surface, causing rays to splay outwards. The rays start to dance as the surface of the water moves, and when I look down into the deep they appear to converge in one spot, as if they are telling me that there is something important on the ocean floor, right there. I get my freedive buddy to swim down to this spot. The images I capture make it feel as if he is going on an epic journey into the unknown, guided by the light.

I will continue to experiment with what I find in the ocean. The images I capture bring me so much joy and the daily dose of cold water is therapeutic, whilst processing the images later helps me to relive that feeling.

www.alisonmoore.co.uk

My love affair with the sea will continue as I learn to dive to reach greater depths.

Paper Shapes

PAUL BATHER ARPS

Lights, a camera and some paper are all I need to while away an afternoon indulging in some enjoyable and imaginative photography; a variety of interesting results can be achieved using an assortment of different coloured papers, lighting effects and camera apertures. The range of possibilities is endless and can open up a whole new world of impressionist and abstract imagery.

I use a simple, basic set-up to achieve the images that I want. I have an A4 book of different coloured papers (available from all good stationers), a pocket torch to shine light on specific areas of the paper, and, of course, a camera. I use both a Nikon D7100 and D5200. In order to try out different effects, I also like experimenting with wrapping

paper - this tends to be after birthdays and Christmas when there is a LOT of it in the house. I sometimes get more excited by the paper than by the present it contains (but don’t tell my family!). Any lens can be used, but to achieve the look that I want, I use a Sigma 105mm macro, which gives me the ability to really focus in on a particularly lit area or fold in the paper. I have tried a variety of apertures in order to arrive at what I want but have found that f/8 and upwards can identify and show up any flaws - frayed edges, for example. Personally, I prefer f/4 or f/5.6.

To ensure that they stay in place, I have my trusty stapler to hand plus a pack of staples and a box of paper clips. Once I have the first piece in position I will introduce more paper, experimenting with different shades and configurations to reveal distinctive lines, curves and patterns. When I am happy with the results and have them all secured, I place the assembled pieces on a flat surface and mount the camera onto my tripod. I then use manual focus to examine and investigate various areas, including the

My images are about constructing shapes to showcase shadow and the movement of light,

tone and texture; by manipulating just a single piece of coloured paper I can achieve a whole variety of different shapes, either circular or angular.

edges. This is the time that I start to play around with the lighting, using the pocket torch to illuminate the arrangement in different ways in order to achieve distinct effects. I will sometimes use the live view facility on the camera as I find that it helps me to focus more accurately.

I shoot in RAW and then play around in Lightroom, adding vibrancy and saturation. For some images I will also add a vignette. I clone out any frayed edges or unwanted dust spots in Photoshop, then I check the size of the image before saving.

If you give it a go you may discover, as I did, that it gives you different ideas about how to tackle other subjects, such as flowers, car parts or people. It

has opened up a new world of abstract and impressionist photography for me and has highlighted just how much I can achieve using humble A4 paper.

I have been taking pictures in this way for some years now, and while not every image hits the spot, I find it a cheap, resourceful and rewarding way to understand light, texture and colour with a limited toolbox.

Creeking, Groaning and Scraping

ANDY HOLLIMAN

I am a passionate amateur photographer and try to get out with my camera as often as I can. Being based in South East London means that I live a long way from the coastlines, mountains and rivers beloved of many photographers - I enjoy photographing the urban landscape around me, from the streets of New Cross to the towers of Canary Wharf. However, for a few years now, my interest has been concentrated on exploring a view more abstracted from reality.

I am most often to be found taking pictures right outside my kitchen window - this comprises a rather unprepossessing view of Deptford Creek, some modern apartments, the Docklands Light Railway and a lot of quite vocal ducks. Deptford Creek is the name given to the short tidal section of the River Ravensbourne just before it enters the Thames, and Deptford acquired its name from a deep ford of the river at the point where it was crossed by Watling Street. From medieval times, the Creek has been an area of shipbuilding and industry, and a

few signs of this past remain among the modern development taking place along its banks. It is visited by a surprising variety of birds; beyond the usual ducks, geese and gulls, a heron and an egret are regular visitors and, rather less often, a kingfisher. As I type, a swan is gliding past in the afternoon sunshine.

One of the driving forces behind my choice of location and photographic style is the making of images that are truly my own.

For a long while my photography consisted of technically proficient pictures, usually of the coast or of holiday locations, that would gain the requisite likes on Instagram. But slowly the feeling grew that I needed something else, some way of being more individual. As so often happens, it was the coming together of several elements that set me off in my new direction. I was a late adopter of digital but when I did make the change it gave me a new drive to learn more about the technology and to find ways of making better pictures. At the same time, I started seeing images by Ted Leeming

and Morag Paterson which looked nothing like any photography I had seen before - here were beautiful swirly atmospheric landscapes and seascapes, high on drama and mood and low on depth of field and sharpness. Further reading around this genre of work brought me to the work of Chris Friel, Valda Bailey and Doug Chinnery - I had found what I was looking for! This is not to say that I wanted to try and copy what these people were doing, but it was the discovery that photography, and particularly digital photography, could be anything I wanted it to be.

While it is only one approach, there are benefits to this way of thinking, not least of which is that if time is limited and if the light looks intriguing, I can grab a camera and be outside in a moment. Beyond this, it helps to understand how different tidal and weather combinations work together; sometimes, whilst walking home, and

by simply taking note of the prevailing conditions, I can begin to envisage a scene that might work. Another benefit is that I have no fear of missing out - I do not feel the same pressure to get the big shots that I might, had I paid to travel to an exotic location!

The main elements that come together in these images are the textures and colours from the buildings across the Creek and their distortion by reflection in the water - because they face west, they tend pick up the colours of sunsets and warm evening tones. The Creek is confined by walls of concrete and old timber which bring texture to the scene

and which give me the raw materials for my image-making, the majority of which are made using multiple exposure techniques and sometimes intentional camera movement. Anything goes with ICM - move the camera as much or as little as you like, keep reviewing the results and something interesting will normally start to happen. It is the same with multiple exposure - try a few things and see how they blend together, then develop the ideas as you see the results.

These images do need more processing than some but, because of their abstract nature, they can be taken in many different directions. I do most of my

It is a well-known piece of photographic advice that you should get to know your local area and understand it in all seasons and conditions.

processing in Lightroom Classic; the current enforced time at home will be a good opportunity to learn a bit more about Photoshop too. I normally spend more time working on colour than anything else once the exposure and white balance are set in the basic panel. This type of image has the potential to have the colours pulled in many different directions and the HSL/ colour panel is a good place to do a lot of this work; the feel of an image can be altered considerably by a few changes to the dominant shades, and the less prominent areas of colour can then be tuned to match. Other recently

introduced features that I like are the range of mask options for brushes and the gradient and radial filters which allow much more targeted adjustments to colours than either the HSL or splittoning tools. Once I am happy with the processing I print my images, as there is nothing more satisfying than seeing them fully realised on paper; I use the Fotospeed signature paper of either Doug Chinnery or Joe Cornish, depending on whether the image needs a smooth or textured finish.

I hope that this will encourage you to see

possibilities in some otherwise unremarkable scenes and, if you haven’t tried them before, to have a go at some of these more creative techniques. Even if you do not use them all the time, it is always good to have another tool in the box.

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Get even better value from your membership of the Visual Art Group: join a circle. Email circles are free to join, while print circles will cost you no more than postage. Meet new people keen to share their experience, to ask questions and to comment on your photographs. Get a different angle on your work from people who are neither fellow club members, nor your family! Members range from new recruits to very experienced photographers, from people who just want to enjoy their photography with new friends, to people working towards distinctions.

There are print and email circles and we’d welcome a few more members. Join a circle.

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