Reflections...

Another fantastic participation from the club members with both Aitor and Tiziano presenting images for the first time.

In the more intimate environment of the A Building meeting room the discussion was fast and furious with members beginning to experiment further with their images, with the words 'cropping' and even 'cloning' being thrown around like true experts.

Image variety was high as well, with water, metals, glass and even bubbles ?! being used as reflective media... there were also the more philisophical members who interpreted the theme to mean human reflection... like I said people had really done their homework..!.

As always please go and leave comments on the gallery page and start giving those thumbs up to all the images you liked...

Next theme is 'People' which I'm sure is going to attract even more participation...

Until next time..........

This months featured photographer...

This months featured photographer is orvaratli, who is from Iceland and as you can see from his images he has a passion for landscape photography..

Hope you enjoy it...

Previous featured photographers:
April '09 - ArTeTeTra
March '09 - Tom Hoops
February '09 - Strobist Favourites
January '09 - Tommy Oshima

Pocket Wizards..;-).....

Newly released film camera !?!...

Just to show you all that film is not dead quite yet, Cosina/Fujifilm have brought out a new film camera based on a design from the 1930's.

A folder no less !!!! that means you can fold it up and put it in your pocket (well almost ;-))

It will go on sale under the Voigtlander Bessa III brand and of course the design has been brought right up to date with a mechanism for switching between two different film formats (6x7cm and 6x6cm) and auto focus.

It is fitted with an 80mm f/3.5 fixed focal length Heliar lens and weighs 1kg and measures 178x109x 138mm when opened. The body is cast in magnesium alloy with aluminium parts, and the camera can be fitted with a hotshoe flash.

Its quite pricey at around 1700GBP, but hats off to Cosina/Fujifilm for making such a bold move no the less, I'll be interested in how well it sells...

MADRIDFOTO...

Following the resounding success of Paris Photo and Miami Photo, MADRIDFOTO is the only international contemporary photography fair in Spain focusing on private, corporate and public collections.

MADRIDFOTO will be showcasing 47 national and international galleries targeting a new brand of photography collector. Several publishing houses and specialist magazines will also be contributing.

The work of 230 artists will be available for viewing in pavilion 6 at IFEMA. The fair is scheduled from the 7th to the 10th May and according to the architect Andrés Jaque "the exhibition hall has been designed to ensure a pleasant and comfortable experience for visitors, while making sure than the works on view at the stands of the various galleries are seen to their best effect".

For all the details head on over to their website here.

This months featured photographer...

This months featured photographer is ArTeTeTra (Roberta), as you will see from the slideshow of her Flickr account she manages to create many wonderful images, images that push you to think and interpret plus the addition of music also adds a new dimension. Her photostream is a constant source of inspiration....

Hope you enjoy it...

Previous featured photographers:
March '09 - Tom Hoops
February '09 - Strobist Favourites
January '09 - Tommy Oshima

Nighttime...

We received again a high number of entries for what I consider was a very hard theme.

We had many technical discussions regarding colour temperature of lights, stitching with wide angle lens and off camera lighting which was all very 'enlightening' considering the subject ;-)

The club president showed his darker side by presenting the above image of an attempted mugging.. you'll be relieved to know that he came to no harm by firing his flash into the eyes of the attacker, temporarily blinding him while making good his escape....

Also, Nico brought along this wonderful image of Segovia taken from a secret 'locals only' location that he has sworn not to disclose...

There are many more great images over on the gallery pages so head over there and enjoy. As always, comments and 'thumbs ups' are always appreciated, and if the authors of the images can leave a few lines on how and why they took the image it would be great as well.

Next theme is 'Reflections' another theme that at first glance appears to be trivial but in execution is not at all..

Until then.......

Sony World Photography Awards announced...

The winners for the second edition of the Sony World Photography Awards have been announced.
In total 44 photographers from 22 countries were selected, both in the amateur and professional categories.

The winners will receive their prizes at a ceremony in Cannes next month, where one will be named the recipient of the Iris d’Or – the Sony World Photography Awards Photographer of the Year.
Check out all the images here.
(source BJP Online)

"when the famous start thinking of immortality, they call for Karsh of Ottawa."

Yousuf Karsh (1908-2002) a Canadian Photographer of Armenian descent, is considered to be one of the most famous and accomplished portrait photographers of all time.

The title of this article was a quote that appeared in the 'Sunday Times' and gives you a clue of the significance that he has had on portrait photography and the respect that he commanded amongst the greatest icons of the world. During a career that spanned more than 60 years he had more than 15,000 portrait sittings producing more than 150,000 negatives, which is absolutely staggering !

He used almost exclusively an 8x10 large format camera and has photographed the likes of Winston Churchill, Fidel Castro, Albert Einstein, Ernest Hemingway and George Bernard Shaw just to name a few.

Currently in Chicago, there is an exhibition of more than 300 of his prints at the Art Institute of Chicago, just in case you happen to be around that neck of the woods.

The OnlinePhotographer has a very interesting article thats well worth the read, and, an absolute must, is a visit to the Yousuf Karsh website itself where you can read a short comment of a number of his most famous portraits explaining what happened during the portrait sitting (absolutely fascinating), there is also a quite extensive wikipedia entry about him too.

This months featured photographer...

This months featured photographer is Tom Hoops, as you will see from the slideshow his Flickr account contains many beautiful portraits, which not only demonstrate his ability behind the camera, but also his skill in post processing as well.

If you'd like to know a bit more about Tom and what makes him tick you might want to read this interview on the '6 Million People' website. His personal webpage can be found here.

Previous featured photographers:
February '09 - Strobist Favourites
January '09 - Tommy Oshima

Whatever you want '09...

The club made a fantastic start to the year with its biggest ever presentation of a total of 52 images from 18 members.

Baerbel, Debbie, Erik, Nacho and Toni presented images for the first time, hope the experience wasn't too traumatic !?

I highly recommend taking some time to go through all the images on our gallery pages, you won't be disappointed as there are lots of crackin' shots.

Don't forget to give a 'thumbs up' to those you like and comments are always appreciated as well.

Owners of the photo's can also use the same comments mechanism to give a bit more information regarding their image if they so wish...

The next theme is 'Nighttime'.... am I being too presumptious in thinking that we can better this first presentation of the year ?

Word Press Photo Awards

The Word Press Photo Awards 2008 were announced yesterday. Have a look to the winner.

You can review the whole list of winners for the different categories here.

http://www.worldpressphoto.org/index.php?option=com_photogallery&task=blogsection&id=19&Itemid=223&bandwidth=high

Have fun.

Ricardo

What the heck is an Octa...!?!

I mentioned the other day that the club had purchased an octa, if you don't know what one is or what its capable of.... take a look at the following videos:

Historic + modern pictures of cities

During the last club meeting some one (Nacho, I believe) mentioned the idea of repeating old photographs of Madrid showing how those scenarios look like nowadays.

There is a quite implementation of this idea in this page.

The picture on the right is a nice example.

This months featured photographer...

This months featured photographer slide show isn't really an individual photographer at all. It is all the images that have been favourited by strobist in their flickr account.

Enjoy... as it really is a stunning collection of images...

Previous featured photographers:

• January '09 - Tommy Oshima
  

Gallery pages re-designed...

Our gallery pages have been given a complete facelift as you can hopefully see from the image on the right.

The homepage now consists of a very snazzy slide show, the top 12 most popular photo's to showcase the clubs images that have received the most 'thumbs up'and 'ratings.

You will also find links to the 'members', 'theme' and 'most popular' galleries, as well as one to this very blog !.

We also have a new logo with a fun space theme.

Try it out and let me know what you think...!

Yearbook 2008 published...

As you already know, our yearbook has finally been printed and most of you have already received your copy.

The yearbook has increased from 80 to 160 pages, it has a new style 'imagewrap' cover, and utilises blurbs new heavy weight premium paper.

This year the president got the cover and Celia the back page as they were at the top of the 'most popular' images on our gallery pages. Don't forget that it always the most voted image over the year that gets the cover so its a good idea to enter images into all the themes and add images to your personal galleries as well.

As you can also see at the top right of the blog is a blurb badge which if you click will take you directly to our shop, should you wish to purchase further copies for your family and friends.

As always, thank you all for contributing to making the club such a success and we could never really hope to produce this book if it wasn't for your enthusiasm and participation in the club activities... my hats off to all of you..!

Blog style change..!

As you have probably already noticed the blog has had a major re-style and now has a few more features:

• Each month we will feature a slideshow of chosen photographers images that we think are wothwhile to showcase.
• Blurb book badges that take you directly to the clubs shop page to purchase our yearbooks.
• Links have been re-organised into groups to ease use.

....anyway, hope everyone likes it, and if you have any more suggestions please feel free to let us know...

Round up of 'Best of 2008'...

National Geographics Editor in Chief, Chris Johns selects some of his favorite photos published in the magazine in 2008. click here

The Online Photographer posts its list for Photobook of the Year. click here

Nature Photographers online magazine pick their Favourite images from 2008. click here

The Sacremento Bee has a number of galleries, for Photojournalism click here, Sports click here and The US Election click here.

The NY Times has a slide show of the Best of 2008. click here

Reuters have their best of 2008. click here

Song Title...

This theme proved to be tricky with a smaller than usual number of images presented, but it was still very interesting to see which song titles you all chose to represent.

For example this image presented by Celia would you have guessed it was 'African Eyes' by Sister Sledge....

...or the one below from Alberto as 'Lonely stranger' by Eric Clapton

This was our final theme for 2008 and marks the end of what has been a very successful year for the club.

As is our tradition the first theme of 2009 will be 'Whatever you want' look forward to seeing all you images soon...