Camera Club 15th Anniversary Celebration

The St.Mary's County Camera Club celebrated their 15th Anniversary last week at their annual holiday party.  Founded on November 2, 1998 at the Trinity Church Parish Hall in St. Mary's City, there were 40 attendees when the new club began.  A few of the original members,  a number of alumni and many current camera club members enjoyed a pizza party and viewed "Islands" slide show, created by Joanna Macaulay and presented at the first meeting.  "Islands" included favorite photos of locations around the world including islands as large as Manhattan and Hong Kong and as small as Spirit Island in Moraine Lake Alberta Canada.  Many lovely photos from the Caribbean Islands and Hawaii were included in the short presentation as well.  Here are a few of my favorite slides from "Islands".

Spirit Island Alberta, Canada

South shore Bermuda

Three cats Avalon, New Jersey

Pelican, Caribbean

February winning photo

We saw this really cool blue orchid in the grocery store and bought it to photograph it.  It was kind of disappointing when we figured out that they had just added some sort of blue dye (a fancy patented process they say) into a white Phalaenopsis orchid.  (sort of like those colored carnations you can get for special holidays but a little fancier)   If it blooms again it will be white.

It still made a nice photo and it won second prize in the Advanced category for the February competition at the St. Mary's County Camera Club.  If you want to read more about the orchids, here is the website for Silver Vase about their blue mystique orchid. http://silvervase.com/w/blue-mystique.php

January winning photos

I had fun in Adobe Photoshop with my first prize Advanced digital  photo for January 2013 at the St. Mary's County Camera Club. 

I turned the photo of a reflection of the Capitol in Washington D.C. upside down.  The photo was taken at dusk, creating the nice golden glow.

I also got an honorable mention for a photo of a Gyr falcon with his lovely white feathers.  Just don't ask me how to pronounce his/her name!

You are invited to view the Photography exhibit at the Lexington Park Library Art Gallery from February 1-March 15, 2013.  The artwork is on display across from the check out desk during the standard library hours.

 

Lexington Park Library

 



The many excellent photographs were taken by members of the St. Mary's County Camera Club and include 7 good photos by Jim and I.  Please take a few minutes to stop by to view the display and check out a good book or DVD at the same time.

St. Mary's County Camera Club Photographer of the Year & End of Year Competition for 2012

I have been crazy busy in the last two weeks.  During the week before Christmas, I suddenly found myself in a full week computer security course called Security +.  I passed with a lot of hard work and no free time before spending the week with my family for the holiday.

This is a little late, but I wanted to congratulate the winners of the St. Mary's County Camera Club end of year competition, especially my friend Theresa Ford, who won the Advanced Digital Photo of the Year.  Way to go Theresa!!  Bravo everybody!

I still put my 2 cents in and won the prize for the most number of competition points for the year in their respective classes, called Photographer of the year, as well as first prize for the Theme photographs for the St. Mary's County theme with my Orange Pier Sunset photo.

Here are all the winners:
Advanced Photographer of the Year: Joanna Macaulay (177)
Intermediate Photographer of the Year: Stefie Bartley (169)
Novice Photographer of the Year (2-way tie):  Dennis Preus & Emily
Baldwin (129)
Runners up: 
Advanced: Sandy Robbins (123), BJ Ramsey (116), Al Scheungrab (114)
Intermediate: Matt Rhinehart (107), Jon Tom (103)
Novice:  Jim D'Intino (124)
 
ADVANCED DIGITAL:
1^st Place – Theresa Ford – “Plants 3474”
2^nd Place – Al Scheungrab – “Clingmans Dome Sunrise 1”
3^rd Place – Sandy Robbins – “Reflection”
HM – Al Scheungrab – “Clingman Sunrise”
HM – Jim Macaulay – “Turn Over a New Leaf”
HM – Joanna Macaulay – “EScreechOwl”
HM – Joanna Macaulay – “Old Boat”
INTERMEDIATE DIGITAL:
1^st Place – Matt Rhinehart – “Holy Reflection”
2^nd Place – Jon Tom – “Spiral”
3^rd Place – Stefie Bartley – “Auditorio de Tenerife”
HM – Jon Tom – “Overlook”
HM – Jon Tom – “Sunset”
HM – Stefie Bartley – “Teno Point Sunset”
NOVICE DIGITAL:
1^st Place – Scott Cote – “White Lily”
2^nd Place – Emily Baldwin – “KL Monkey”
3^rd Place – Jim D’Intino – “U S Grant Memorial”
Honorable Mention (HM) – Dennis Preus – “Ducks”
HM – Dennis Preus – “Spring Colors”
HM – Emily Baldwin – “Lord Murugan”
THEME DIGITAL:
1^stPlace – Joanna Macaulay – “OJ Pier Sunset”
2^nd Place – Stefie Bartley – “Sunset Photographer”
3^rd Place – Theresa Ford – “Alisa 2015”
HM – Dennis Preus – “Light”
HM – Emily Baldwin – “Hollywood”
HM– Joanna Macaulay – “Tree at Sunrise”
HM – Jon Tom – “Brunelleschis Dome”
NOVICE/INTERMEDIATE PRINTS:
1^st Place – George Taylor – “Egret”
ADVANCED PRINTS:
1^st Place – Al Scheungrab – “Glass Water Bottle”
THEME PRINTS:
1^st Place – Leslie Steinback – “Aimless Wandering”

 

Funny Dog Photos: Learning How to take Humorous Pet Photography

The St. Mary’s County Camera Club had a themed competition of humorous photos last week. Humorous photos are challenging. You can either hope to get lucky when something you see strikes you as humorous or you need to create something funny. I decided to get more pet photography practice and learn about photographing humor at the same time. I enjoyed my photo attempts because I am very interested in humorous photos.


Some pictures are funny if something doesn’t quite make sense or fit in with the rest of the photo, there is an unexpected element. Human activities, clothing, silly hats, funny teeth or children’s toys look funny because we don’t normally associate them with pets. I’ve also seen photos that are funny because something unfamiliar happens, like a photo of a dog floating in the air with balloons attached to his body or dogs waterskiing.

I photographed a Westie “playing” the piano, reading a book and driving a car. My first place photo was a Westie at the piano. The original photo was mildly funny, but the addition of the piece of music called “Unleashed Melody” added an extra funny element. The dog reading a book received an honorable mention. The pictures were all challenging, because the dog was in a wiggly mood.

To see some wonderful humorous dog photos visit photos by Eliot Erwitt or William Wegman. I give my thanks to Andrew Darlow for his pet photo advice.

St. Mary's County Camera Club End of Year Competition

 On Oct 20th, the St. Mary’s County Camera Club had the end of year competition including all of the winning photographs from the monthly competitions.  I had entries in the Advanced Digital photos, 1 entry in advanced prints and 2 in Theme.  I was almost embarrassed to win Advanced digital 1^st place (Point No Point Lighthouse) and 2nd (Osprey Landing) and 3rd (kitten 2) and both honorable mentions, (St. Mary’s College of MD Sunset and Gladiolus) plus 2^nd place in advanced prints (Butterfly and Bee).  Several of the clubs best photographers spent a lot of time teaching and judging the club members at meetings, instead of competing.  I think it made it a lot easier for me to win.

St. Mary's County Fair Photo Winnings

We had a lot of fun at the St. Mary’s County Fair this weekend.  Jim and I helped out the camera club by accepting entries and returning entries on 2 different days at the Photography competition.  Jim also helped out during the judging session by putting up photos.  We both won prizes this year.  I got a big purple ribbon for Best Photo in “Life in St. Mary’s County” for my picture of “St. Mary’s College of Maryland Sunset”.  First place for “Mishka”, (a Siberian Husky on my Apr 20^th blog), 2^nd place for” a Marionette with Balloons” from last year’s Mitchell Marionettes, 2^nd prize for an “Osprey Landing”, and honorable mention for a “Great Blue Heron” and a “Waterfall with Ferns”.  Jim’s 3^rd prizes were “Two Geese Arguing” and a “Tunnel Abstract” made with a red torchlight.  I was pleased with the prize for Mishka, because I am learning pet photography.  I also had fun telling Nancy Mitchell and her husband, Jack Gebhardt, from Mitchell Marionette Productions that a photo of their mouse marionette won a prize from last year’s fair.  When Nancy saw me in the crowd, she announced that an award winning photographer was in the audience and they might want to go and view the photo.  Other highlights at the fair included trying a fried milky way bar on a stick made with funnel cake dough, the flowers on exhibit, the horse pull, watching horse jumping, the Mitchell Marionettes, watching the Queen of Tolerance win and visiting the goats , sheep and Clydesdale horses.

St. Mary's Camera Club July Competition

As I get ready for the Camera Club competition this evening, I realized that I hadn’t sent some of my St. Mary’s County Camera Club competition winners from last month to my blog. Enjoy some lovely photos from Hawaii taken in May, a pink Hibiscus (Advanced Digital 1st place) and a beach on Molokai (Advanced Digital 2nd place).

We really enjoyed taking flowers with a new micro lens that can take sharp close up details. The beach was so lovely that I am currently using it as a background on my computer at work. It is such a relaxing photo. Molokai is very laid back and there aren’t a lot of tourists there. There is very little night life. We enjoyed talking with the local folks and visiting the quiet beaches.

St. Mary's County Camera Club Photography Display

The St. Mary’s County Camera Club will have a photography exhibit at the Lexington Park Library on display from August 15-September 30th. Several of my photographs and Jim's photos will be on display and available for sale along with photos by my friends. Please stop by.

St. Mary's County Camera Club Third Prize

At the St. Mary’s County Camera Club competition last week my Barn Wall photo received 3rd prize in the Advanced Digital completion. The same photo won 1st prize in the Black and White Abstract category at the St. Mary’s County Fair last September. I even was asked if the Fair could borrow my photograph temporarily to demonstrate photography technique. I liked the wall because of its fascinating textures. I rarely do black and white these days, but the original was very monochrome in color, just right to accentuate the old look of the ancient curling rough wood. The photo was taken in the late afternoon, which increased the shadows and added depth to the wood shingles.