The Amateur Triumphant - Part Three

Well, you've finally done it - closed the doors of the professional practice and sent a farewell notice to the ATO. You've tossed the letterhead, invoice forms, and business cards into the fire and told the accountant that you will be doing your own lying in the future. You are set to be a real amateur.

No turning back. No doing jobs for money. From now on the only compensation you will be receiving will be "exposure", "a drink", and "recognition". And the occasional bucket of lemons from Mr. Valducci's tree. There will be more lemons than drinks.

The demands on you will change - while no-one can compel you to deliver the goods on time, they will expect you to hand over every raw file that you have taken so that they can have them printed at Officeworks. This might have seemed unreasonable when you were a working professional but that was when you were a person with a camera in hand - now you are a camera with a person attached. The camera has remained sharp but you have become fuzzy.

Do not despair. While you no longer will have money, you can still have fun. By all means turn over the raw files to the person who demands them. Just copy them all into 1993BFG.3.0PiX format on a 5" floppy disc and hand it over. And a pleasant smile when you do so doesn't hurt.

Your own photography will improve greatly in the future. You will no longer be asked to make tins of cabbage ends or anorexic teenagers look appetising. No one will ask you to take 3.2 metric tonnes of lighting equipment up the top of Bluff Knoll in relays to capture the magic of toilet paper. You can go to a wedding and drink.

Better still, you can go to a wedding and watch the wedding photographers at work and let them watch you watching them. If you know how to let out good strangled shriek or do a very slow face palm you can have fun all afternoon. A slow wink also does the trick.

Are you worried about the piles of gear that are still stacked in the locked cabinet? Well, if you haven't finished paying for them you need not worry too much longer. The leasing and finance companies will be sorting that/you out in short order. If it is yours freehold, you can either use it to take immensely detailed photo essays of spit or you can take it to the camera markets that they hold every three months. You can then bring it home again.

There is an opportunity for the new amateur to join the art scene. This can be effected on-line or in person by attending at local art groups. Sociability, kindness, and the ability to see good in everyone is an asset in this sort of affair. It is rewarding if you are prepared to learn the language of Artspeak and are not afraid to try a few halting phrases. " Awful Dreck " and " Ghastly Daub " are useful...

Finally, have you thought of finally settling down and writing the Great Australian Novel? Or the Definitive Outback Photoshoot? Or setting fire to paddocks? They are all equally attractive propositions, and as you are a free agent you can turn them over in your mind...

Onward. Excelsior!

Uncle Dick

Achieving Amateur Status - Part Two

Once the decision is taken and the die cast, the bridge crossed, and the Gordian Knot cut, it is time to decide how to become an amateur. Here are some first steps:

a. Get a photo vest. If you are an urban type, get a black one with lots of pockets. If you'll be out in the country choose a grey or khaki one with lots of pockets. If you are going to haunt the motorcycle and drag races get a blue denim one with lots of pockets.*

b. If you cannot afford a vest just get lots of pockets. You can wear them like a Mexican bandit's ammunition belt. Be prepared for Pancho Villa jokes.

c. Get a baseball cap. It does not matter whether you wear it forward, backwards, or sideways but you must wear it at all times. If they attempt to take it off you in church, change religions.

d. You no longer will worry about taking extra camera bodies, lenses, and batteries to an assignment. You'll no longer have to trail three roller cases full of lighting heads and extension cords. And you'll no longer have a poorly-paid assistant to set up, clean up. and throw up for you. Celebrate by paring your outfit down to one pre-1970 SLR with a standard lens and a smudged UV filter. Encase it in a brown leather ever-ready case with extra pockets down the strap for rolls of film and cleaning tissues.

e. Stock up on Ilford FP4 and Kodak Gold film.  Keep it on the back parcel shelf of your car.

f. Join 15 internet forum groups that deal with different camera brands. Play one off against the other by researching the minute details of each new product and making spread-sheet charts of the reasons why each one of them is worse than the other.

g. Go to random weddings and obstruct the professional photographer. You know precisely where they need to be to get the best coverage for the event and you are now in a position to prevent it.

h.  Practise your computer skills by making composited HDR shots of babies with harsh cross lighting and graffiti in the background - preferably against a pebble beach with lowering clouds. Print these with 100% sharpening and push the finished results under the doors of the local portrait studios. Eventually you will get a scream.

i. Haunt the shops. No, really, put on a white bedsheet and come in through the front door making a "Woooooo" sound. The staff get little enough amusement as it is and they will look kindly on you.

j. Tell people how you did it in your day. If your day was just before last weekend they may listen to you. If your day was just before last century they may throw chairs at you. You can sell the chairs for a decent price.

k. Make up one of those inkjet-printed plain paper advertisements offering cut-rate photography "for exposure" with a little fringe of tear-off phone numbers at the bottom. Tape one to the wall in the waiting area of every portrait studio in the town when the receptionist isn't looking.

l. Offer to lead a workshop photo tour expedition seminar event to a town in the bush that has no store, petrol station, pub, or supply of running water.

m. Write articles on photography and submit them to Dolly Magazine, The Watchtower, and Hansard.

* The pink lace vest is a dangerous choice...

Uncle Dick

Coyne Collecting - A Seminar To Treasure

I hope the subject of this column doesn't mind me using his name as a headline - I'm actually talking about Michael Coyne, the internationally renowned photojournalist. No disrespect meant.

How could I - the man uses the beloved Fujifilm cameras to document diverse cultures around the globe. He's lectured before here at our own Shoot Photography Workshops and that was worth hearing. Now he'll be holding a seminar at the Central Institute of Technology later this month to tell more.

We still get a look in - and you can look in as well - as there will be an exhibition of his prints at the Shoot photography Workshops - 232 Stirling Street right next door to the shop - from the 18th of April to the 29th of April. It will be seen between 8:30 AM until 5:30 PM on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays. It'll be well worth a viewing, particularly if you go along to see Michael at Central TAFE. The name of the seminar is " Capturing Humanity ".

Well, what will you hear at the seminar? The background briefing and inside story of historic moments - including his recent tour of Fukushima in Japan. Consider that he's been shooting assignment photos in over 20 countries and any number of sticky - and non-sticky - situations. There's a lot of stories and a lot of insight for the photographer who also wants to observe mankind.

The seminar will be held at the main lecture theatre of the Central Institute of Technology on Wednesday, the 27th of April. It starts at 6:00 PM and goes until 8:00.

Costs:

AIPP Member                 $ 65.00
AIPP Student Member    $ 45.00
WAPF Members             $ 80.00
Non-Members                 $ 95.00

There is a booking site on the web run by the AIPP - Please click over there or give them a ring to see about going.

Mr. Coyne is well worth listening to - and if you are a Fujifilm user, his insights into how our favourite cameras operate in the field are priceless.

A Cheerful New Year From The Editorial Desk

I cannot speak for the rest of the staff - who may be at their several homes lying down with cold cloths over their faces, but I feel fine this morning. New Years Eve swept over the house and nothing seems to have been dislodged.

Writing the weblog column has been a great deal of fun this last year - assisted not a little in the last two months by the fact that it could be banged out with no telephones shrilling in the ear and a better studio for photos. That latter point is still in the process of improvement - I think that all studios evolve as time goes on. The Little Studio has taken a new turn with the business of product illustration. All those old technical books on studio stuff are now fertile ground.

You'll see a post a day in the coming year - the experiment of morning and afternoon posting was interesting but if the stream of new products slows too much you can tun out of novelties. Of course there is never a dull moment in photography and Camera Electronic and Shoot Workshops seem to have such a diverse connection with the amateur and professional world that if the Weblog reporter - The Photographic Spectator as it were - ventures further than the shop racks there is always something going on.

Some years ago Camera Electronic adopted the slogan " We Love Photography" and I looked upon the phrase with a rather jaded eye. I've since come to see that the various people who make up the sales, service, and business team in the place actually DO love the sport. Err, hobby. I mean business. No - wait - it is art. Oh all right, it is science, if you must. Vice? Who said vice...? Well anyway, the team actually does think photography most of the time and this has real advantages for the clients and for themselves.

It means that if one person doesn't know the answer to a question, another may. Indeed we all have our special areas of interest quite apart from assigned positions or set tasks. It is the interests that make the different people most valuable, because they will know stuff far in advance of the current press release or warehouse blurb. In my case it is not so much knowing what is coming but what used to be - and I can tie this in to modern practice sometimes. And sometimes I haven't the faintest clue what I am writing about, but I poke the thing with a stick and stand back.

Well, on with the motley. I would appreciate it if each person reading this column would come into the shop in the next couple of weeks and buy a camera bag, because they are starting to increase in exponential numbers. Buy two - you can never have too many camera bags.

Uncle Dick

The Initial Diagnosis

AIPP
WAEPPA
WAPITI
AIPP
WAPF
AAPP
APS
ACMP

Here's a puzzle for you to work on while riding the train to work - look at the list of organisations above and correctly identify the words represented by the letters.

Be careful - many of these fine organisations use similar names and ideas but arrange them in different ways.

We can give you a general hint - they have something to do with photography, competitiveness, and money.

And one includes a number of large hairy beasts who roam about and cause trouble by knocking down fences and rooting up vegetable gardens. Once a year they may be legally shot and eaten...and make superb gravy.

Clicking In A Westerly Direction

I can remember a night out at the movies used to include coloured slides flashed on the screen to advertise local businesses  - it also had watery orange cordial and ice cream bombs that cost less than the price of a moderate-sized family home. Those days have gone...

What excites me now is the prospect of next week - the 3rd of June at the La Premiere Cinema at Carousel. That'll be the venue yet again for the WAPF's presentation of the Canon Click West competition.

They've been busy, the judges - considering the entries from camera club members all over the state. They have been looking in 4 various categories and sorting through portfolios that photographers have submitted to them. The rules for submission meant that there were entires into different forms of photography but as they were put to the contest in digital form it will all have gone swimmingly.

I note that this year they have also added a prize for first-time entrants.

Prizes? Well, there is a prize pool for this contest of some $ 22,000. that's big money in equipment, services, trips, and other things. Well worth the time of those club photographers who submitted their work. They have probably been sitting on tenterhooks this month - the cut-off date for submissions was the start of May.

They'll be showing the entries on the big screen at La Premiere next Wednesday - if you are interested in seeing what will be, go to the Click West website of the WAPF and follow their directions for booking.

In the meantime, we here at Camera Electronic will be packing  showbags for the night.
There will be goodies in there from a number of sponsors and something interesting for every show-goer. Unfortunately the Customs Department seized the fireworks and flick-knives I was originally going to give out, but I'll will find something else.

Uncle Dick

Knighthoods For All! - Photographers To Be Honoured!

The news is good. the Government of Ruritania has just announced that knighthoods will be awarded in their annual New Year's Honours list to photographers. Their Royal Heinyesses have placed the seal of approval*on the legislation that was moved in the Volksrat.

While we in the press will have to wait another 10 months to learn who will be beknighted, this gives an opportunity for ambitious young things...and crafty old things...to curry favour  with the palace. Whether it would be better to use the milder forms with yoghurt and mint or go for the tandoori spice is not known - time will tell.

Ruritania has many scenic views that invite landscape photography, so those workers who hike up mountains or over glaciers will have a natural advantage. If they carry cameras with them so much the better. For the gritty urban street photographer sorts, Strakenz, the capital has a wide variety of gritty urban streets. Some of the grit has been there since the last Roman invasion.

Of course, people are always a popular subject for photography throughout the world and Ruritania is no exception. The girls of the countryside pose willingly in their native dress and once one learns to set up the tripod up-wind of them many charming portraits can be taken. Of course the sturdy peasantry are also fine subjects and many of them have teeth, so smiles are possible.

One note of caution - governmental defence regulations prohibit photography, drawing, or playing peek-a-boo within 500 stroms  of any military subject in the kingdom. This is not too much of a problem as the Strakenz regiment lives at home with his mother and only parades on the last Tuesday of Lent.

The announcement of the Ruritanian photographic knighthoods follows on from the awarding of similar honours to every other crowned head in Europe that is still on its crowned shoulders - plus a special one-off award to the Queensland Minister for Roads. It will give the lie to the assertion that artists cannot be praised in their lifetimes - if Ruritania cannot do it, who can?

* it's a very good seal and can balance a ball on its nose and play a tune on horns.

Click West First News

This will seem a rather bare post today - it is the first news of the winners of the Canon WAPF Click West competition that was displayed and announced last night at La Premiere cinema in the Carousel shopping center.

Congratulations to the winners who will be sharing a considerable prize pool. This is just a list, but we recommend that you go to visit the clickwest.com.au website and go into the section shows the entries and the final choices. They are ALL great photographs and it will do you good to see them.

Winners:

Landscape Category

1 st.    Jordan Cantelo
2 nd. Ashley Pearce
3 rd.  Tony Segers


Portrait Category

1 st.    Kirk Norman
2 nd.   Chris Barry
3 rd.    Julie Holland


Mono Category

1 st.     Shirley Milburn
2 nd.   Katrina Bartley
3 rd.    Tony Segers


Macro Category

1 st.    Katrina Bartley
2 nd.  Katrina Bartley
3 rd.   Cindy Buchan


Portfolio Category

1 st.    Katrina Bartley
2 nd.  Tony Segers
3 rd.  Shirley Milburn

We hope the prize winners will thoroughly enjoy their winnings and that more people will be encouraged to participate in this worthy WAPF club venture next year. The website is already counting down the days and hours until the next event...

June 4 Is CW Day - Make Ready For Click West

June 4th - Hoyts Carousel La Premiere Cinema

The Big Event for WAPF members when Canon and Click West combine to show the best f he WA club competition photographer's work on the extremely big screen.

It is a pretty spectacular gala night - they d food and drink and show the entries into the various classes of competition - including Mono Architecture, Portrait, Macro, Landscape. Then they talk, and that's pretty spectacular too. Then they present the prizes...

Oh My Dear. The prizes are big. I know - we at Camera Electronic provide a large chink of them. So does Canon, Kimberley Expeditions, Fitzgerald's Photographic lab, and what looks to be a half dozen famous professionals.

I'm busy stuffing CE showbags for this. Cutting up the slices of blood sausage, sewing the tea cozies, packing the advertising pamphlets...all busy.

If you are thinking of entering your picture of the holiday in Fiji you are too late this year - entries closed in May - but you can still go along and have a very good time seeing the competition. It gets pretty good when the judges declare a tie in any category and they lock the two exhibitors into a cage with clubs and let them decide who wins by the oldest methods. It is a club event after all...

Any road, go along to the Canon Click West site or any site for a WAPF club and you will be directed to Click West deatail. June 4, Hoyts Carousel. I need to go back to packing the show bags because they have just delivered the gerbils and I need to find grass for them.

Uncle Dick

Still Time To Go Fishing

We've been delighted with the exhibition of underwater photography here in the shop - many thanks to the talent and vision of the WAPF photographers. Apparently Sunday was a lot of fun. The pictures swim away at the end of this week - Friday in fact - so do try to get in and see them in the meantime.

And for those of you inclined to try your own fins at the this sort of photography may we recommend that you go look at the work of Darren Jew - the Canon AIPP technical, scientific, nature photographer of the year. he has a website that is positively dripping with beauty. You'll have a whale of a time...

Also - we do have small underwater cameras for sale. Of course, you can take anything underwater but the specialised ones keep working...

Note to self: mop floor after the exhibition packs up. Some of those pictures are too realistic...

WAPF Underwater At Camera Electronic

This Sunday - the 29th of September - is going to see the inaugural opening of the WAPF Underwater Photo Exhibition - right here at our shop.

If you come to 230 Stirling Street, Perth between 4:00 and 6:00 on the 29th you'll see a glorious mini-gallery of underwater shots from some Federation experts. A chance to talk photography with people who love it, as well as see what you can do in the water.

Won't be a dry visit, either...

See you here.

We Love Photography - We Hate Cockroaches

You can be forgiven for wondering at the conjunction in the title - our shop slogan with crawling insects. Leaving aside speculation about the characters of the sales staff, I can explain.

Someone in the shop asked me how I got good results for belly dance photographs and images of model cars. I think they wanted me to tell them a secret of a special lens or a special light - an item they could buy to improve their own pictures. I was delighted to tell them the secret, but it did not involve selling a piece of equipment - it involved selling an idea. And the price was cheap.

The real way to get good images of anything - cars, cockroaches, brides, or belly dancers - is to either love or hate the basic subject. You can choose for yourself which emotion you fancy, and you can freely switch between them as you like - provided you really do care one way or the other.

If you don't - either through general lack of interest in any topic or burnout from long exposure to it - any pictures you make will show this. And the people seeing those pictures will perceive that disinterest. That's a powerful clue for them to let them know how they should react to your work, and they will comply readily. If you don't care, they won't either, and you have wasted everybody's time.

I think this is a pretty good explanation for a number of photographic books and monographs that I have seen in bookstores in Melbourne over the years. The old Printed Image bookstore in Prahran had shelves of them - the NGV bookstores at the main gallery or their Federation Square branch are also pretty good ...errr...dump bins. Okay, not every picture book is Cowboy Kate but some of the depths of banality that are plumbed by small publishers...

Not talking about vanity photo books or self-publishing here - the things that we make of our holiday snaps or our hobbies. These actually have some substance - the audience may be limited to a family, club, or individual, but the book is often intense and treasured. At least the thick ones can be used to swat cockroaches with.

Heading image: Thanx to Jane and Henri

Pictures To Look At - Drop Into The Box

I have just been informed by Ric McDonald that there are winning pictures from last night's Click West presentation to be sen in the Drop Box website. Not quite sure what to do, but if you are savvy about these things, go to the site and ask for Clickwest 13 winners. If you need more information you can contact Ric on

 ricmcd@iinet.net.au.

I had the chance to see the cinema they used last night out at Carousel - La Premier with the fancy seats up the back - and I daresay some pretty fancy projection equipment to show the images. As I was waiting to go in and put the show bags on the seats I watched the regular cinema patrons stream past. It's been a while since I went to the movies and it would appear in the interim that the snacks have gotten bigger - the popcorn tubs I saw yesterday were the size of railway gondola cars...the soft drink canister looked like an oil tank car with straws...

Back to the images - I'm looking at some of them right now but in book form. I like printed pictures in about a 6" x 9" size anyway, and these are wonderful. The WAPF must be very proud of itself in having such talent and being able to present it in such a way.

A Good Night Well Spent - With Kingsley And Crew - DSLR Video

Did goe to Shoot Photography in Stirling Street laste night and was greatly amused.

The venue was warm on a cold night, and filled with enthusiasts, equipment, and expertise - and I benefitted greatly from the lecture.

Kingsley Klau from Photo Coffee in Rockingham hosted a beginner's course on the video capabilities of the DSLR. This was to assist members of the WAPF to access the video section of the cameras that they already own - and to prepare them for an upcoming competition. The Nikon company will be sponsoring a video comp in conjunction with the WAPF and there seem to be a number of really valuable prizes on offer.

Never mind the prizes - what Kingsley had to offer last night was really valuable - the logical presentation of the subject with practical help to each member of the audience in setting up their own camera. There was a variety of ancillary equipment to be seen as well, courtesy of one of the experienced members, and good advice from a professional in the video business. But the inspiration that Kingsley gave was what people really need - he recognises that some of the new capabilities of the equipment ned to be matched by confidence on the part of the users.

We got a mention, naturally, and hopefully someone will come in and buy everything in the shop from the specials list...My particular thanks go to the lady who provided the coffee-time cake and Florentine slice. A good Florentine slice bespeaks elegance and fine character, and if that isn't a broad hint, I don't know what is. Canadian butter tarts are also considered grounds for canonisation.

Apart from this, we got to meet Nikon again - always a pleasure - and come away with the determination to record something - anything - and get out there and experiment. Ah, Inspiration, thy name is Klau...

Modest Proposals - Foto Reports From The Guild

Greetings foto fans and welcome to a new season of Modest Proposals - your view of the photographic world through the eyes of The Guild.

First up is the news reported in the DP Review that a major Chicago newspaper has sacked its photographic staff, closed the darkroom and other processing facilities, and enrolled its reporters in a course on how to take pictures with an iPhone. This is an on-going story that will unfold with time, or as long as the newspaper can stay open. Sounds like this might be a measurable period of time...

The Guild applauds this move to downgrade the profession, and sees it as a land mark decision in the fight for poorer quality images. No longer will readers have to put up with seeing the faces and actions of newsmakers clearly and have to endure well-lit or carefully-composed shots. This sort of thing has been going on far too long - and it is time it stopped. From now on the public will be encouraged to use its imagination about news photographs - filling in the gaps between the pixels just as they please.

Note that we cannot get an official statement as to whether the displaced photographic staff will be given 457 visas and moved to Perth to replace our current lot of newspaper photographers. It might be a good idea if the relevant local people form a mob with pitchforks and torches and storm up the street. Around dusk with some side-lighting would be nice. Try 1/60 second and f:2.8. Focus on the front rank.


On to the next bulletin - the Bureau of Statistics has released the report on weddings and has highlighted the number of these ceremonies that are being done for second, third, and fourth marriages.

This has led to an enterprising studio here in Perth instituting a service for these customers in the form of a book of tear-out coupons to be issued at the first ceremony but allowing for discounts for second and subsequent ones.

Dear old Elizabeth Taylor is long gone, and she would have got a roll of tickets on a dispenser - but there will be lots of others. The studio, Radish Foto, has been so named because it repeats on most people.


For our final news we would like to offer the readers of The Stiletto the chance to go into the 2014 Photographic Competition.

As usual there will be a historic images section devoted to photographic representation of great moments of treachery in the past. This is always popular, and has become more so with the introduction of digital filters that simulate old plate and film camera work.

There will also be the usual BGA Year In Review section that awards a prize for he best photograph of a Guild-registered stab in the 2013-2014 period. These are generally more modern images.

This year we are also going to include an Apprentice Section so that Guild apprentices for the current year may also compete. Time to start snapping, kids.

Here is a picture to keep you happy in the meantime.

Still Time To Get A Seat - Click West

Normally I would not advise someone to grab their seat in public...but tomorrow night is an exception. Mind you, you'll need to start searching for it today.

The WAPF is holding their second big exhibition of competitive photographs at Carousel's La Premiere cinema tomorrow night - the 6th of June.

This is the big one for WA camera clubs, with some of the finest photos by WA members shown on one of the biggest screens you will ever see. This beats setting up a bed sheet and a Hanimex Rondette in the CWA hall by a long shot...

The WAPF has a website dedicated to this competition - just Google on over to it and look up at the top of the page. There is a section that lets you book a seat for the night. There is reserved seating, seniors seating and lots of other things. Pop over there now and grab the telephone.

Note on the site that there are a number of big photographic names here in Perth associated with this competition - not least of which is us down here at Camera Electronic. We'll be sending one of the chiefs to the pow wow and I'll be reporting on the winners - with images I hope - afterwards.

Gone Bush With Camera Electronic

Last weekend we lost the bosses. Yes, we looked behind the wardrobe and no, they weren't there. They had escaped to the bush near Dwellingup at the Nanga Bush Camp.

The Western Australian Photographic Federation held a weekend retreat/seminar/camp there on the 24th, 25th and 26th of May. We packed the 4WD full of shop goodies and Saul and Howard took a pretty good trade presentation down for the WAPF members.

These things are always a bit of a puzzle to know what exactly to send. I bet this year on rain and packed a dozen of the Op/Tec rain sleeves and three of the Promaster rain jackets in the mix. In the end, it looks as if it was fine weather. Ah, well, a lot of other things caught the eye of the attendees so all is well.

Note from the attached photos that Nathan Archer conducted a class on portraiture and Sasha the model was there to help the photographers put some of Nathan's ideas into effect. If you're going to learn something it is good to learn from experts.

The WAPF always puts on fine shows - Ric McDonald sees to that, and Perth photographers would do well to look to the WAPF site to see what is coming up in the future - I know the big exhibition at the cinema last year was a major event and I suspect they will build on that to have even a better one this year.

"I want three volunteers for a hazardous mission. You, you, and you..."

A Modest Proposal - Guard The Presidents

The recent inauguration of the American president would appear to be the subject of some little controversy - and not just whether or not the President was entitled to stand for office. You may entertain your own opinion on that one, and if you are an American citizen, attempt to express it. Good luck.

No, two questions seem to revolve about whether the singer who assaulted the national anthem and the Marine band who opposed her were using canned music and lip-synching to do it, and whether Bravo Company - the ceremonial troops who provided the USMC contingent in the march-past - were compelled to parade with M1 rifles that had been stripped of their bolts.

Leaving aside the singer, please, the Marine guard question is moot. I have seen images that seem to show just that, and I have seen websites that claim it to be a furphy. If done, it would be one branch of government controlling another ( SS vs USMC ) and either  a valid security decision or a deadly insult.
I am still trying to get further sight of footage of the troops in motion at such a resolution that I can see for myself.

The real point of this is we must consider whether or not to implement the same idea for photographic society and association meetings here in Australia. Every one of the organisations - AAPP, AIPP, WAPPY, etc. has a president, vice president, and such and at an open meeting they are sitting targets for anyone in the audience to take a pot shot. At an eastern states conference I myself squeezed off half a dozen exposures of the speaker at a high ISO and had I done so with a dodgy white balance, the consequences could have been grave...

Perhaps we should require the audience members to parade before each meeting to be frisked by the guards, then have their batteries confiscated, and upon leaving sign a statutory declaration that they do not have any live cards or produce on their persons. This, and a strict watch upon their web sites, work computers, and families should do it. With a little common sense and a docile attitude on the part of the association members, hangings should not be necessary.

If they are, at least there should be good lighting, a catalogue, and wine and cheese at the opening ceremony...

Uncle Dick

Wet Enough For You?

The small hiatus in the blogstream this last weekend was caused by the whether - whether or not I could find the dongle - and by the weather. In the first case, no, and in the second case, a great deal of yes.

Went to Busselton. Saw the Busselton Camera Club at their weekend conference. It rained. It hailed. It blew. No volcanic eruption, but that was probably because the volcano got wet. I was largely indifferent to the downpour as I was inside and the camera club members were out walking through the bush and along the seashore, but fortunately I included a product in the trade table that sold very well.

The Op/Tec Rainsleeve protectors come two to a packet and feature a clear flexible PVC bag with a drawstring at the front to snuggle up to the rim of your lens and a small hole in the back to allow the eyepiece of your DSLR to poke out. Your hand fits in the bottom of the tube to let you control the camera. The rest of you may be soaked but your camera and right hand will be dry!

There are other rain protectors on the market made by other firms but this is one of those quick-use emergency products that is a real life saver for outdoors photographers. Keep one in your camera bag to stave off disaster.

Of course none of the above applies to the lady who exhibited her photos taken at the Busselton jetty. She can get as wet as she likes and so can her camera because she has them in underwater housings...that cost as much as the camera. But her colour photographs of nudibranchs were stunning.

Joy of Flash

If you followed yesterday's blog, and have almost started the screw up your courage to try a flash picture...we have good news on two points; equipment and training.


You wanta flash? We gotta flash. We gotta the Nikon SB 910, we gottta the Canon 320EX, the 430 EX II, the 600 EX-RT, we gotta the Metz 48 and 58. Come in and getta you nice fresh flash.

And when you get your new flash unit, pick up your 10% discount coupon for the upcoming Shoot Photography Workshops course:  Small Flash Techniques. This course is being run as a one-day workshop on Sunday the 12th of August at the Shoot Photography studio here in Stirling Street.

The lecture runs from 12 to 4 so you can sleep in a little on the morning - don't sleep too late because you don't want to miss KINGSLEY KLAU as he shows you how to use your new flash...remember...to best advantage. He'll be covering:

Off-camera flash
Camera setup for off-camera control
Small flash portraiture
Shadow filling and softening
Punching up your pictures in Photoshop

Kingsley is the current president of the WAPF, a fully accredited AIPP member, and teaches for the Nikon company. They trust him not to explode the equipment. You can trust him to show you how to get the best from your flash and to use this to vastly improve your general photography*.

The course is not expensive - $ 189 - and you can book with Shoot Photography by calling them on 9228-8232 or going to their email:

enquiries@shootworks.com.au

* note astro-photographers may need a bigger flash and astral photographers may need to get out more and meet people...