Weathered Competition Photographs

To introduce the evening’s meeting, Mags Fewkes kindly shared her wide knowledge and experience of entering national and international photographic competitions. Not only did the talk remind us of Mag’s much deserved success, it also illustrated the high level of organisation and planning required when entering these competitions.
This week the large print section was won by Pete Brehaut with “Any Old Iron”. One of several pictures depicting rusty metal, Pete’s image was a popular winner and was truly on subject .Despite the precariously wornout look of the subject, the image was strong both in the richness of colour and the “in your face” view point. Having secured wins in the enprint section this was Pete’s first A4 winner. Annie Woodington came second with “Rusty Lock”, a dilapidated padlocked door with the inevitable peeling blue paint. The colour range, exposure and composition were spot on and the image endorsed Annie’s skill of seeing detail in the big picture. Rachel Lee’s winning form continued with her third placed “French House”. This image captured the essence of all those wonderful dilapidated French buildings that no doubt one day will become holiday homes to the Brits. The limited tones were perfect and the darkened windows and doorways added an air of mystery making this a high quality image.
In the enprint section Maurice Brehaut continued the Brehaut winning streak by gaining a first place with “Old Shed”. This shot certainly showed the effects of the weather with missing tiles and paintless timbers. The rather sombre tones added to the rather neglected feel of this subject which Maurice captured so well. It was good to see Ian Corbin back on the winning sheet with a cleverly seen half sunken anchorage. This was a very pleasing shot with excellent use of colour and composition and printed with Ian’s usual attention to detail. Rachel Lee gained third with “Esso” again, taken in France, a rather worn out sign on a shed, made into a great shot with interesting foreground. The cleverness of this image lies in the composition; Rachel has sought out an interesting angle rather than taking the obvious end on shot.