In the Herald - April 22nd - Competition is Zooming into Focus

The Club's in the local paper again this week. Many thanks to all the photographers, Clive Watkins and The Irvine Herald.....(click on images below to view full screen)

I’m sure that many of you have very quickly become experts in video conferencing over the last few weeks.  With the restrictions on social interaction in place we are all having to use technology for work, play and family to keep some form of contact with each other going.  Irvine Camera Club decided to use the popular Zoom software to allow our members to continue to virtually meet each Wednesday evening.  Although we have had some teething problems, the vast majority of the group have now got the app up and running on their various devices.  It really is a very clever system.  We can not only see and speak to each other, we can also share images, discuss them and even run online polls to vote for our favourites.

With our end of season knockout postponed at the end of March when the lockdown started, we considered it the perfect candidate for our first couple of Zoom meetings.  With an entry of 57 images to look through, we thought it best to split the photos over two sessions.  The competition works by randomly presenting pairs of images on which the audience vote.  The highest scoring image goes through to the next round and the other one is knocked out.

We had a great selection of varied and interesting photographs to look through.  Nature, landscape, portraits, street and studio photography were all represented.   After a couple of rounds the favourites begin to emerge, and the voting gets closer with opinions being more clearly split.  A couple of times I needed to cast the deciding vote to separate them and break the deadlock.

Eventually we came down to the final head-to-head.  Sandra King’s street photograph “lunchtime” of workmen having a break at the top of Buchanan Street was pitted against Ian Mortimer’s colourful droplet study “Water Splash”.   The voting was close, but a decider was not needed.  Ian’s bright and dynamic splash shot received the majority of the votes.  Well done to everyone who entered images, but particularly to Ian & Sandra for making it all the way to the end with their fab photos.

Needless to say, these evenings are just about photography.  There is plenty of banter and chat between the members, just as there would be on a “normal” club night – things that we perhaps took for granted before, but have taken on more significance for many of us given the current situation.

If you would like to join us you will be warmly welcomed.  We will continue to meet online over the summer, setting challenges and sharing ideas, tips and tricks as we go.  You can find all our contact details at www.irvinecc.co.uk or on our Facebook page and members group.