Monthly Photo Themes for 2012

Monthly Photo Themes for 2012

Photography is an art form reflecting your creative interpretation of a selected subject. Reproductions of paintings, other's artwork or photographs and mere record photos (snapshots!) of monuments, sculptures, and buildings are discouraged for presentation at the Gainesville Photography Club. Keep them for your personal files and show us your very best.

General Guidelines:

• Photographs of People, Places and Nature must depict subjects with good fidelity to reality.
• Post-camera changes may subtly enhance a photograph optimizing fidelity but not add to it.
• Cropping, removal of minor unwanted elements, removal of color cast, highlight and contrast control and subtle use of digital effects (like sharpening, gradients, contrast masks, black & white filtering, etc.) are acceptable enhancements.

Theme Descriptions:

Theme assignments are designed to move you out of your comfort zone to try something new.  Most themes are selected to be relatively easy.  A few are more challenging and may require special equipment or computer software. Professional photographers face challenges almost daily so it is not unreasonable for advanced amateurs to be challenged only once a month. Ideally, members should bring contest quality theme photos to club meetings, but quality is less important than demonstrating you have made the effort to take on the challenge of the monthly themes.

The following themes carry forward year-to-year:

Contemporary: These photographs might be called abstract art. They represent a deliberate alteration of reality; it does not mean subjects of our era. They may be achieved using one or more camera attachments such as special filters, fisheye lenses, creative use of flash or zoom lenses, black light, distorted reflections, and long exposures. They are often derived from original images using one or more processes such as bas relief, posterization, solarization, or other forms of darkroom or digital manipulation. Some original photographs such as abstracts, infrared, and multiple-exposures (not panoramas) may also qualify. Almost anything qualifies if it artistically distorts reality but is not an error in technique.

End-of-Year Slideshow: Select your best pictures of 2012 or create a theme-based slideshow. If necessary, add others to your year's best photos. Include music background in your slideshow, music and narration, or just narration. You need not buy special software. Windows has Movie Maker 2 built in or download a free copy of Microsoft's Photo Story 3. Photo Story is easier to use but Movie Maker has 2 audio tracks and flexible timeline. Please respect others by limiting your slideshow to about 6 minutes or less. If you include music in your show, plan on 6 seconds per photo or no more than 60 photos. If you include narration in your show, plan on 12 seconds per photo or no more than 30 photos. Then, we can finish all slideshows in about a 90 minute time frame.

Nature: A depiction drawn from any branch of natural history, these photographs should tell a nature story. As such, this theme includes landscapes, plants, and animals. Photographs should depict subjects with high fidelity to reality and near to total absence of human influence (including fences, power lines, roads, signs, footprints, trash, etc.). However, it is acceptable to "house clean" the subject area. While animal portraits can be very interesting, the best animal pictures show typical behaviors and interactions. The best plant photos result from using equipment creatively and are often taken from unexpected viewpoints. Lighting is most important to capturing the colors and textures of outstanding landscapes. Garden or zoo photographs are acceptable if the plants or animals would normally be found in the wild. Images of cultivated plants, domestic animals, still life, or stuffed or mounted specimens are inappropriate. NOTE: Because photographers take so many Nature pictures, we will offer this theme twice a year.

People: Photographs that do more than simply record what a person looks like. They should reveal what is special about a person, or perhaps provide clues to what they are feeling. They should convey information about their character or the essence of their personality. They could be anything from intimate facial close-ups to full length images of from one to several people interacting. Environmental portraits are made in or near the subject's neighborhood -- their home, workplace, on the street, or where they play. Placing relevant objects from the environment in the composition relates information about the subject to the viewer. The photographer may be inconspicuous when taking these pictures to avoid outside influence. Whether formal or informal, the best People photographs tell a story and have an emotional impact on the viewer – no snapshots of old Aunt Myrtle sitting by the pool please. This definition applies equally to children and adults.

Places: The best photographs of places strongly convey the character of a place; its particular location and culture giving the viewer a sense of place. This is not simply a matter of including some recognizable feature. The photographer should be aware of experiencing unusual lighting, and unfamiliar sights, smells and sounds. Photographs should try to capture this heightened awareness. Be receptive to the mood of a place and your own feelings about it. Look for a telling image or an evocative effect of light that expresses how you feel.

2012 Themes that will not carry forward

 Cityscapes -- Experience Our City:  Usually when seeking out photo opportunities, we visit picturesque places outside the city; rarely attempting to capture images of Gainesville’s urban environment.

Cityscapes are just landscapes taken in an urban setting, therefore, the rules of landscape photography apply.  Images may range from depicting the more seemly industrial or blighted parts of town, to showing off Gainesville’s proudest development.  For dramatic impact, it has recently become popular to shoot cityscapes using HDR (high dynamic range) photography techniques, and of course, the more gritty aspects of the urban environment are well suited for a black and white interpretation.

Capturing cityscapes involves working on composition, light, point of view, perspective, etc.  Don’t just get to a spot and press the shutter from the position you happen to be in.  Work on finding an interesting point of view that will make the viewer more interested in the urban scene you are depicting.  Don’t limit yourself to shooting at eye level; make the extra effort and find that angle nobody thought of before. Your reward will be an image which will provide a fresh view of a well known scene.    

Flowers: Gainesville offers boundless opportunities throughout the year for photographing flowers.  Roadsides in spring and summer, Kanapaha Gardens, and, perhaps, your own backyard will provide opportunities for shooting flowers.  You may also consider purchasing some colorful flowers at a florist to shoot in your indoor studio.

Although not absolutely necessary, tripods, macro lenses or extension tubes placed behind telephoto lens are often employed in making good flower images. 

*Note: Something different for this theme is that all monthly pictures must be of flowers.                                                            

Improvised Indoor Studio for “Still Life” Photography:  At January’s meeting, club member Don Bassett will conduct a demonstration on setting up a simple photo studio in your home for taking “still life” pictures.  It only seems fitting, therefore, that applying what you have learned from Don’s presentation should be one of our themes for this year.

Set up a simple studio in your home and experiment with taking flattering and interesting images flowers, still life subjects, or any other subjects that come to mind.   

Water’s Edge:  Water’s Edge was such a popular theme in 2011 that we will revisit it this year. Water’s edge, where land meets water, is pretty wide open as to where you can go to take interesting images.  Take pictures at the beach, or by a lake, river, stream, pond or water fall.  People and man made objects, such as boats, docks, marinas, mills, barns, houses bridges and dams should not be ignored as they often provide interesting subjects related to their location at the water’s edge.

Complimentary Colors:  Complementary colors are opposite each other on the color wheel.  For example, red purple is the compliment of yellow green, and orange red is the compliment of blue green.  Complimentary colors compliment and intensify each other; their juxtaposition is a sure recipe for photographic impact.  According to color theory, complimentary colors harmonize most completely when the area they occupy are in an image is inversely proportional to their relative brightness.

Here is an example of a complimentary color photograph. The two dominant colors of this photograph are orange and blue and are located opposite of each other on the color wheel. When complimentary colors are used together like this in a photograph they create contrast to produce a dramatic image as each color makes the other color appear more active.

Local Setting:  An area of local photographic interest – yet to be determined -- will be the subject for this theme.  Last year we visited Dudley State Historic Park.  This year it could any other of a number of interesting places near Gainesville.  Go to the selected location on your own and as many times as you wish to achieve images you will share with the club.   A club photo shoot at the selected location also will be conducted during the year in advance the theme date.

Photo Submission Guidelines:

Please help us by emailing your photos no later than the Friday before the meeting; it will save precious time at meetings. Photos should be emailed to: Gainesvillephotoclub@gmail.com.  You can showcase up to 8 photos a meeting (3 assigned for the theme, 3 general photos, and 2 Monochrome). Please note that if you send less than 3 assigned theme photos, please do not make up the difference by sending 4 general photos. The objective is for you to submit images in all three categories. However, general photos and monochrome photos may also cover the monthly assigned theme.

Before submitting the photos, please perform the following:

1. Downsize the images - downsize your photos to medium quality JPG's, 1024 pixels X 768 pixels at 72 ppi, (Native resolution of our projector and your projected images will fill the screen. At this dimension, your image files will be quite small and all 8 photos probably will not exceed 1.5 MB.)

2. Rename your files using the following format: TypeCount-Name-MM-YYYY
where:

Type will be A for Assigned Theme, G for General picture, and M for Monochrome photo.

Count will the the number of the photo. This will be used to set-up the order of display.

Name will be your last name

MM is the month in two-digit form

YYYY is the year

For example, if a person named Olivier were to show 5 photos, 3 theme, 1 general, and 1 monochrome, the file names would be:

A1-Olivier-122008, A2-Olivier-122008, A3-Olivier-122008, G1-Olivier-122008, M1-Olivier-122008

3. Archive the images - Zip all of the images into a single file for email attachment.

4. Subject line for the Email - Pease enter "(Your Name) Photos for (Month)" in the email subject line.

5. Email your photos to Gainesvillephotoclub@gmail.com

HAPPY SHOOTING!