Good morning, All Last week we held our spring committee meeting, we discussed many topics including the new program which will be available to you all soon and did some preparation for the AGM. This week, Wednesday 2nd April, Brian McCarthy FRPS will be coming along to show us some more of his work. Brian is an ex-member of our club but has more recently been a member of Grimsby Photographic Society. You can also now start sending your print titles for the Curves and Open competition to Dave Turner. Regards Graham

This year’s project is “Prime Time”, simply one photo taken each month with the same prime lens. The resulting 12 images will be shown to members on our “Project Night” next January. Why a prime lens? Well, a lens with a single focal length, a prime lens, provides a photographer with creative options. Composition of the image when using a lens such as this is essential, a photographer must choose a subject and move around that subject to obtain the photo. Every photographer should have a prime lens in their bag, and it doesn't need to be expensive. I recently switched from Fuji cameras to the Olympus / OM Systems camera ecosystem. Now, I use the OM Systems OM-1 camera with two zoom lenses and three f/1.8 prime lenses. For the “Prime Time” project, I'll creatively use the Olympus 45mm (90mm full-frame equivalent) f/1.8 lens, this lens is typically employed for portraits. This tiny, sharp lens, which captures beautiful portraits, was bought used for £149 from a reputable dealer.

Good Morning All Last week at the club we held our PDI competition for March, with the categories of "Including the Moon" and "Open" judged by Mike Bennett. It was a very good night with some excellent photographs entered in the competitions, especially the Open. There were three twenty points awarded out of twenty photographs in each subject, Tony Gaskins had a very good night winning both the subject and the Open. All the results are on our website under competitions. The NEMPF PDI Inter - club competition went ahead recently, not so many clubs entered this year, I think there were only three LPA clubs who had entered, Louth came 11th, I'll leave it there. Thank you to Harry for organising our entry. This week, Wednesday 26th March it is a committee meeting for committee members only to attend. To keep you busy though you could prepare your prints for the next print competition, with the categories of "Curves" and "Open". Regards Graham

At our meeting last night we held our Projected Digital Image (PDI) competition with the categories of "Including the Moon", and "Open". The judge for the evening was Mike Bennett. Mike skillfully judged the 33 submitted entries in the "Open" category, providing excellent feedback on the various images. After the break Mike appraised the 18 images in the "Including the Moon" category, this had been a difficult subject for members to photograph, and was also challenging for the judge. Congratulations to Tony Gaskins for his first placements with "Moonbell, Mablethorpe" in the "Including the Moon" category, and "Dawn, Whitby" in the "Open" category. As is usual, the Competition page of the website has been updated with the top three placements in each category, and full results. Many thanks to Mike Bennett for judging the competition, and Dave Mann for providing the refreshments.

This morning I took my used OM Systems OM-1 camera, and the used Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 75-300mm, f/4.8 -f/6.7 lens, recently purchased for £249, with me for a photographic walk around the nature reserve at Gibraltar Point. The weather was excellent, and I'm pleased with the resulting images of the various birds to be seen. I believe the bird reflected drinking from the pool is a Common Chaffinch, and the other bird perched on a log appears to be a Dunnock.

One of our members, Richard Hildred is holding an Exhibition, and workshops in Fydell House, Boston, Lincolnshire. See attached posters for further details.

Good Morning All Last week at the club Dave Mann showed us what he had been photographing lately, Dave had been visiting Chesterfield, Devizes, Bath and Boston. Dave showed us photographs he had taken on his phone as well as his camera. There is a full report on our website. Thanks to Dave, and also to Derek for doing the door and Harvey for setting up for the break. This week, Wednesday 19th March, we are holding the monthly PDI competition, with the categories of "Including the Moon" and "Open". I found Including the moon quite a difficult subject so it will be interesting to see how other members tackled the subject. The judge for the evening is Mike Bennett. I mentioned the first two subjects for the new program and just to remind you here they are again, May, PDI competition, Seasons and Open and June , print competition, Britain's coastline and Open. Regards Graham

Dave Mann gave an excellent presentation of last years outings to Devizes, and Bath. Dave showed many photos around the town of Devizes, and the incredible engineering construction feat of 16 locks that form the steepest part of the Devizes flight at Caen Hill which is a scheduled ancient monument, Caen Hill (pronounced ‘cane'), is one of the longest continuous flight of locks in the country. With a total of 29 locks with a rise of 237 feet over two miles with a 1-in-44 gradient. In Bath, Dave showed many photos from around the city, and the stunning Pulteney Weir, featured in the released film of Les Misérables. Part of the scene where Inspector Javert commits suicide by jumping into the River Seine was filmed there in October 2012. Everyone knows of the famous Roman Baths in Bath, however Dave showed us photos of the less well known Cross Bath, all the thermal spa baths in Bath are fed by hot springs in Bath, from which the City derives its name. The springs are a wonderful, natural resource which deliver over one million litres of mineral-rich water every day, and uniquely in the UK, the mineral water is hot. Dave completed the evening with some more local photographs from Boston, Lincolnshire. Thank you Dave for a fascinating evening.

Many photographic commentators believed that the Micro Four Thirds small sensor digital camera format was dead and buried, especially after the Olympus brand was hived off to OM Systems, and Panasonic began producing full frame cameras. Lately though, the Micro Four Thirds system has had something of a renaissance, with Panasonic introducing the G9 mark ii, and OM Systems producing a new camera model the OM-3, together with some new lenses. OM Systems are continuing to develop, and innovate, contrary to industry speculation. My reasons for selling my Fuji X-T3, and buying back into the Micro Four Thirds system, with an OM System OM-1, are threefold; I want to create more landscape photos, macro photos, and some bird photography (not to Harry Kerman’s level but just some passable images). For bird photography I needed a lens with a longer focal length, and for a camera with an APS-C, or full frame sensor, the lenses get heavier, and more expensive. With the Micro Four Thirds OM-1, I have bought a 75-300mm Olympus lens which equates to 150-600mm on a full frame camera, giving the reach that I needed. For landscape photography the OM-1 has in-camera ND filters, and for macro photography the camera has in-camera focus stacking which should come in useful. The advantages of a Micro Four Thirds system are well documented, lighter compact lenses, with greater depth of field for macro, and wildlife photography. The professional Olympus / OM System cameras are rated IP53 weatherproofed, as are all the “Pro” range of lenses. There are also a dizzying range of lenses from Olympus / OM Systems, and Panasonic. Choosing my prime lenses for the camera has been relatively straightforward, the Olympus 17mm f/1.8 (34mm full frame equivalent) was a must have, having previously owned this lens, and taken some amazing images with it. The Olympus 45mm f/1.8 was another simple choice for portraiture. However, the Olympus 25mm f/1.8 (50mm full frame equivalent) lens has been a strange choice for me, as I usually prefer a wider focal length of around 40mm full frame, but the detail rendering, and micro contrast of this lens has really surprised me. Choosing a standard focal length “Pro” lens has been much more difficult, I’ve agonised over the Olympus 12-40mm f/2.8 “Pro” constant aperture lens, or the Olympus 12-45mm f/4 “Pro” constant aperture lens, finally deciding on the Olympus 12-45mm f/4 as it is smaller, and lighter, and the brighter apertures are provided by the prime lenses. Owning the camera has been a steep learning curve, there is much to learn, and many buttons, and controls to configure. My post processing workflow has completely changed, the Olympus RAW files contain the Adobe DNG / DCP information, which was not available with Fuji RAW, so I always shot with JPEG on Fuji. Now, I always shoot RAW with the OM-1, the .ORF RAW images download to my laptop at around 20 megapixel, and the files are readily, and quickly processed in Luminar Neo by choosing from the DCP camera profile list. The resulting post processed images look very natural, and organic.