The rise of smartphones with the associated improved cameras, and computer aided photography leads to many people asking “do I need a digital camera?” For the majority of people the answer is simply “no”. The smartphone is just so ubiquitous, in everyone’s pocket or handbag, ready to take an image at the click of a button. Even at weddings, social occasions, and events the smartphone is ever present clicking away, and for most people the resolution of the image is perfectly acceptable, especially for social media where these images are frequently used, and shared. However, for those of us, a somewhat diminishing breed of photographers now, a digital camera is an essential tool to capture the very best images, yes it does require learning and acquiring the skills needed to obtain the very best from the camera, but when that stunning image is captured there’s a deep satisfaction in capturing an image that is just not possible with the smartphone. Here's a selection of images that demonstrate what can be achieved with a digital camera, a ladybird on foliage, and a gannet rising out of the sea with a fish in it’s mouth. For comparison this is a photograph taken on the Embsay and Bolton Abbey heritage railway, the locomotive is pictured first with a smartphone pointing into low sun, and the flaring makes this image almost unusable, whereas this image of the locomotive taken shortly after on a digital camera is more controlled and usable. The Louth Photographic Society reopens after the summer break on Wednesday evening 11th September at 19:30, members of the Society will be giving short illustrated talks titled “What you did over the summer”. Come along and see what we do, our Society is a friendly group enjoying photography.

Good Morning All I hope you are all enjoying the summer break and having a few outings taking photographs. We have just got back from a week in Conwy, North Wales, so I have been busy with my camera at times last week. It will soon be time to return to club nights starting on the 11th September with a series of mini lectures. For newer members we are looking at 15 minute talks with projected images brought in on a memory stick on the night showing what you have done over the summer break. We have Harry, Paul Gray and Derek so far taking part, please let me know if you would like to take part. The following week we have a PDI competition (Projected Digital Images), with the categories of "Panoramic Landscapes" and "Open" and will be judged by Martin Joy of Barton. You don’t need to do stitch panoramas unless you want to of course you can just crop your images to make them panoramas, remember you can enter up to six images, three in each section but put an R after one of them in case we have too many entries and that one will be withdrawn. You can start sending your entries to Harry from now. It is also the time to start thinking about the N&EMPF exhibition, our club has been quite successful in recent years so hopefully members will get involved again, essentially you will need to send in your very best images. I have acted as our clubs N&EMPF entry secretary in the past and am happy to do it again. Regards Graham

Many of you will know that as a photographer I enjoy working with models. Working with an experienced model can produce some awe-inspiring portraiture, or fashion style images, and the reason I enjoy this genre of photography is the working interaction with the model, many times we are chatting away, discussing different poses, and ideas to create that “special” image. So, some of you may not be aware of the “cosplay” sub-genre of model photography, this is where a model dresses, and takes on the persona of a fantasy figure, a Marvel comic character, a film, or story book character. The attention to detail that some models take to create their characters is stunning, recently I worked with a model to capture an “Alice in Wonderland” scene, but with a Goth twist. The costume, makeup, and props she brought to the shoot must have taken hours to accumulate and cost a fair amount of money. So, here’s a selection of images; Bonnie Raven as Alice in Wonderland, Olga Solo at the Masquerade Ball, a warrioress shoot, and finally the vampire shoot which was a lot of fun. These types of images provide me with several options when entering club competitions, as I will usually drop one of my model images into the “Open” section, as one of my choices, along with a landscape, natural world, or a record shot. I enjoy my photography and get a lot of pleasure from taking photos. Being a member of the Louth Photographic Society has improved my photography, sharing images with other members helps me to learn new skills, and ideas. Our next meeting will be held on the 11th September, why not come along and see what we do.

Many photographers think that the only way to isolate subjects within a scene, especially in portraiture is to buy, and use a f/1.4 aperture lens, there are even f/1.2, and f/0.95 lenses available. When photographers discuss having a blurred background to images, to create subject isolation as a compositional aid, they are talking about the depth of field produced by a specific lens / camera combination. Depth of field, and therefore isolating a subject within an image is primarily obtained by the closeness to the subject, and distance from the subject to the background. The aperture setting, and also the size of the camera sensor all play a part in this. I use an app on my mobile phone called “PhotoPills”, this is a very informative, and invaluable app for photographers. The “PhotoPills” app gives information about sunrise, sunset, moonrise, and moonset times based on your location, exposure value calculator, field of view calculator. The "PhotoPills" depth of field (DoF) calculator to enables a photographer to determine the depth of field for his camera, and lens combination. Mastering aperture priority mode on your camera is a key skill to learn, often it’s a matter of choosing the correct aperture for each situation. In this photo of yours truly, taken by my young lady in a heritage railway carriage, I’ve deliberately set the aperture at f/2 on the Sigma 30mm f/1.4 lens, before handing the camera to her, and you can see with the sharp focus on my eyes, my clothes, and the backrest of the train seat are blurred, this is a deliberate portrait rather than a contextual view of me sitting in a railway carriage, for a contextual view f/5.6 could have been selected, if an f/1.4 aperture had been chosen my ears, and nose would also have started to blur. Insects, and small mammals / reptiles are notoriously difficult to select the correct aperture (sometimes termed “f stop”) for depth of field, and therefore sharpness over the whole of the creature. How many times has a judge commented on an insect photo about the wings, or tail being out focus? For this lizard photo I selected f/7.1, (more by accident than design) on a 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, the focus on the eye is perfect, the foreground, and background rocks are defocused, in this situation f/5.6 or even an f/6.3 aperture may not have given the correct sharpness on the reptile. This butterfly photo is a complete failure, a grab shot, taken at f/5.6, on the 70-300mm telephoto lens, I’ve got one wing in focus!! A choice of f/7.1 may have improved the focus across the scene. For landscape photographers, choosing the correct aperture to achieve foreground to background sharpness is important. Many landscape photographers suggest setting the aperture somewhere between f/8 to f/16 and focusing a third of the way into the scene. In this scene of the Cow and Calf rocks on Ilkley Moor, I’ve chosen f/11 and deliberately focused on the foreground rock to capture the engraved graffiti, this is a contextual scene, with the heather, and Cow and Calf rocks acceptable, rather than “tack sharp”. Remember failure in photography should assist us to learn, rather than discourage us from taking great photographs. Get out there with your camera and enjoy this wonderful hobby.

David Stokes has sent the attached vintage folder that photographs would have been enclosed in during the old days. I am sure we all remember sending films off or taking them into a shop for developing and printing, you probably don’t get the same feeling of expectation or failure with digital as we did with film especially transparencies. The advice given is perhaps out of date now but not pressing the shutter unless focus is correct is still valid today.

Recently I watched a YouTube video by Peter Coulson, asking a question about having too many lenses, in Peter’s case I would suggest a definite yes, as he had three 50mm lenses, and when he showed portraits taken by the three lenses it was difficult to discern the difference between them, in summation Peter will be selling two of his 50mm lenses. While I have a reasonable collection of lenses I only tend to head out on a shoot with two, possibly three lenses, tailored to the scenario for the shoot, as I like to travel light. For my recent Gannet Dive Experience for example I took the Fuji 16-80mm f/4 zoom, the Fuji 70-300mm zoom lens, and the two camera bodies. This photo of a Gannet emerging from the water with a freshly caught fish in its mouth was taken with the Fuji 16-80mm lens, at 35mm, f/8, 1/3200, ISO 640. On my indoor model shoots I will take the Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8 zoom, and the Sigma 30mm f/1.4 prime lens, this photo of Jayne as “English Rose” was taken with the Sigma 30mm at f/1.4, ISO 200, 1/105 with the Fuji X-T3. For outdoor model shoots, I will often use the Fuji 16-80 f/4 zoom, partnered this time with the TT Artisans 56mm f/1.8 prime lens, and usually the two camera bodies to avoid changing lenses on location. Travel photography requires a slightly different approach, usually just the one camera body, and the Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8, this one lightweight lens takes the place of three prime lenses and provides the flexibility to work in low light. Last year I took the TT Artisans 27mm pancake lens and the Fuji 18-55mm lens to Skiathos, but I hardly used the 27mm lens. This year in Menorca I had two lenses the Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8 zoom, and the Fuji 70-300mm zoom as I knew that we were staying near to a nature reserve. This tiny Holly Blue butterfly was taken with the 70-300mm lens at 300mm, ISO 400, 1/240 on the Fuji X-S20, while walking through the nature reserve. The Fuji 16-80mm f/4 lens is invaluable for landscape photography, and I often pair this lens with the Samyang AF 12mm f/2, most of last years “Churches” project was taken with the 12mm lens, as can be seen with this image of the church at Markby, taken on the Fuji X-T3, f/11, ISO 400, 1/550. The Samyang 12mm has also been used on the Mam Tor, and Whitby outings, the lens is also ideal for night photography. As I’ve been writing this blog, I’ve viewed several YouTube videos of photographers extolling the virtue of the one camera, one lens approach, usually a 50mm prime (35mm on APS-C cameras), and this is possibly the right approach for street photography, or documentary style, and I have emulated this approach in the past with the TT Artisans 27mm lens, and one camera, yes it is liberating, easy to carry, and produces a unique style to photography. Indeed when I used Olympus cameras the E-PL7 married with the Olympus 17mm f/1.8 was a pocketable travel companion which I still miss for simplicity. So, in conclusion do I have too many lenses?

Now, this isn’t one of those “click bait” articles, where one design of a camera is denounced over the other. Both DSLR, and mirrorless digital cameras are capable of taking some incredible images, and when viewed as a print any viewer would be unable to discern which camera took the photo. This article was prompted by a friend of mine seeking advice for lens choices for his Canon 700D, he brought the camera around, and he has the Tamron 18-400mm lens, and a shorter focal length zoom lens. He is finding the Tamron lens with the camera body to be quite heavy, the lens itself weighs 710g!! My friend is an amateur photographer, and only uses the camera on occasion. Now as I handled the camera, I realised how different a DSLR camera was to handle, it took me a while to find out how to select one of the nine autofocus points, and using the LCD screen to choose camera settings was totally alien to me. The optical viewfinder was fine as I could see the camera settings, metering, and the focus points. My first interchangeable lens camera was actually a DSLR, a Nikon EM, purchased in 1980, I was used to the manual focusing via the prism, and I took some wonderful photos with the camera. When digital compact cameras became available I bought an Olympus C2 to replace the Nikon. I bought my first mirrorless interchangeable lens camera in 2010, an Olympus E-PL1, and I didn’t have a clue how to use it properly, and mainly used the camera as a “point and shoot”. Over the years I have progressed through Sony, back to Olympus, and finally Fuji, all mirrorless cameras. The electronic viewfinder (EVF), “live” LCD back screen, lightweight crop sensor bodies and lenses, with usually simple controls are all plus factors. Conversely poor autofocus, and poor battery life were characteristics of early mirrorless cameras, but with many mainstream camera manufacturers such as Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Fuji all producing mirrorless interchangeable lens cameras, these early traits have disappeared. My newest Fuji has a battery life of around 800 shots, improved autofocus with eye / face detection, bird, mammal, and aeroplane modes providing confidence in obtaining quality images. If you currently own, and use a DSLR don’t rush out and purchase a mirrorless camera until your present camera is unusable, or outdated, instead concentrate on your photography technique, and use quality lenses suitable for your needs. I showed my friend how to use aperture settings to isolate / include components within a scene, and how to select (when I found out!!) the autofocus points. I also advised him to purchase a Canon 24mm EF-S f/2.8 lens for his camera, it’s an absolute bargain at £160 new, and the reviews are very complimentary. A small pancake lens such as this will make the camera lighter, and make you want to go out more with the camera.

Good Morning All I took the photograph of the Comma butterfly last week on our outing to the Kirkby Gravel Pits. To give you more information which might or might not help you, I took it on my Nikon D7500 APS-C sensor camera with a 105mm lens attached, this gives a focal length of about 157mm equivalent on a full sensor sensor camera, I manually set the ISO to 640 as it was a bright day and I wanted a decent F stop which I set manually at F8 to give a bit more depth of field and a shutter speed of 1/640 which the camera set, I also set my camera to slightly underexpose to try and stop any burn out. The next trick was to slowly creep up on the Comma as you still need to be as close as you can to the subject to make it a good size in the image without too much cropping. I am sure you have all seen the results from the third round of the LPA battles at Barton, if you haven’t Louth came first with 173 points which I am reliably informed that puts us 5th and into this years final, which I hope a lot of our members will attend, news of the date etc. to follow. A big thank you to Dave Turner for organising our prints and attending all of our rounds with the prints. Well that’s it for summer, enjoy the break and get out and about taking photographs ready for when we restart in September. I won’t be doing a newsletter during the break unless there is anything to report but please feel free to send blogs to Derek for the website if you have attended something interesting or if you just want to demonstrate a particular technique. There are things to be getting on with during the break, don’t forget to keep doing the yearly project, numbers, there are also competitions to take for, Panoramic Landscapes (PDI), local competition, photos taken on your mobile or compact camera (PDI) and a print competition, Monochrome, all these competitions have an open competition as well. The first night back we will hold a series of mini lectures by members, 15 minutes to show us what you have done over summer, you may want to take part in that one as well. Regards Graham

The 3rd round of the LPA Print Battles was held at Barton last night, this contest between Louth, Barton, and Lincoln. Martyn Wrigg introduced John Whaler as the judge for the evening, referring to his character as “erudite”, which turned out to be very prophetic. John was excellent as a judge, not only judging the prints on technical merit, but also quality of composition, storytelling, and that indefinable sense of a “great” image, all genres appeared to be judged without any partiality. Three members from Louth attended the Battles, and tension mounted as more Louth prints were added to the “hold back” pile. After an excellent buffet supplied by Barton Camera Club, John proceeded to award points for the “hold backs”, with many of our prints being awarded the highest score of 20 points, some of which are depicted here. When the scores were added up Louth was placed 1st, with Barton, and Lincoln trailing behind with equal points, thus it was an excellent night for Louth. The full results for the competition are being tabulated by Dave Turner and will be circulated later today. A big thank you to Barton for hosting, and provision of a superb buffet. Thank you also to John Whaler for his excellent critique, and impartiality in judging.