We have now been doing our online Zoom meetings for the last two months and have had members who live as far away as Nelson joining in meetings. While it has been a successful medium for many, I do acknowledge that Zoom has not worked for all members, so I hope this update newsletter helps fill the gap in some way.

At this stage, we do not have a date when we see our meetings at the church hall or practical sessions starting again, so Zoom meetings will continue for the next while. 

Images from the Bubble

Each week members have had the opportunity to share up to 4 images taken during the week. Some weeks we have had close to 80 images with a wide range of subjects. Here is a selection of images from the 36 members who participated.

PSNZ Sony National Exhibition 2020

Congratulations to the following members who were successful in the PSNZ Sony National Exhibition 2020.

Open Prints

• Kate Burton: 4 acceptances
• Ita Daniels: 2 acceptances
• David Steer: 2 acceptances
• Gordon Speed: 1 acceptance

Open Projected Image

• Glenda Rees 1 acceptance

Nature Prints

• Gary McClintock: Gold Medal and 1 acceptance
• Glenda Rees: 2 acceptances

Nature Projected Image

• Glenda Rees: Gold Medal and 2 acceptances
• Noelle Bennett: Silver Medal

Unfortunately due to COVID 19, there was no exhibition of the images but you can view the online catalogue here.

Speakers

Nicola Wilhelmsen

Nicola has shared her knowledge with the society a number of times now. She is a professional photographer based in Dunedin. Nicola shared the development of two images that she has submitted for a fun lockdown challenge hosted by NZIPP. It was helpful seeing how she refined her concept and images, as well as seeing some of the technical issues around lighting. Nicola posts on Instagram as nicolafromthehelm

Sam Purdie

Ross met Sam one night while out photographing insects at Woodhaugh Gardens, when he stopped and offered to show Ross where he could find stick insects. They swapped details and the result of that encounter was an interesting talk by Sam where he presented a recipe for finding insects and then some tips on photographing. Sam posts on Instagram as samanimalman

Nick Beadle

Nick runs a window cleaning business in Dunedin, See Through Windows Ltd. He shared his journey from watching one of his employees taking pictures on his phone through to now dividing his time between window cleaning and a growing photography career. Nick posts on Instagram so just search for seethroughwindowsltd

Future Plans

We will look to resume face to face meetings as soon as this is possible. However, we are aware that there may be some members who will continue to manage their health risk by not attending physical meetings. We have also seen that Zoom has enabled some of our more distant members to be involved.  Between now and the end of the year, Council has decided to continue with one regular Zoom meeting per month. This meeting will involve presentations by overseas speakers.

As a taster, our first overseas speaker will be this week, Monday 25 May 7.30pm – Zoom Room, Julian Elliott. He will present a talk Mongolia – From the landscape to eagle hunters: take a journey across Mongolia from the famous Steppe landscape to the eagle hunters of the Altai region in western Mongolia.

Look forward to seeing you all in the Zoom Room on Monday.
Gary McClintock
President, DPS