Minutes for May Photoclub meeting

[anna mccolm]

Pierre broke through the chatty rabble and started the meeting.

He welcomed two new Club members - Richard Dick (who was at the meeting) and Caleb Huntington (who has something ready for the Electric Vehicle show already). He also welcomed Ann, a visitor.

Anna McColm has taken on the position of Secretary and Gwen, Margaret Benmore and Colleen Barnes have all offered to take the minutes if Anna is away so the position is well covered.

Jana gave the Club an update on the Eclectic Vision Show. She had flyers available for posting or handing out to people.

Places that already have posters  -  The Information Centre, Country Grocer, Fernwood Café, Remax, Penny's, Fulford, The Wine Cellar and Colton's store in Gasoline Alley.

People offered to cover Barbs, TJ Beans, the store at Vesuvius, the bulletin board by Glads and the one in the Senior Centre. Pierre mentioned that vendors at the Saturday Market are often willing to host a pile of small flyers on their table during the event - Sat. May 19th and 26th.

Jana confirmed that drop off times at the Gallery are Tuesday 15th  10 - 12

                                                                       and Wednesday 16th 3 - 5

Thursday will be devoted to hanging the show with Razali presiding and Judy and Maggie helping. No further help is needed as too many cooks etc.....

Jana is willing to pick up photos if someone is unable to get them to Gallery 8. She has a keen driver in one of her sons who is practising for his driving test.

Bios can be dropped off at the same time as the photo drop off.

Pierre and Margaret are swapping sitting times and Jana will post the final sitting schedule on our website.

A copy of the registration details was passed around for people to check for errors in spelling or prices etc. Wendy can now start printing out labels for the show.

Harbour House had promised the Club some money for the winner of the 'People's Choice Award' but now it's under new management. Fortunately the new owners honoured the promise and donated $50 as prize money, presumably in the form of a gift certificate.

Jana has a ballot box ready and there will be paper available for people to mark their choices.

Fifi (in charge of food at the show's Opening Night) has help for set up but asked for help with clean up. Bernadette volunteered. She also needs tablecloths. Jana, Judy and Elizabeth Dow are donating tables and Anna will help deliver Elizabeth's table to the Gallery. If you are bringing food (and please do bring food!) remember that there's no kitchen at Gallery 8, "not even a spoon", so please provide any dishes, bowls, utensils etc. necessary for food presentation and remember to take them away with you when you leave. If you want to leave early bring something particularly yummy so your dish will be emptied quickly!

Country Grocer, who have always been keen supporters of our show, have donated a $400 gift certificate to purchase what we need.

Jean Panapinto showed us the book that Costco printed of this year's photos in the show. It looked good. Five participants missed the boat and Jean is asking them to send their images to her ASAP if they would like to be included in the next printing. If those extra photos are included the price for further printing will then be $40. One copy, marked 'Club Copy', will be available at the show for people to look at.

If any Club members would like to order a copy the price at the moment is $34 and please get in touch with Jean at - [e-mail]

The books take 5 - 8 days to print and she would like to have some on hand for the Show Opening. If people commit to buying one she can order that amount and then those copies could be sold to any interested public (at a cost of $50) and Jean would re-order that amount for the Club members. You just have to wait a little longer to get your copy.

Rizali kindly offered to have the books at his Gallery after the Show as postage costs are quite high; $20 to the States and around $10 for local mailing.

The book of the Victoria Photography Club's best images now belongs to the Club and is available to any member.

Anna spoke briefly about the Electric Vehicle Show at the Farmer's Institute in June called REVolution SS. She reminded everyone that there is a photo-shoot  opportunity at Maggie's house on Sunday May 20th from 10.30 - noon. Maggie and her husband have 3 Electric Vehicles and she lives at 222 Wright Road near the top of Cranberry. Wendy will help to design a sign to use on site to alert people that there are photographs to be seen and admired and we can use one of our sandwich boards. There will be heritage posters on tables underneath our photos so that section of the barn will be a visual feast.

Pierre alerted us to World Ocean Day on Friday June 8th. There will be a slide show presentation of a coral reef by 4 divers at the library from 7 -9pm. The diving photographers are; Ann Donahue, Ken Sutherland, Catherine Griffiths and our very own Pierre.

Colton is showing some of his work at Country Grocer for the month of May.

Photosynthesis and the Photography Club have jointly applied to the Salt Spring Arts Council for a grant to help with advertising etc. for 2019's big Photo Festival.

Kahsia ,who has taken on organising a monthly Photo walk, gave us the next time and destination. It's to be at Bruce McPhee's place (Thank you Bruce) at 1635 North End Road, just before Fernwood Road (if you're heading North). He promises lambs and baby goats. It's set for next Tuesday, May 15th, at noon.

The website renovation is still a work in progress. It was decided at Pennys that a committee was needed to establish some ground rules. In the meantime people are asked to reduce the number of photos on their pages (25 is optimal. 50 would be OK) and also to reduce the size of the photos posted. ie. reduce the number of pixels. Most photo programs have a re-sizing option. This is all necessary because we are using way more space than the legal amount we are allowed.

Jean volunteered to be on the committee and so did Pat and so did Wendy, our Webmaster. They will discuss how we wish to present ourselves on our website.

Wendy mentioned that since February 2016 she has archived all the photos on the website. So if you've lost one you know who to contact.

The Education part of the meeting was devoted to the participants of this year's EV show showing their images to the group and talking a bit about them. We all now are much more connected to those images and will have something to draw on if a member of the public is showing interest in a photo whilst we are sitting the show. I was personally blown away with the quality and diversity of this year's show.

The second part of the meeting was a slide show of people's street photography shots, inspired by Bob Fenske's talk last month. I noticed that not one person actually did the 'homework' assigned to us which was to approach the person you took the photo of, engage with them and then report back. Many people used photographs they had taken in the past so that was obviously impossible. However, I think the fact that that part of the challenge was ignored compounds Bob's observations that it is somehow awkward and uncomfortable to get close and personal when cameras are involved. I personally take my street photography from across the road and rely on my zoom lens. A very different thing and something that does not demand courage! No offense anyone. Lovely photos. And maybe some of you did approach your subject but didn't mention it.

[Avril Kirby]

Well done, Anna!

[Curt Firestone]

Bravo

[Patricia Page]

Anna, Caleb is entering a photo in Eclectic Visions, not the Electric Vehicles (an easy confusion right now).   Otherwise, thank you for doing an excellent job.