Granby Camera Club Is Picture Perfect

Rob Fisher, President of Granby Camera Club, opened up Monday night’s meeting with a quick introduction of members from around the room and a question.

Fisher asked the group “Which Super Bowl commercial was your favorite or tell us about how much you loathe the snow.”

The room burst into laughter as Nancy Canfield, Vice President, said she actually loved the snow.  Members joked that they would be waiting for her outside for a snowball fight.

Contests, forums, field trips and workshops were discussed among the group. The forum is a way to create dialogue among the members online.   They offer each other advice, suggest field trips and display their latest photographs. 

After a long list of photo contests and field trips were presented by Gene Suponski, a member of the club. The room was abuzz with excitement.  Some of the field trips involved photographing a ski jump competition or an exotic flower show.

Everyone then gathered around a table in the front of the room where Fisher conducted the club’s monthly photo Scavenger Hunt.  For the contest, members must take pictures that relate to inspirational words picked by the group the month before. 

This time the words were, texture, change and favorite.  As the members circled  the table, they placed pennies under their favorite photo.  After 3 rounds, Canfield and Paula Johnson were declared the winners.

The winners are recorded and at the end of the year, the member with the most points receives free membership to the club for the next year.  Last year’s winner was Suponski.

At this meeting there was a guest speaker, Wendy Van Welie from  Indigo Images.  She started out by having us sit in a circle, so we could all see each other.  It was a fitting arrangement because the topic of discussion was how to take a good portrait.

“What I’m going to discuss tonight with you is how I do my photography. You may go home and say that’s not how you should do it, but it’s how I do it and it works for me,” Van Welie explained.

Van Welie shared her philosophy on how the eyes reveal the subject and the images you capture should be real.  You should also evoke from viewers some sort of emotion from your portrait.  She said that portraits are the best way to capture people’s personalities.

“When you capture the essence of a person, it’s just magic,” she said.

After giving the members tips on how to play with shadow and light on their subjects and relax them as well, Van Welie showed the group her latest lenses that she favored. 

Van Welie closed the meeting with an invitation to the members to come to her studio later in the month as a workshop.  They will use each other as subjects, and hone their skills on capturing personalities in portraits. 

The Granby Camera Club meets twice a month , the first Monday of the month at 7:00 p.m. at the Granby Senior Center for their formal meetings and then usually later in the month for a workshop on site.  Anybody interested in joining can attend one meeting to see if it’s for them and then if it is, they can join the group after paying a yearly due, Dues are $15.00 for residents and $20.00 for non-residents for the year.