Ashford Photographic Society News

The first of our portrait and flash workshops was held on Saturday 23rd June. In previous years we have run separate (indoor) portrait and flash sessions, but this year we decided to combine the two together. Philip helped members on working with the models and Anthony and Martin provided guidance on lighting.

Our two models were Karen and Scott, pictured below with the rest of the group.


On a hot and sunny day, the rural setting offered us the choice of shooting in full sunlight or in the cool shade of the trees. The latter was welcomed by both models and photographers alike.

We ran the session split into Canon and Nikon groups. Not because we are partisan but for the simple fact being that we could harness the power and felxibility of miltiple off-camera flash setups from compatible speedlites.



During the workshop we explored different techniques:

'hard' lighting, using direct output from the flash guns'soft' lighting, using diffusers, softboxes and umbrellas to give …

Report courtesy of Marjorie Burge.

While the club has its summer break, we still keep up with our photography by meeting for outings, and on Saturday 16th June a group of APS members met at Wingham Wildlife Park, making the most of the fine weather and looking for photo opportunities.

There was plenty to choose from at Wingham, with the ever-popular meerkats, as well as monkeys, penguins, reptiles, lions, tigers and many more. With caged animals it is always a challenge to get good shots through the fencing but at Wingham there are several enclosures where you can walk through and take photographs without the barriers.







The Flamingo section was popular with the group, and the tropical butterfly house, although a little on the warm side, presented lots of chances for close up shots. But by far the most fun for all of us was the ring-tailed lemur enclosure, where the animals really did interact with the photographers, climbing all over us, the inquisitive babies’ playful behaviour maki…

A team of Givaudan employees set themselves a challenge of cycling the 900 miles between their San Celoni site in Barcelona back to Ashford, arriving on the 5th June. Each of the ten cyclists had pledges to raise £500 each towards the company's chosen charities: Kent Association for the Blind and Pilgrims Hospices.

As part of Ashford Photographic Society's partnership with Givaudan, we were asked if we could photograph the homecoming. Adrian Aslett and Martin Till responded to the request and attended on the day to capture the event.

The cycling team being: Mike Cullen, Gary Nicholson, Tracey Dray, Simon Jones, Martin Blades, Andre Stiffell, Kevin Beardwell, Tony Britton and newbies Martin Murphy and Damir Hess, ably supported by Simon Clifton and Roy Fulcher as the Support Crew.

The team started training early in the year but can anything really prepare you for 900 miles in 9 days – 2 days cycling over the Pyrennes - then the full  length of France, back via the tunnel to co…

Ashford Photographic Society

On Friday 25th May, APS members, friends and family celebrated a wonderful year of photography, lectures, outings and competitions by gathering together at Givaudan to wine and dine together. Our special guests for the evening were Annie and Clive Tanner FRPS MPAGB APAGB. Clive, who has a passion for church interiors, had brought along some of his outdoor panels, and talked of the pleasure he found in putting them together, reminding us that pleasing ourselves was occasionally more important than pleasing the judges. Awards for those achieving top places in our League and Trophy competitions were handed out at the end of the evening by Clive and Chris Shore, our Competition Secretary, and will be on our website soon.







It was a lovely evening of celebration and friendship, bringing our season to an end. A sigh of relief that the pressure is off for a while, but APS members will be out with their cameras during the summer break trying to find that special im…

Report courtesy of Marjorie Burge.

On Friday 18th May, Tom Way, European Wildlife Photographer 2016, explained his approach to wildlife photography. Tom favours a fine art approach to photography, has exhibited world wide, and shares his knowledge by giving lectures, talks and workshops. Having discovered the beauty of wildlife – elephants, lions, leopards, gorillas - in Africa, Tom set up his business to fund his travels so that he could see these amazing animals wandering free. In this country his photography covers local wildlife - kingfishers, badgers, little owls, red foxes, puffins - and provides many of his images sold as framed prints. Abroad, in Africa – Zambia, Kenya, Uganda – he is looking for competition wildlife shots. Shooting mainly with aperture priority, settings are crucial. His images must have light, character, emotion and simplicity, and no tension. Single images with out-of-focus backgrounds are his ideal – if you haven’t got the ideal lens, shoot with the subje…

Report courtesy of Marjorie Burge.

On Friday 11th May, we were delighted to welcome Ian Stone DPAGB BPE3* and Marie-Laure Stone DPAGB BPE5* EFIAP Platinum and EFIAP Diamond 1, from Folkestone Camera Club, to judge our Annual Exhibition Print Competition. As our Chairman said, this competition is the climax of our season, and as the prints were put up it was clear that our photographers had entered some of their best work - mono, colour, digital and dark room. Ian and Marie-Laure are experienced photographers in all fields, leaning towards nature, leaning away from creative, but ready to give every image their whole attention. Each image carefully assessed. As well as camera skills, titles and mounts were important, Marie-Laure liked our use of textured papers, sharpness of course, particularly with eyes, cropping, print quality, distracting backgrounds, and effort involved in composition, all taken into account. There was such quality in all images that it was inevitable that many were…