PIP Rabbitts, one of our members and a qualified judge, took on the task of delivering feedback on members’ competition entries entitled ‘The Letter R’ this week.

It was a real privilege to hear her well-considered comments which were focused on shared values and aimed to give us food for thought that would effect future improvements.

We valued her judgements, and all those who entered enjoyed the evening and were glad that they had made the effort. Pip had certainly deliberated long and hard, and came well prepared with extensive notes, making comments on colours, tones, composition and techniques that were well received and very helpful.

In the colour section, Diana Walker was Highly Commended for her Red Panda whilst Tony Nineham and Graham Nicholls were Commended for “Refractions and Reflections” and “Rounding a Muddy Corner” respectively. Diana Walker took second place as well with her “Red Squirrel in Autumn” squeezing Jenny Short’s” Rust” triptych into third place, but Jenny won the competition with her unusual entry entitled “Refraction” which was a play on light rays passing through a cubic prism.

In the mono section, both Diana Walker’s entries were again successful, taking Highly Commended for “Raven” and second place with “Rat”.

Jill Toman was Commended for “Road Run” and Janice Cuer for “Remembrance”. Third place went to Lou Bailey’s “Raindrops” - a first attempt at entering a print competition, but it was Pamela Bruce-Lockhart who finally got onto the honours board with a couple of creative abstracts that she has been working hard to perfect.

She was Highly Commended for the unusual and mystifying “Round Reflections” but deserved the win with the innovative “Stop at the Railings”. Congratulations to all who entered -now the quest begins for next year’s focus on “The Letter S”. It will be another 7 years before we run out of letters of the alphabet.

We have had plenty of recent excitement at our meetings; a fortnight ago, accomplished wildlife photographer Ann Aveyard visited to showcase some outstanding images, accompanied by a fine mix of narrative, advice and information regarding animals in their environments.

Next week we will be looking at a selection of images crafted by members since the talk by Rose Atkinson on the creative use of “Intentional Camera Movement”. The discipline has been quite a challenge, and it will be interesting to see how we have tackled the art of blur.

Jenny Short, NRPS