Fun with The Photography Club of Cape May

I belong to The Photography Club of Cape May and we have a lot of fun while learning the ins and outs of photography. The best way to learn anything is practice, practice, practice, and there's lots of that going on with PCCM! On our Facebook page monthly challenges are posted to give us inspiration to take pictures. We can post our photos with information about the lenses and settings we used to get the shot,  it's always great to get input and positive comments from our fellow photographers. It's also a place to learn and grow our skills by posting questions, and getting a lot of opinions and help. I highly recommend joining a club involving your favorite hobbies as a way to learn and perfect your craft.

Here are some photos I've taken at meet ups we've held through the years. I enjoy the enthusiasm and encouragement our members provide when we meet. It's always a fun time. The photos below have been taken over the last 2 years with my Nikon D3100. I am enjoying learning from the good and bad photos.

Meetings are held monthly where we have photographers with experience and expertise in specific areas share their photos and techniques with us, our organizer, Dottie Rogers, is a wonder when it comes to convincing photographers and artists to share at our meetings, along with organizing meet ups and photo walks to learn by doing. We are so fortunate to have her as our leader.

 We have had a few photography exhibits hung in Cape May, NJ. If you get the chance to experience one, definitely take a look, they are inspiring and always enlightening. There's an exhibit of the club's opening  this Sunday at the Chalfonte Hotel in Cape May, with wine and cheese from 2-3:30pm. Everyone's invited...go take a peek you won't be sorry!

 I took this photo in my front yard, it's July's 2014 super moon. The club got together for the August Super Moon on the beach in Cape May Point to share tips and have some fun shots of each other and the moon. They are so inspiring and generous with their knowledge.

I really am fortunate to be a part of this creative group of photographers, it is a lot of fun to share your love of something with the like minded.

Learning is my favorite pastime! I hope I've inspired you to join a club and share your talents!

Go take a pic!!

Nini~

Quilt Photography Workshop Linky Party August Challenge

Taking good pictures is harder than you think. Taking a picture that is clear and sharp isn't necessarily a good photo, there's a big difference between a picture in focus and a "good" picture. A good picture in my opinion is a picture that tells a story and pulls the viewer into the photo, it makes the viewer believe they know exactly what was happening at the moment the picture was snapped. If you can hear the trees rustling, the conversation and even feel the breeze in my opinion that's a GREAT photo. I know these are pictures of fabric there's no convo, but ya know what I mean... you just wanna grab the fabric and head to the machine! Sew, here's my fabric photos...I'll start with what I don't like and then move to what I think is more pleasing.

Too busy, if it was cropped it could be better.
ISO 400 f5.6 1/20

Too blurry and busy with the spools in foreground.
ISO 200 f9 1/3

Too much of the photograph is blurry, it hurts my eyes.
ISO 200 f5.6

The background is too distracting. There's sunlight sneaking into the pic.
ISO 200 f5.6

I don't like how the fabric is leaning.
ISO 400 f5.6 1/13

 Okay, so this is what I like better.

This photo is cropped below...I like the cropped version better, it's centered on the fabric.
ISO 400 f5.6 1/15

I like how the fabric completely fills the frame, the fabric on the diagonal makes it interesting and you can see the texture of the fabric.
ISO 200 f5.6 1/8

I like the off center-ness of this one...you can see the texture in the fabric and the spool doesn't take anything away from the pic.
ISO 200 f5.6 1/6

I like how the fabric is pretty straight across the photo.

I have a good friend who says... "Fake it til you make it!" Even though I can't keep track of what all the numbers mean on my camera...I adjust them until I get a sharp focused pic. Some day I hope to know all the lingo and what settings to use without guessing...I got pictures I like even if I couldn't tell you how I got them...I got'em just the same!!!

I'm linking to Plum and June's Quilt Photography Workshop! Make sure you check out all the other link ups for more tips and tricks for blog photography!

Now go take some pics!

Nini~