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Chairman's Christmas Message
It is traditional this time of year to take a few reflective moments and look back on the achievements of the previous 12 months. Though I think 2020 is a year most of us would rather forget than celebrate!
It has certainly been the most unusual year in the history of the club. Here are my personal highlights:
The year started with an excellent presentation by Jonathan Saull in the hall, when physical meetings in the hall seemed like such a normal thing.
February really showed our commitment to practical training and photography with Mark Edwards running an excellent Portrait Photography evening and macro evening with Peter Warne.
At the beginning of March as Dave Peck got us excited about drone photography, there was some talk about coronavirus and social distancing but none of us was prepared for what would soon happen.
Suddenly it was lockdown and the committee had to make a decision on how to react to it. Whilst many clubs shut down completely the committee decided to see if we could provide something virtually.
We were in a surprisingly good position to go virtual with this newsletter, WhatsApp,Twitter, Youtube and Facebook providing good communication channels and a mail-in system for competitions the switch to an online world was relatively frictionless for us.
Starting on Skype we had talks from Olympus and Canon experts,combined with our "winner stays on" competition, proving that we could have interesting speakers and activities despite being in lock down.
May saw the move to Zoom, making the meetings a bit more inclusive and it featured our first ever virtual AGM, members technical presentations and the duplicate battle with Loughton - which was made more poignant by David Woods joining us from his hospice bed.
June featured talks by Light & Land tutor Verity Milligan, our DPI of the year comp & talks by our very own Stan and Warren.
In July we had a series of inspirational talks from ex-pro David Davis, Tom Peck on Portraits, Paul Radden and Justin Minns. Unfortunately, we also saw the sad death of David Woods.
By the sunny days of August, we could actually manage that most unusual of things - a physical meeting. Thanks to Jonathan Saull we had a lovely evening outside talking and catching up with friends.
Later in the month, we attempted a second physical meet but the weather was not with us and the brave souls that ventured out certainly got a little soggy. Personally, I dried out around mid-December! With a talk by David Watts on local landscapes and cave photography as well, the summer was certainly interesting.
By September, Zoom meetings became routine with a talk on abstract photography, competitions, practical evenings and our first ever Lotto critique.
October featured the hugely inspirational talk from Jane Lazenby and yet another physical meet up in Epping Forest.
As the nights started to draw in, November featured the legendary Dick Cicone presenting from the other side of The Atlantic and Trevor Davenport from The Wirrel.
In the run-up to Christmas we had Stu Meech's first-ever zoom talk, a Christmas quiz and our textures competition. The auction of David's books raised £400 for Charity.
When I look back at the year it is not without a great deal of pride I look at what we have achieved. We have managed to provide a varied and interesting program despite the limitations forced upon us and for this we owe a great debt to our committee members (past & present) who have worked hard to keep things running and have taken on all manner of tasks to that end.
We have reached the end of the year in a good position financially, have shared our meetings with other local clubs and have even managed to attract new members - this is certainly a contrast to a lot of clubs I talk to and this is entirely due to the committee and the enthusiasm of all our members. For which I thank you all.
Our first meeting after the break is the 7th of January with "The World of a Wildlfe Photographer" by David Boag.
All that remains for me to say is to wish you all a very merry and safe Christmas and a happy new year and I hope to see you all in the hall at some point in 2021.
Chris
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