In the Herald - Members were streets ahead of challenge

This week members of Irvine Camera Club ventured into Kilmarnock town centre on a quest to take photographs of street life, the urban landscape and light trails. The first of these themes was particularly challenging as by the time we arrived the Kilmarnock town centre was practically empty! Undeterred, we broke up into small groups and headed off to see what we could find. My little group soon happened upon a group of kids who were more than keen to show off for the camera. A recovery truck driver was also more than happy to pose proudly by his wagon. Others found interesting subjects at the bus depot and the train station. Documentary photography like this is so important in recording these strange times for future generations to look back on, especially when scenes feature people wearing masks – a real sign of the times.

Kilmarnock has a good variation of architecture as well as elements of natural landscape within the town centre. Our members fulfilled the brief of urban landscape by capturing the various aspects of the town as the light began to fade – the brutalist architecture of the 60s and 70s juxtaposed with the much older church buildings, theatres and tenements.

See the images that made the paper, and a few more, here - https://irvinecc.co.uk/results/archive/gallery/16284

As the sun went down and the streetlight came on, the cars & buses also lit up. This provided us with the opportunity to try some light trail photography. Long exposures are used to allow the camera to record vehicles moving through the frame while the shutter is open. This creates visually striking images of streaks of light that move dynamically through the twilight of the city scape. It’s great fun to try and really does help photographers learn the relationship of the shutter speed, aperture and ISO settings on their cameras.

I hope you enjoy some of the photos shown here from our evening trip to Kilmarnock. We had the pleasure of reviewing them on Wednesday night at our temporary new home of Dreghorn Bowling Club. We were made to feel very welcome and safe with all of the appropriate social distancing rules strictly applied. I have to say it was great to once again meet up in person and to get off of Zoom for the first time in 4 months.

If you would like to know more about our club you can find out all about us on our website www.irvinecc.co.uk or by finding us on the usual social media platforms. Our new winter season will start in September and you’ll be assured of a very warm welcome if you’d like to pop in and see us.