The 2008-09 photographic year for the Charlotte Camera Club is just about upon us. Our new year begins on September 1, with our first meeting, and competition, being held on Thursday, September 11, 7:30pm at St John's Episcopal Church on Carmel Rd. Members, and first time non members, may bring up to 2 color prints and/or up to 2 B&W prints to be judged and critiqued by other members of the club. (Remember, we are all trying to improve our skills, so take our positive and negative comments about your images with a grain of salt). We also accept online competition images on our web site each month as well. THE DUE DATE FOR ONLINE IMAGES TO THE WEB SITE IS ALWAYS THE 10TH OF EVERY MONTH REGARDLESS OF WHEN WE HAVE OUR MONTHLY MEETING AND COMPETITION AT THE CHURCH. The subject matter is always open for these competitions unless we specify differently. The first meeting of every month, from September thru April, we have a friendly competition. Most, but not all the time, we have a second meeting in the month (the 4th Thursday). In that meeting we try to have some kind of educational program or exhibit.

Let me tell you of some things we are planning to do this photographic year. We are going to invite a couple of local pros to give us a talk about photographic skills. One will be on cropping, and one will be on light. We are also going to have our tabletop workshop (black light, mylar, glass, etc) sometime after the holidays. For our summer workshop we are planning on doing street/architectural photography by meeting downtown in the early evening as a group and working around the downtown (or uptown, if you prefer that word) area.

As always we also are involved in PSA (Photographic Society of America), a national and somewhat international organization of camera clubs who hold 2-4 competitions per photographic year in a myriad of divisions. We belong to 3 such divisions: Nature; Open; Creative Club. So we will be submitting images that our members provide, as a club, to PSA.

We also will be viewing and judging images from a number of camera clubs from the Buffalo NY area that we've been doing for several years. It's a great way to see what is happening in another part of the country.

We do have a couple of assigned topics for our monthly competitions. One is reflections, and one is texture. Check our calendar for the specific months, and all other activities as well, as we try to plan our year. However, some things do pop up at the last minute.

Well, that will get you started. I hope to see a bunch of new faces coming to the club, with lots of images seen thru their eyes. Our experience ranges from rank amateur ( I just got my first camera-how do I turn it on?) to serious amateur ( I'm not ready to quit my day job yet) and everywhere in between. And, I hope to see our current members returning, bringing with them plenty of images. So as we part, I'll see you in September (my do wop friends are singing in the background).