Soon, the leaves will all be gone – as will the beautiful colors.  Photographing waterfalls isn’t quite the same without lush green foliage – and it will be months before the wildflowers reemerge.  The days are getting shorter….the cold breeze is ever more present.  Doesn’t seem like there is much to shoot now.  Well, maybe you can use this time to enhance other parts of the photography repertoire.
 
Education – It’s really easy to say – if I had THAT lens, Id be a better photographer.  Well, some of that might be true, how about using the less-than-ideal shooting conditions to (instead of paying for a new piece of gear) take a Lightroom course online or a Kelby One course?  There are literally thousands of decent (and free) YouTube videos to help you better understand this art we are all passionate about.  Some of my favorites include:

• Kelby One
• Anthony Morganti and Julieanne Kost (Lightroom and Photoshop)
• Mike Moats (Macro and up-close photography)
• Steve Perry (wildlife and landscape)

New Genre - How about using this off-season to learn a different genre of photography?

• Astro – the colder weather can create some really crisp skies for Astrophotography.  Shooting Orion from the blue ridge parkway on a new moon can really give you a different aspect of settings.
• Night – Shoot the Christmas lights at night in downtown; car trails; buildings/architecture at night all require different aspects of your camera settings and gear.
• Macro/Abstract – Challenge yourself to ‘see’ things instead of ‘looking’ at things.  The beauty of macro and abstract is that it can all be done right at home or in your own backyard. 

Photo project – Use the winter months to do a theme project (barns, trains, ice and ice patterns, snow, Hendersonville architecture, etc).  It is also a great time to reprocess some of those older images (especially after you learn some new tips from lightroom). 
 
Finally, the winter months can be a great time to do some ‘house cleaning.'  Cull through all your images and delete your bad ones; reorganize your catalogs and folders; reprocess older images; go through and file images on old SD cards; overhaul your tripod; clean out the camera bag and finally give your lenses and camera some overdue camera love and clean them up. 
 
Winter months don’t mean you have to put your camera on the shelf and wait until the spring thaw.  There is plenty to do and learn.  So – what are you waiting for?

Contribuled by Steve Matadobra

Here are the instructions for submitting images to the November Photo Review. 

You can submit up to three image pairs by 11:59 pm November 5^th, Saturday.  There is no assigned image theme for these monthly reviews, so you are free to submit any image.

Submit image pairs.  The image pairs are the original images as recorded by the camera and the processed/edited images.   Both the camera-recorded images and the processed images should be processed as follows.

Size your images to a maximum of 1400 x 1050 pixels resolution.  Note that 1400 pixels applies only to width.  The image width should not be greater than 1400 pixels and the height should not be greater than 1050 pixels.

Format the image as a jpeg.

Name your photo as:

Rank_ Your Name_Title of photo_O_Rank.jpg    (e.g. 1a_John Smith_Hooker Falls_O.jpg)

The rank refers to the order you wish the images to be shown in the album for review.  Use “a” and “b” for the original and edited versions, respectively.

The O refers to “open,” meaning there is no assigned theme.

For each image, provide the requested information on the template that can be accessed via this link.  Just click on the link, and the template will be downloaded. This will aid the reviewers in their review.   Submit the template as a Microsoft Word document with your images.

Address your e-mail to:  ccoh.images@gmail.com

Send your images and the completed templates as attachments to your e-mail. 

The e-mail” Subject should show November Photo Reviews.

If you have questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.  

The October photo album with comments is now available. Here are instructions for accessing and viewing the images and review comments.

1.  Select this link to view the images in the October album:  
https://photos.app.goo.gl/MKgxp63BPSo9ivN7A

This will allow you to do a quick scan of the photos.

2. Double-click on an image to bring it up for viewing.

3.  Click on the "i" inside the circle in the upper right to view information about the image.

4.  Click on the small rectangle in the lower right to view the comments.  

Note: you may be required to enter your email address and e-mail account password.

5. To move to the next image, click on the forward arrow in the middle of the black area to the right of the photo.  You can also select the back arrow in the left black area, which takes you to all the smaller images.

• Member at Large (David Avigdor is stepping down)
• Mini Workshop Coordinator (Allison Knaperek is stepping down)
• Hospitality Chair (this has been open for 2 years due to Covid)
• AV backup (much needed now that we do hybrid meetings)

Due to Thanksgiving, our 2022 November
Monthly Meeting will be on the 3rd Tuesday,
November 15. See you there!

November Monthly Meeting
“Abstracts” by Guest Speaker Don Rosenberger

Our guest speaker at the November 15 meeting will be Don Rosenberger giving a presentation on “Abstracts.” Don describes himself as just a guy who loves to make images. His love of photography began when he was a teenager. Along with his passion for cars, Don would often be seen at the starting line photographing drag races on the weekends. After a while, the cost of photography grew to be too much and Don stopped taking pictures. Fortunately, the arrival of digital photography re-ignited his love for photography and it has been his driving passion ever since. It is the constant desire to improve his craft and elevate the quality of his work that keeps Don growing as an artist. He believes that if this ever stops, he’ll stop growing as an artist.

Don has teamed up with Kelly Schneider Fine Art Portraiture as a tour manager on his international portrait workshops. He also runs the Fairfax (& DC Metro Area) Photography Meetup group, where he organizes different photography opportunities where photographers of all skill levels can get together and explore new places, develop skills and meet other photographers. To see some of Don’s work, and his current workshop offerings, or to learn more about his passion for automotive fine art photography, visit: www.donrosenberger.com.



CCoH 2023 General Meeting Schedule Under Construction

The CCoH General Meeting Schedule for 2023 has been under construction since mid-October, 2022. If we have commitments from all our guest speakers, guest photo critiquers, CCoH members, etc., by November 15, a ‘sneak peak’ will be shared at our November 2022 Monthly Meeting. Regarding the 2023 Print Competition, we plan to have THREE categories of photographers, Enthusiasts, Intermediate, and Advanced to encourage more members to participate.