Morpeth Camera Club: Various subjects in the spotlight for challenge

In the second of his challenges, Peter Downs requested that members submit up to three sets of images – each including an original-sized image, together with a square cropped version in both colour and monochrome.

Twelve members responded to the challenge with a wide variety of subject matter; sunset through woodland, barnacles on rocks, beached boats, Bamburgh Castle, The Alnwick Garden Christmas light trail, the Alwinton hills, old doors, the High-Level Bridge, graffiti and Cragside.

Throughout the evening, each of the authors stated their reasons for why they chose to crop and the audience chipped in with whether they thought that cropping and the converting to monochrome had improved the image.

During the discussion, comments included the view that some images lend themselves to colour and when converted to monochrome, the atmosphere of a colourful scene is lost.

In some cases, statuary for instance, converting to monochrome brings out texture, contrast, tonal range, detail and shadows.

To sum up, it was agreed that it pays to look closer at an image as a whole, ask yourself how you can make the image more dynamic, are there distractions that can be removed and by cropping, you can improve composition placing of the focal point.

Also, it is good to experiment by being creative to get the very best out of your image.