During the imposed Lockdown due to the Coronavirus pandemic, EPS introduced a monthly photo challenge, here you can see some of the results of that. Lockdown began, in the UK, on 23rd March 2020. Our first challenge was for April 2020. There were no prizes or specific rules. Members were invited to submit their images and a few words to accompany them. Members were also invited to submit up to 10 images made during Lockdown that did not adhere to the themes of the monthly Challenges, that gallery will be completed later. All images are the copyright of the individuals. The April Challenge theme was “Creative images taken at home”. The May Challenge was “Five minutes from home”. For the June Challenge the theme is “No more than 5 miles from home” for the first time since lockdown powered transport is allowed.
Alan Givens
May Challenge
Since my wife uses a walking stick we had to find somewhere reasonably flat for outdoor exercise. The closest harbour is Dysart, but is a bit uneven, so we go to West Wemyss harbour.After a walk along the pier and my wife returning to the car, i had another wee walk along the pier and made these images.Ive arranged them into a panel of 10 with the theme being ” blue”.
Alexandra McOrist
June Challenge
Alistair Cowan
April Challenge
May Challenge
Andrew McKie
May Challenge
June Challenge
Andy Hayes
June Challenge
Barbara Bartkowiak
May Challenge
June Challenge
Barbara Bogacka
June Challenge
Bill Johnston
May Challenge
Brian Flemming
May Challenge
June Challenge
Caroline McDermott
April Challenge
For my photo, I decided to treat myself to a bunch of tulips on one of my very rare outings to the supermarket. I work in resilience planning for the NHS so you can imagine, have been really busy over the last few months. Fortunately I can work from home but when I saw these flowers I decided I deserved a treat so bought them for myself. I mainly enjoy macro photos of plants. The tulips were on my living room windowsill. Now there is so much new life in spring I am taking a lot more photography outside in my garden as it is full of life. I been posting on FB and Instagram as I find it cheerful to see others’ photos and hope others will enjoy mine as well.
Christopher Osborne
April Challenge
June Challenge
David Buchanan
June Challenge
David Greer
April Challenge
I used my free time during the April Covid-19 Lockdown to experiment with three new photographic techniques viz. ICM, Focus Stacking and Photomoshing/Glitching.
The rest of the time, I hung out of my balcony, somewhat precariously, to take pictures of strangers in the street
May Challenge
June Challenge
David Wolfenden
April Challenge
May Challenge
June Challenge
Derek Robertson
May Challenge
June Challenge
Dennis Linn
April Challenge
June Challenge
Donald Stirling
April Challenge
Dragged out my ’toy’ collection to use as subject matter.
May Challenge
June Challenge
Doug Berndt
April Challenge
I see my camera as a friend that accompanies me out of doors. It’s rare for me to take images indoors. For my images – the idea came from Gavin Hoey here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKp8YO2DkwA -I also used various PS built-in 8-bit artistic filters on the images. You can find Gavin’s background images here – https://www.gavtrain.com/?p=6869 My backgrounds were derived from these but are not straight copies – credit to Gavin for the originals.
May Challenge
Images around Fairmilehead area of Edinburgh – a changing decorated window, warning signs, Mortonhall golf course closure, abandoned road works, ornamental rabbits left on a hedge for kids amusement, painted stones at Fairmilehead Parish church door. Kid’s street game follow the line to a rainbow, a neighbour isolated behind her washing line and enjoying the sun. St Fillan’s Church services cancelled.
June Challenge
With the changing rules easing lockdown restrictions, we were allowed to travel a little further with recommendations being not more than 5 miles. I had not been in the City Centre since March and took the opportunity to visit Edinburgh Waverley Station. People were still travelling by train but very few and there were more employees than passengers. The station was marked out with social distancing stickers that included footprints on the escalators. I’d spoken with the customer service assistant that you can see at the foot of the escalator, who told me how great it was to photograph the empty station and to go and enjoy myself. Shortly after that I met a Network Rail employee who told me “You can’t take pictures in here!” (Apparently it would have been OK if I’d just been using my phone!). I’d have loved to have stayed longer, but when asking for a permit to photograph was told that Network Rail had a duty to enforce social distancing for safety purposes, I struggled to find someone to distance from.
Douglas May
May Challenge
Edinburgh Council have used section 14 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 to close off part of Braid Road near my home.It is said to be for the purpose of supporting social distancing for cyclists and pedestrians. It has certainly given Braid Road an eerie and isolated feelingwith no motor vehicles and in particular a line of parked cars for visitors to the Hermitage. Meantime further up the road work continues. On an emptyPentland Terrace a short distance away two cyclists, like many other cyclists, cycle close to the pavement and do not give the pedestrian thedistance she should be entitled to expect.
June Challenge
Edward Richards
April Challenge
New Home I spent some time making and giving away bird nesting boxes from scrap materials. Decided to put one up on a tree in the garden and it was occupied in 24 hours. Lockdown supplies I always liked making still life compositions from things lying about the house and lockdown consumables seemed a good opportunity. Spring Cleaning Was really cleaning conservatory when decided it could make a still life. Drew a freaky face on box of gloves but no one has noticed it! Wind Spinner. Tried to keep movement but also show vanes on spinner. Double Camellia Colourful but short lived blooms. Camera Canon G7X shutter priority at 1/500 because a strong wind blowing.
May Challenge
Empty Queensferry Road This is usually busy 24/7 and is eerily quiet in the lockdown
Empty Play Park Again usually a very busy park with kids enjoying themselves and again deserted with COVID
All Mod Cons This boat has sat on waste ground beside the River Almond for years complete with toilet. It disappeared the day after it was photographed.
Cramond Brig from beside cottage ruins, just to complement the story that follows… Jock Howison’s Cottage Ruins – This is a ruin immediately beside Brig and was occupied by a farm labourer named Jock Howison
King James V Statue Apparently King James was attacked on the Brig by robbers and was saved by Howison coming to his aid. The statue was erected to mark the occasion but it is half a mile away across the Queensferry Road, now in a courtyard housing development.
I have lived in this area for 39 years and never knew the story or found the statue till the lockdown!
Eric Robinson
April Challenge
Fiona Spence
June Challenge
George Milligan
May Challenge
June Challenge
Gair Brisbane
June Challenge
Graham Morrice
April Challenge
May Challenge
June Challenge
Hilda Dalgetty
June Challenge
Isobel Lindsay
April Challenge
May Challenge
James Glass
May Challenge
Jim Moir
May Challenge
Jean Manson
May Challenge
Krysia Kotowska
April Challenge
June Challenge
Louise Wallace
May Challenge
June Challenge
‘5 wee Lochs within 5 miles’. … I thought, as a country member, that would be appropraite for a city club presentation 🙂 The distance went from 0.6 to 4.6 miles. The theme went slightly off by the inclusion of the Pen and cygnets as there are some wider shots of the Pot Loch, but the swan family were quite far away and I chose a closer shot.
Mhairi Chambers
April Challenge
For my 3 images i decided to use both my 60mm macro lens and the in camera focus stacking setting in my Olympus EM5 mkiii by seeing what was around the house. All the images were shot hand held, as i was interested to see the results without resorting to using a tripod. The spider obliging appeared as my camera was to hand…. luckily for me!
May Challenge
1)Bowling Suspended-taken at the Merchiston Tennis and Bowling Club. I pass this on my daily walk and it was obvious that the green was being kept tidy and cut. I liked the striped pattern on the green. 2)House of the Future,Maybe-This was taken at the old Boroughmuir High School. Cala Homes has a sign at the front gates made of plexi glass and when passing one day, I realised it distorted the surrounding buildings and any vehicle passing at the time so I went back took the shot.It’s cropped in to just show the Cala Homes logo.3)Reaching For the Sun-This was taken at St Peters Place,it was growing at the bridge over the canal. 4)Outside Looking In- also taken at the bowling green.I liked the shadow pattern of the wrought iron fence,so i stood beside it,that’s my shadow in the shot.Felt like i was behind bars looking in at the planter.5)Trio of Fox Cubs- taken overlooking a neighbours garden in which 6 fox cubs and their mum are currently living.Its a bit of a jungle so difficult to shoot when there is only a small patch of sunlight in which they play and snooze!
June Challenge
1)Graffiti in DT2-Taken at Straiton Pond nature reserve. I had not been there for several years and found this on the wall of a tunnel under the bypass. Converted to black and white in Olympus Workspace. 2) Honey bee at work-Also taken at Straiton, I had been trying to get shots of a honey bee for a few weeks and finally succeeded. 3) Just bumbling along-Also taken at Straiton, I like the colours in this one with the blurred green background and the yellow of the bee sitting on the reddish flower. 4)Whose Art is it Anyway?- Another one from the Straiton walk, as in many other places in and around Edinburgh these days, tunnels get “decorated”. Some is very artistic, others you can debate whether its art or graffiti. I liked this section, converted to black and white using Olympus Workspace. 5)The Big Yellow Store- Calder Road in Edinburgh. I liked the lines and angles of the building, plus the blue sky goes well with the bright yellow of the building.
Martin Ashford
May Challenge
Newhaven Sunset (Almost) -Wanted to stay another 20 minutes to catch the sunset but two very burly policemen turned up and started dispersing people – though it prudent to pack up! Sunset through the flowers – Walking back to Trinity along lower Granton Road, noticed a young girl taking a picture of the sunset through some wild flowers that were growing out of a crack in the promenade wall. I waited a minute or two, walked to the same spot and stole her idea! Supermoon – walking home, biggest lens I had with me was a 90mm prime. It was light at the time but I lowered the exposure in Adobe Camera raw to silhouette the branches, then added a graduated filter to darken the sky.
June Challenge
Muriel Binnie
April Challenge
Two images were inspired by a Bailey and Chinnery video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIh7v29WA9c The other three were taken using a lightpad. For lightpad mastery – look for Jane Simmonds on flickr or Instagram.
May Challenge
The black and white images were all taken in the same local graveyard. With one exception, they are multiple exposures taken in camera. B&W suited my mood and gave more intense results, sometimes capturing two headstones in the same image. This seems to me to represent the lock down – separation yet community reliance.
The coloured image is also a multiple exposure – there was an irony in Classic Laddie whisky packaging in a shop window counterpointed against a local authority street sign right outside – is it advocating roof repairs without a rope?
June Challenge
Neil Scott
April Challenge
May Challenge
These were all taken in my garden. I had just bought a 100-400mm lens for my Fujifilm X-T2, meaning to try my hand at bird photography when the lockdown started. I was therefore on the way! My main photographic interests are people, including street photography and still life/abstract stuff, so this was well outside my comfort zone. I had to learn to use manual focusing after learning about focus peaking, and was using ISO ratings of 3000-5000 and shutter speeds of 1/2000 or less – all completely different from my usual settings. Since the birds are travelling extremely fast my initial success rate was probably around one percent. In other words only one image out of 100 was acceptably sharp (or indeed the bird was in the frame at all!) My hit rate has since improved, with much appreciated help from Eric Robinson, Jim Moir and Sandy Cleland.
Pete Gaskin
April Challenge
Robert Dewar
May Challenge
June Challenge
Robert Ruscoe
May Challenge
Shirley Finlay
May Challenge
Tom Flint
May Challenge
Unda McKie
May Challenge
Images are taken on Calton Hill – 5 min from home. The rat family (while not the favourite subject of mine) has lived next to Calton Hill stairs for few years and were quite obliging on Sunday morning. I am not sure of the name for the plants, but they are one of the carrot family and are currently all over the parks and greens.
June Challenge
Zoltan Laszlo
June Challenge
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