The Wairarapa Camera Club is a friendly group open to anyone interested in photography, and visitors will find a range of fascinating work on display in their new exhibition which happened biannually at Aratoi. The club has a stated aim of “impactful story-telling”, so I asked some of the exhibiting members about the story behind their image.
Nik Player: “I was at the edge of Lake Wairarapa just off Western Lake Road on a fairly clear and still day, trying to get some nice shots of the lake with some swans and the reflections of the foliage in the water. It was late in the afternoon when I started to notice a southerly coming in. At first I was rather annoyed as I was hoping to get some good sunset shots, and the clouds started to ruin my plan. The sun was still poking through the clouds from above the Rimutakas, throwing some light across the lake so I stayed a little longer focusing on the refections.
I decided to leave when the temperature dropped but looked up and saw this huge cloud above the southerly edge of the lake. I set the camera back on the tripod and took a couple more shots and it was then that I noticed the sun had just broken through enough to create a small vertical rainbow. It was by far the best shot of the day.”
Martin Connelly:
“I wanted to capture something that we do not normally see. This was a planned shoot and it took three days get an image I was happy with. The key technical aspect is that it gets shot in the dark using a flashlight to both illuminate the water droplet and capture the instant in time that it lands. This works because a flashlight emits its light for a very short period of time, thus appearing to ‘freeze’ the moment.
Before the final image was captured I had to shoot many hundreds of water drops, trying to find a way to get the image I hoped to find. So I needed to set up a contraption to deliver water drops into a basin at regular intervals. This took a lot of trial and error and a fair bit of water ended up in places that it should not have!
The drop being a very small object, I had to use a macro lens, which are very difficult to focus accurately on a moving object. Finally I had to make the flash go off at exactly the right moment. Finally, the right drop of water hit the basin in the right place just as the flash went off. A miracle of timing and patience.
‘Droplet' was shot for a competition, which the club holds regularly. I particular enjoy these as they challenge me to experiment and do something new.”
Nik Player’s 'The Foreboding Storm'
'Droplet' by Martin Connelly
For more information on the Club: www.wairarapacameraclub.org.
Currently showing at Aratoi: ‘Hidden Faces, Hidden Gems’ - Wairarapa Camera Club, until 21 Sept; King Street Artworks: 'Mauri Ora', until 12 Oct; ‘WW100: Wairarapa’, until 7 Sept; ‘Nicki Stewart: Remember to Remember’, until 7 Sept; ; David Cauchi: 'Memories of the future', until 12 Oct.