Photography News Issue 42

Photography News | Issue 42 | absolutephoto.com

CameraClubof theYear in associationwith

Three down, two to go. Five camera clubs will battle it out for the title of Camera Club of the Year and three have already made the final. If you want your club to join them you have to qualify by winning one of the remaining two rounds. Here’s how… Welcome to Round 4 of the PhotographyNews Camera Club of the Year 2016-17 contest. there are at least five members. Online groups, internal company clubs and those clubs not affiliated to the PAGB can also enter. Camera Club of the Year contest 2016-17

Your club’s target is to win this round and qualify for the final. It is as simple as that and the contest’s theme is a challenging one: action. See opposite for some expert tips from Fujifilm ambassador Jeff Carter. Qualify for the final itself and your club is in for something quite interesting, the details of which will be released simultaneously to the five finalists. However, what we can reveal now is that the final will be a unique event that will offer a tremendous creative challenge and a never-to-be-forgotten experience for the deserving finalists. This year’s contest is sponsored by Fujifilm which should give you a big clue as to what the final challenge could be. The club that emerges top of the pile after the final shoot-out will thoroughly deserve the honour and prestige of being our Camera Club of the Year 2016-17. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves here so let’s start with how you qualify for the final. Your club’s competition secretary (or whoever is going to enter each round) must sign up on absolutephoto.com. Terms and conditions are also available on the website. Any club or group is eligible to enter so long as The X-T20 is a 24.3-megapixel mirrorless camera that can shoot great stills as well as both Full HD and 4K video. It features the same style of design with a centred pentaprism and large control as the X-T2 to give DSLR-type handling. The camera is founded on an X-Trans CMOS III sensor, the same as that seen on Fujifilm’s X-Pro2 and X-T2 flagship cameras, and so you can expect picture quality to be straight out of the top drawer with richly coloured, detail- packed and low-noise images. The native ISO range is 200 to 12,800 and that is expandable to ISO 51,200 at the high-speed end. Thanks to a tilting LCD monitor and the touch shot function of the X-T20, taking shots from low or high angles is made easier. Use the Auto Mode Selector and the camera will even choose the best settings for a variety of scenes. Of course many photographers like to take control and the X-T20 is fully equipped in that respect with richly featured exposure, white- balance and autofocus systems. Ideal whether you are shooting static or fast moving subjects, the X-T20 has a refined AF algorithm offering improved accuracy especially with finely textured subjects. Also an AF-C custom settings option lets you choose one of five AF-C presets to suit the movement of your subject.

Once you’ve signed up, go to the Members Area on the top menu bar, click on that and you will see Camera Club of the Year 2016‑17 in the drop-down menu. Select that, then register your camera club and follow the upload instructions. JPEG files should be at least 1500 pixels on the longest dimension, under 2MB in size and, preferably, in the sRGB colour space. A club can only enter one set of five images from five different members each round, while failure to enter five shotswillmean themissing shot/s scores zero points; so it’s crucial to enter the full number of images. If, by mistake, six images are entered (it has happened this year already) only the first five will be scored. After the closing date each picture will be scored out of 20 points and the highest scoring club each month will qualify for the final. In the event of tied scores, we will ignore the highest and lowest scores and average out the three remaining scores. The highest score wins. If scores are still tied, all five scores will be averaged out. When the issue with that month’s result is published, the scores for every picture entered

will be published on the website so you can see how you’ve done. There’s no monthly prize apart from qualifying for the final shoot-out and once a club has qualified for the final it need not enter again. Of course your club can do it for the challenge and pictures will still be scored, but there’s no reward for winning in this instance. In effect, because each monthly contest is self-contained, ie. it’s not a league system over the period of the contest, you do not have to enter every month – perhaps it’s a theme

the club is less strong at or the club’s contest secretary has gone on holiday. Clearly it makes sense to give yourself as many chances to win as possible, however. So, good luck everyone. Read the entry details again, check out the theme on the opposite page and start working on your club’s entry. Remember, you need five strong shots with high scoring potential. Qualify for the final and your club could be joining us for a very special photography event with the title of Camera Club of the Year to be won.

Fujifilm’s latestmirrorlessmodel, theX-T20

The AF boasts 91 focusing points in a 13x7 array, 42 more than its predecessor, the X-T10, and if you prefer there is the option to use 325 AF points. To suit different subjects, situations and personal preferences, the AF system can be set to use a single zone, a small number of zones or all 91, leaving the camera to decide what to focus on. Versatility is increased further with options for face and eye detection. The X-T20 is available in black or silver for £799 body only, or you can purchase it with the XC16-50mm f/3.5 OIS II lens for £899, or with the XF18-55mm f/2.8-4 R LM OIS lens for £1099.

fujifilm.eu/uk

Key features at a glance

24.3megapixels JPEGandRaw Takes 1x SD card Continuous shooting at 14fpswith electronic shutter or 8fpswith mechanical shutter

3in tilting touchscreen ISO200-12,800, extended 100-51,2000 30secs to 1/4000sec shutter range in all modes 4Kand Full HDvideo 350 frames battery life approx