‘Staycation Summer’
See the Mini Challenge 5 RESULTS Here
Coronavirus Update 28/5/20
In view of the uncertainties around the coronavirus situation, we will run the first 3 months of next season online.
Your Committee has been working through lockdown to prepare the programme of talks, activities and competitions for next year. Having initially prepared a full season based on meetings at Castle Park Arts Centre, we have now reluctantly decided it would be unwise to go back to “business as normal” in September, even if Government regulations allow and if Castle Park Arts Centre is open.
We know that many of you will be disappointed with this decision, as are we, but our reasons include:
- the age and health of many of our members and/or their family mean they may be reluctant to meet together indoors because of the risk of cross-infection,
- uncertainty about when Castle Park Arts Centre will be allowed to open, and whether their social distancing arrangements would make our meetings possible.
With three full months to plan to take the club online, we are confident that we will be able to arrange a full and enjoyable programme of activities.
These will include talks, our first three club competitions, demonstrations, members’ nights and practical activities.
We will run some free ‘taster’ online meetings in the next couple of months and can offer one-to-one tutorials/ test sessions to get you started, if needed.
We hope that most of you will decide to stay on as members, but to accommodate those who feel an online club is not for them, next year’s subscription will fall into two parts (or of course you can pay for the full season as usual £50) – a £25 membership fee for September to December and a second £25 subscription for the January-April meetings. Although the cost of running the club online will be lower than normal, we will still have costs such as insurance, L&CPU membership, licencing costs for the online software and, in some cases, speakers’ fees.
Competitions will run much as before, except that they will be restricted to Digital Images while we operate online. We will bring back the print competitions as soon as we are able to meet in person. Incidentally, we are tweaking the scoring system slightly to improve the feedback for beginners and will be introducing a new “Novice Cup”, but we’ll tell you more about that later.
For those who can’t, or don’t wish to participate in online meetings, we hope to record the meetings and make the recordings available for later viewing on our website.
Over the next couple of weeks, we will be trying to speak to all members individually to get feedback on this decision and to identify any concerns, so we can do our best to address them before the start of the season.
Meanwhile, keep safe and keep shooting
The Society was established in 1965 for those with an interest, hobby or occupation in photography in Frodsham and the surrounding district.
Our Aims are to promote local interest in photography through regular meetings providing education, recreation and competition and to use our skills in the support of our local communities.
We are a friendly group. If you have an interest in photography at any level and would enjoy sharing ideas and experiences with like-minded people then please come along to one of the meetings. You will be made most welcome whatever your level of expertise and your first visit is free.
If you think you might join details are here.