I must apologize for the unmitigated disaster of our last club’s meeting. In theory it should of worked well. Unfortunately, it didn’t. First of all I want to make it clear it was not because of our presenter, Allen Kurth. Allen, Kathleen and I did a test run on line and it worked out excellently. If we all had been on the Zoom call and not in person it would have worked out. I am reminded how well it went when Peter did his presentation during a Zoom only meeting . Thank you to Allen for trying.

First of all, the wireless internet connection was terrible. Next, was the lack of good audio volume for those of us that attended the meeting live at the forest. And our digital projector’s display was not large enough for us at the forest to see clearly enough of what Allen was doing. And lastly it was my fault for not anticipating the troubles we experienced at the meeting. It was clearly a waste of your time to attend this meeting. That is on me and I am sorry. If we try this again, I recommend that the next president do a Zoom only meeting.

Thanks to Kyle, Brent, and Kathleen for their help with the meeting.

March 17, 2022 Photo Club Meeting.

Jay Davis will be our guest speaker and will do a presentation on Architectural and Commercial photography. Jay is another past president of the club. Jay’s website has information about Jay and Jay’s business.

We will attempt to do an in-person meeting and a zoom call at the same time. We will have Jay’s laptop connected to our projector and we will have Kyle on the camera looking at the projector’s display screen.

We may have Jay share his screen with the zoom participants for better visuals.

Camera for Sale

From Alan Brodin:

I am in the process of converting to Mirrorless cameras and am starting to sell off some of my DSLR equipment.

I have a Nikon D500 in Like New condition with less than 12,000 shutter releases with a battery grip I am selling for $1,000. I have all the original box, packaging, charger, and battery. See attached.

I will also have 2 Nikon D750’s to sell once my new Z9 gets here.

Please contact the webmaster for Alan's contact information if you are interested.

Photoshop

Field Trip

Would any of you be interested in a Zoom only meeting? And if I can get Allen to agree to show us what we attempted to do at the last meeting, perhaps we can have a successful presentation. This would be on a different night from our regular 3rd Thursday of the month. Think of it as a field trip on line. Please comment below or contact your webmaster if you would like to participate.

Video

Allen was attempting to give us some help post editing photos at the February meeting. Photoshop can be as easy as you need or as hard as you make it. I find myself in the middle. The video below has a lot of info for the 13 minute length. I recommend you pause the video at each subject and have your Photoshop program loaded and play with the tool shown, then move on.

YouTube is a resource with hundreds if not thousands of tutorials for learning Photoshop.

I have a goal to be able to take out a person in a photo and insert a different person in place of original person. What are yours?

That’s It

I will close for now and hope for better times to be achieved for all of you. Please leave a comment below on what you thought of today’s post.

Phil

In one of my last posts there was confusion in what I said and what the meeting minutes provided by the secretary wrote. Someone thought the secretary wrote that some members were still a bit skittish attending in person at our club meeting. These were my words not the Secretary. Please observe the title of the section in posts that I submit to the website. On this post I have only included the minutes from the February meeting so there should not be any confusion.

If there are any changes or modifications needed, please comment below!

Phil

Fontenelle Forest Photo Club Meeting minutes

Fontenelle Forest Photo Club Meeting minutes

Agenda items

1. Welcome by President Phil Mininni.
2. New members: None

Changes are being made at the Forest that may affect our photo displays. 1. They are remodeling. 2. The Baright gallery may be going away. 3. A place for our photos will definitely change.

The Forest wants to display only photos taken at the forest which may limit our photo taking. We took a small vote and about 19 members disagreed with this and about 3 members agreed. It isn’t easy for all members to walk the forest property due to physical limitations. Members suggested some of the following:

*This is an unreasonable request

*We do what they ask because they allow us to use the facility for free.

*We pick the subject for the forest display.

*If we can’t get many forest shots then in our display maybe highlight 3 photos of the forest within the other photos on display.

*Do a “four seasons of the forest” display.

*Display the photos of the Forest that were entered in our Photo contest whether they were a winner or not.

Maybe as members shoot photos of the forest or at our raptor shoots, create a folder on your computer and keep all forest pictures together so they are readily available when we ask for them for our display.

Judy and Frank: Accepted photos of sunrise/sunset for Library display. Holding off on hoof stock photos for the forest until it is worked out or understood exactly what the Forest wants displayed. Phil will set up a meeting with them again to discuss. Also, if you want to sell any of your photos that are on display there is a sign that says ask at the desk and then they contact the photographer with the buyer information.

The library is moving to the area of the corner of Cornhusker and Fort Crook Road amongst the businesses located there. No date yet on when the move is to occur.

Kathleen: Treasurer’s report: amount in Treasury is: $1464.67

Brent:

Sue: A member suggested to Phil that the responsibilities of the Secretary of the photo club are very lax in content. I try to record the information being provided and discussed. This is a small club with 57 members, all of whom do not attend, and sometime the content of discussion is very minimal and I will not apologize for how I do this task, but at any time if I have missed something or typed any content incorrectly any member is welcomed and encouraged to mention it for submission or correction. Thank you.

Donna Gray:

Kathy Holm: Kathy had sent Phil a suggestion on how to attract young people to join was to see if the Forest would have a lower membership fee for young people and maybe our club could offer a student membership rate.

Bellevue Times

We have our meeting info posted on the calendar in the Times. Thanks to Kathleen for working with the editor.

Forest partnership with the photo club

The forest is excited about the club’s potential participation in more of the activities the forest holds during the year.

1. Walking tours
2. Photographing events
3. Giving photo hints to their members, i.e., on walking tours

Flora and fauna

Landscapes

4. Possible night walks

3. Our speaker tonight was past president and current member, Alan Kurth showed us some of his workflow of post processing photos using Lightroom and Photoshop. Unfortunately, it did not go as well as planned due to the technical issues. Maybe in the future Alan can present again in person at one of our meetings. Thank you, Alan, for your efforts.
4. Thanks to Lorraine Feldhausen and Diane Kinney for the treats tonight.
5. Our speaker for March will be past president Jay Davis on Architectural photography.

Submitted by Club Secretary:

Sue Mininni

Rockbrook Camera

Rockbrook having a Bird Photography Contest.

Go.Omaha.com/PhotoContest   is the link.

National Wildlife Federation

Also is having a contest.

Photo Contest

Sunrise/Sunset

I had forgotten to mention. Judy will be collecting, at the February 17th meeting, your sunrise/sunset photos for the next library display.

Proofread

Wife mentioned that I should have proof read my last posting more than twice. Definitely not an English major. I did rush to put out the last post. My apologies!

Photo Contest

The National Wildlife Federation has a photo contest.

We are excited to announce the following nine categories for entry in our 2022 contest:

• Birds: Portraits and behavior
• Mammals: Portraits and behavior
• Baby Animals: Portraits and behavior of young animals of any species
• Other Wildlife: Portraits and behavior (includes underwater life, reptiles, amphibians, insects, spiders, macro and more)
• Landscapes & Plants: Scenic views and plants from backyards to wild places
• People in Nature: People enjoying the outdoors or connecting with nature and wildlife
• Mobile: Nature, wildlife and people outdoors photographed with a mobile device (phone or tablet)
• Portfolio Category: A submission of up to 10 images built around a common theme related to nature and conservation (*To enter a portfolio, you MUST purchase the Photography Portfolio entry package, listed below.)
• Young Nature Photographers: For photographers age 13-17

Check out their website for details

Photoshop and Lightroom

Allen Kurth has accepted the challenge of presenting some of the steps he takes to clean up a photo using Photoshop and Lightroom. He will try to answer your questions. Allen is a past president of the Fontenelle Forest Photo Club and an award winning photographer. Some of our members may add to the presentation by assisting in answering questions and/or their input using these two programs. He will be sharing his screen from home on the Zoom call.

Zoom Call and In-person Meeting

We are doing a zoom call in concurrence with an in-person meeting at the Forest at 7:00 PM. For the members using Zoom, please check in from 6:45 to 7:00 PM. The Forest has deemed your mask do work and is now requiring us to wear one inside their building. Kathleen will be sending out invites to attend the Zoom call shortly. If you have not receive one by Wednesday the 16th, contact me at webmaster@fontenelleforestphotoclub.org . Members are the ones we permit Zoom meeting access. If you are a non-member and request to visit, contact me. You can either email webmaster or leave a comment below. And you are always welcome to come in-person to our meetings to visit.

We will attempt to video record our meeting and post it on YouTube. We did a trial run with Allen and Kathleen to see how Allen can use his PC to share his screen. We will use the digital projector for our in-person participants. We may have to sit closer to the screen. An of course I beg your indulgence as we will need some time to work out technical details if and when they occur.

Forest Photos Database

One of the many things the Forest is planning for is to accumulate photos taken at the Forest. The Leaflet the Forest publish will have photos, some of which will be taken by our members, taken at the Forest. The following subjects they are looking for are;

• Common Winter Birds
• Deer in Winter
• Photos of Snow at the Forest
• Spring Wildflowers
• Spring Fungi
• Baby Animal in Springtime
• Trails During the Spring

This is an initial list that will change during the year. The forest is still dealing with the logistics of the database and who will maintain it. They will be looking for photos that are high resolution, 300 dpi or better. They would like files sent as .png or .eps. Please include any caption info (ID/location) and the photographer to credit. But DO NOT send any now till they are ready. I would like our members to make a folder in their systems and place Forest photos, you take or have taken, in it. Then you will be ready when the Forest sends out a request for photos.

I could start our own database and keep on a separate hard drive. The club can afford one that has a few Tb or more. I will try to discuss at the meeting on Thursday.

Content Aware Fill

A powerful tool in Photoshop. See video below!

Will be an in person and a Zoom meeting combined. I would like to see all of you at the meeting in person. I understand those of you who are still skittish to attend in person, will Zoom.

This posting is somewhat delayed. I am still working on a speaker for February 17 meeting. Judy wants you to bring your sunrise/sunset photos to the meeting. She also need you to work on your animals with hooves.

Photo Displays

Bring your sunrise/sunset and animals with hooves to the February meeting. Forest is requesting that photos displayed at the forest be taken in the forest. I think this limits us somewhat because it doesn’t allow for our members to shine and display their talents across the board. And some of us old timers not physically able to handle those hills. I hope to work something out with the forest executives. Kathleen had a great idea. We could display photos of the raptors from past photo shoots. I don’t think 18 photos of the vulture would be too interesting. We would need to mix it up.

Bellevue Times

We have posted meeting info at the Bellevue Times calendar. www.BellevueTimes.com . One of the most powerful features of the new site is the Bellevue Community Calendar. Finally Bellevue has an easy to navigate, one-stop-shop for all of our Community events. I’d like to invite you or someone from your group to add some of your future events to the calendar – even if they are months away. It is easy to do. Just go to this link to get started:https://www.bellevuetimes.com/events/community/add/

January meeting 1_20_2022

Below is a YouTube video of our Zoom Meeting. Click on the link or hit play on the arrow below.

https://youtu.be/XwSlBChCaJQ

A Comment on our Zoom Meeting

Just wanted to let you know that even though I was not feeling well, I feel like I learned helpful pointers on  everything from what to focus on as a suitable subject to how to lighten gray snow. That picture of the frost on the window was such a terrific example of how simple and often overlooked subjects can be unexpectedly beautiful. 
I think once members get more familiar with the format, they will offer more suggestions. But there were several really good suggestions, and you did a good job showing how to implement them on the screen. And it sure seemed Margaret (?), the dark-haired lady with glasses, was very familiar with the editing process.  
I hope you will try to do several more of these—even if they have to be done on a night other than the regular meeting night. 
Thanks for daring to try something different. 



I am encouraged by your kind words about the Zoom meeting. I think we all learned a bit more. What did you think of the format for this meeting. Please comment below. For those members who did not attend the Zoom call, please watch the video above to see what we accomplished. We had 19 members attend the call.
Phil

February 17, 2022 meeting

My hope for the presentation, Q & A on Photoshop fell through. My speaker’s schedule conflicted with our meeting date. I will pursue other options. Would you be willing to attend a meeting that is not on a third Thursday of the month? If the Forest would allow us to meet on another night. Reagan is quite knowledgeable about Photoshop and other Adobe programs. See his DoSpace video below.

In the meantime I will try to come up with something. February 6, Sunday evening. My other possible speaker fell through also. So I am waiting to hear from another possible speaker.

Reagan Pufall video about PS

January Meeting Minutes

Fontenelle Forest Photo Club Meeting minutes

Agenda items

1. Welcome by President Phil Mininni.

New members: None

Treasurers report by Kathleen: Amount in Treasury is: $1444.67

Brent: Absent

Sue: Nothing new

Judy and Frank: Submit photos at next meeting of Sunrise and/or Sunset and animals with hooves. The forest is pushing for photos only taken in the forest. It was mentioned that taking photos at the Forest are limited due to the physical limitations of some members walking the trails. Phil will meet with them to clarify.

More Forest photos were swapped out for display.

Donna Gray: She will send out an updated informational email about the photo contest

2. The meeting with the forest to go over issues was held Monday Jan 10^th. Discussed problems we have with the website, and with their staff changes they wanted to get a feel for what our club is about. We gave them a copy of our By-laws and talked about what the club can do to promote the forest. They mentioned having nature walks with the public and our members and we would discuss nature photography and what our club is about. They want us to continue providing photos of the forest for the display there and our other photos would still be on display at the Bellevue Library. For right now we will continue to meet at 7pm on the third Thursday unless there is a conflict. They also wanted to thank Tom Boggs again for his photo that was used for the card for their fundraising campaign.
3. Everyone was asked to submit a winter scene photo to Phil that he posted and then the members said what their photo was about and then all the members present could critique them with some positive feedback and/or suggestions on how to improve on it. We had 17 submitted. It went really well.
4. Our speaker for March will be past president Jay Davis on Architectural photography. Still working on someone to present for our February meeting. Looking at having someone from Do Space talk about Photoshop.
5. A suggestion was made to try to come up with a way to encourage high school kids to join our club (maybe contact the schools to see if they have a photo club and get our information to them) and how to get information on our club out to the public to encourage membership.

Submitted by Club Secretary: Sue Mininni

Treats for February Meeting

Lorraine Feldhausen and Diane Kinney are scheduled to bring treats for the February 17 meeting.

Comment Below

Please comment below your thoughts!

Fontenelle Forest Photo Club Meeting minutes

Agenda items

1. Welcome by President Phil Mininni.

New members: None

Treasurers report by Kathleen: She was absent. Amount in Treasury is:

$1444.67
No income or expenses last month.

Brent: Nothing new

Sue: Nothing new

Judy and Frank: Out of town

Donna Gray: Not present

2. Thank you to the Club and Margaret Block-West for the treats tonight.
3. Survey: 19 have taken it so far. Please take it if you haven’t as it closes next week.
4. The meeting with the forest to go over issues with our website as not been scheduled yet as they have not responded to Phil’s email.
5. Lorraine spoke about her 3 sunset pics. She had learned that the better pictures are after the sun goes behind the horizon and wanted to share her info with the members.
6. Phil wants each member to send him one winter picture and our members will critique them at the January 20^th meeting which will be a zoom meeting only.
7. Brent and Keith White were scheduled to bring treats next month so maybe you can bring them on March 17^th as there was only one person signed up. Just let me know if that would work or not.
8. Ken Smith presented on Astro/Star photography.

Submitted by Club Secretary: Sue Mininni

Survey Monkey Survey

Our survey is now closed. Thanks to all of you who participated.

Ken Smith’s slide presentation

Ken has given me permission to make available his slide presentation from our December meeting. Click on this link

Some members have asked to see the slides with the information Ken showed us. I had posted a link previously that only had his photos.

January 20, 2022 Zoom Meeting

I want to remind everyone that our next meeting in January will be a Zoom meeting only. No in-person meeting at the forest this time.

Winter Scene pictures

Send me one photo of a winter scene. Anything goes here, as long as it is a winter themed shot. At this time, not much snow on the ground. There is still time before the January 20th meeting. It can be an old photo, you are not limited to having to take a picture from this year. We will present your photos to the club on our Zoom call. Club members will critique. Be prepared to describe your photo and tell us what kind, if any, post processing you did.

More Winter Photo Ideas

This video is about 11.5 minutes. I liked the Scottish accent.

Closing Thoughts

I want to wish you all a Happy New Year. As always I am sure I’ve forgotten something to talk about. Please comment below if you have any thoughts about anything!

Phil

No In-person Meeting at the Forest

Our next meeting will be on January 20, 2022. I jokingly predicted a major snow storm that evening. We are going to have a Zoom call for this meeting. There will not be an in-person meeting in January, zoom call only. Kathleen will send out invites to all members in January.

Winter Scene Photos

For our meeting, we will be critiquing each other’s photos. I need each of our members to send to the webmaster one photo of a winter scene. Old, new, or one we may have seen before. Anything goes as long as you stay within the theme. Be prepared to discuss your techniques and post processing thoughts. Please be willing to take some constructive criticism. Remember that snow may come out with a bluish tint and you may want to research why it does. Send your photos to webmaster .

Tips for Snow Photos

Our December 16, 2021 Video on YouTube

Since I could not upload our meeting video to the website, I was able to send it to YouTube. You can skip the break we had. It is at 14:20-23:00 minutes. Ken Smith’s presentation is after our break.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Have you had one of those days, weeks, months? Your webmaster is trying to complete some projects at home, work out issues with the website and dealing with the drama that the holidays seem to bring out in people. The most frustrating is dealing with the hosting site officials in resolving already discussed issues.

Our website is owned and supposed to be administrated by the Fontenelle Forest. This is the issue, I can’t make any major changes because my name is not on the registered admin list. I am asking our board to break our website away from the Forest ownership and purchase with our own funds our own website. If approved I will attempt to get on a new hosting site and transfer. in total, our website. I will try to keep the same URL address, if that doesn’t work we will have to get a new domain name. Leave comments below, your thoughts, about taking on this expense.

There is a representative at the forest we will be meeting with in January to discuss the club and website. If I can get permission and rights to the domain, we will not need to go nuclear and start fresh.

Astrophotography

Ken Smith’s presentation was well received. He has provided a link to the slides of his presentation for you to review. Click on this link to see his beautiful slides of the night sky. Night Sky

Ken is willing to give us a field trip to one of the sites. There were some enthusiastic responses for this. It will have to take place in the late spring or early summer. Details to come out later. Keep in mind it will be a late night. Thanks to Ken for a great presentation.

December 16 meeting video

This is one of those things I mentioned about at the beginning of this post. I tried to upload the video of the meeting from December 16 and the system thinks it already has it. I can’t find it at all. I hope to be able to get it to the website after we have our meeting with the forest administration and get access to the hosting site’s support service.

Survey Monkey Results

We had 21 members complete the survey. Below are the results. Thanks to you who took the time to take the survey. I and the board hope to use this info to make our club a better club. I had to “Snip and Sketch” screen shots of the results. I was limited on what I could do. Most of the bells and whistles for this site cost money. I will start with question #1 and place comments that were made under each question. For those of you who did not take the survey, feel free to leave comments below about the survey.

Q1 depends on what is happening with covid

Q2 and I have some knowledge to participate.
Depends on my work schedule

Q3 Would have to be a day I am not working
depends on when and how vigorous (we can’t walk long ways or on too rough of ground)

Q4 I need more help than i can give.
I don’t know enough about digital.
I am not confident enough to do this
Only know my own camera
If I have a skill they don’t have

Q5 There were no comments

Q6 Depends on work load

Q7 Possibly
NA
maybe for certain jobs

Q8 Will Fields & Kurt Brink(professional photographer that heads Hobby Lobby Framing dept.
I found one for last year. Will continue to look.
Will Fields- maybe studio lighting?
I could suggest some interesting people, but I have never met them.
I sent Phil the name of someon who presented on phone photos at the Omaha photo club. Also the “Great Course” series has one on taking photos with a smart phone.

Q9 I need to think about this..
Lightroom develop module
Not confident enough to do this yet.
I am definitely not a professional but could present something on night Astro landscapes
NA
Not sure of any topics I am that proficient in

Q10 When there is notice of a post.

I have been working on the survey. A big thank you to Lorraine Feldhausen and Diane Kinney for coming up with most of the questions. An email will be going out shortly to our members with a link to the survey site. This is the first time I have used Survey Monkey and hopefully we will gather usable information to guide our club direction.

If you do not get an email with the link and you are a paid up member, email the webmaster at webmaster@fonenelleforestphotoclub.org and let me know you did not get the link and I will send it to you.

Treasurer’s Report for November

Greetings:

Nov. Treasurer’s Report:

No Income

No expenses

Balance: $1444.67

December 16 meeting

Don’t forget our December club meeting at the forest. It will be an in-person meeting as well as a Zoom call meeting. Ken Smith will be our speaker and the subject will be on an updated astro/star photography discussion. You all will be sent a Zoom invite. I hope to see most of you at the meeting in-person. There will not be a “pot luck” dinner this time.

Phone Photography

Below is a 15 minute video about street photography tips. I have been pondering a new challenge for our members. That would be a slide show of our phone photos. I would put these on the home page of the website. What do you think? Please comment below,.