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The library showcase (outside the Reference Library, on first floor of Central Library on Surrey Street), is booked for the whole of September 2008 for an exhibition of SPS members' print work. The Society has mounted a small exhibition therein for some years now.

I need mounted prints from members, preferably of images not shown at the Winter Garden or Annual Exhibitions. Because the showcase has limited space, I would prefer images no larger than A4 size, mount extra. Small prints, submitted to the Annual Exhibition but not accepted, would be welcome. The images will be selected by Eileen and I and we will do our best to include at least one image from every member who submits work, space permitting of course.

I would like to have the images in my possession by the end of July. You can let me have them at the summer outings, or drop them in to my house (advisable to ring first). At Digital Group last Thursday I said they can be given to me at forthcoming Digital Group meetings, but I have since discovered that I will probably not be there in June and July - sorry about that.

Colin New kindly arranged to collect and take along prints for the London Salon, which encouraged more members than usual to send in entries. Colin now has the results:

Congratulations to those people who have had acceptances and medals in this year's London Salon. It was the Salon's biggest entry for years and the most successful for SPS ever. Commiserations to those who were not successful on this occasion. Better luck next year.

Guy Brown 2 acceptances (one Gold Medal)
Fred Bean one Gold Medal
Adrian Richardson 1 acceptance
Rebecca Nex 1 acceptance
Keith Lord 2 acceptances

The complete list of those who had acceptances is now up on the London Salon website http://www.londonsalon.org/ along with images showing the gold medal winners. The exhibition will be opened in London at the Cottons centre on 28th June at 2.30. It will be on show from 28 June to 11 July. The exhibition will have its second opening at Smethwick Photographic Society on 19th July at 2.30. It will remain on show from 19th to 31st July.

We are planning to hold a special exhibition in the Winter Garden in Spring 2009 to show prints on the theme of Sheffield Life. The plan is that members should take photographs on that theme between now and around September 2008 and submit them in the autumn for possible inclusion in the exhibition. There will be a lot going on in Sheffield during that period so there should be plenty of opportunities to get interesting pictures of Sheffield people at work and play. If you can get pictures of places or events that are not very well known you will obviously stand more chance of getting your pictures selected for the exhibition - if you go for the Peace Gardens or the silver balls outside the Winter Garden you will have to come up with something really special to stand out from the crowd!

To help us on our way, Steve Dorey has produced a list of events happening in Sheffield during the summer - click here to see it. If you know of any other interesting events, contact Steve at a meeting or via email (to Steve dot Dorey at gmail dot com) and he will add details to the list.

Jim Charlton has now produced a document giving the details of this exhibition, and suggests that you look at this page of events in Sheffield to see what is coming up.

This year's Bakewell Photographic Circle outing (which many SPS members go on) is heading for Whitby on Sunday 18th May. The pick up times given earlier were wrong, as we are in fact setting off half an hour earlier than usual. The correct times are 07:30 Bakewell, 07:35 Baslow, 07:45 Robin Hood pub, Springfield Road, and 08:00 Rustlings Road / Ecclesall Road junction. Please don't be late!

Terry Irons has provided information about the meeting topics for the next few digital group sessions, and dates of meetings for the next year.

29/Feb/08: Colin New exhibition

Colin New has an exhibition on in Barnsley from 4th March to 29th April 2008. Click on the poster for more information.

At our exhibition at the cathedral we asked the visiting public to vote for the picture that they liked best. The results were: first (16 votes) "Ready for Battle" by Ray Brightman; second (15 votes) "Stonelow" by Stephen Elliott; joint third (14 votes each) "Foggy Bottom" by Stephen Elliott and "Burbage Sunset" by Peter Matthews. This is the second consecutive year in which Ray has won the Favourite Print Poll. Click here to see the winning print.

Our annual exhibition in February this year took place in the new 1554 Gallery at the Sheffield Cathedral. Click here to see the award-winning images.

Gerry Sweetman has provided me with some pictures of one of the summer outings that I did not go on, and Eileen Cooke has provided pictures for last year's Winter Garden exhibition.

As I am sure you will have heard by now, our annual exhibition in February 2008 will be held at a new venue, the newly-built gallery at Sheffield cathedral. We are very excited about this chance to use this new space, which has been open for only a few months, but we will have to work very hard on publicity to make sure that everyone finds our exhibition!

Keith Allchin has produced some documents about the exhibition, which will also be sent out with the next newsletter:

In the early days of the digital group we had an outing to take photographs of the Christmas lights in Sheffield, and this has been repeated several times since them. Last year the weather was extremely wet, which is good for night photography, but somehow most members preferred the inside of a cafe to venturing out into the rain. We are going to try again this year, a little earlier in the evening to catch the twilight, and in time for you to get some good shots and take them along to the December digital group meeting one week later.

Details are: Meet at 4pm in the Winter Garden on Thursday 29th November. You don't need to tell me if you are coming: just turn up. If you can't make the early start time, come along later and ring me on my mobile (07903 071768) to find out where we have got to. Don't forget to bring your tripod. Peter Mason.

The Winter Garden exhibition has been very successful and featured several times in the local papers. Many thousands of passers by saw the exhibition, and many of them took time out to thoroughly enjoy it. You can relive the exhibition on the web by clicking here.

This year's Winter Garden exhibition will run from 5th to 12th November 2007; if you want to take part you need to sign up soon on Keith Allchin's sheet. Keith has provided a document giving full details of the exhibition and the timetable of events leading up to it.

This competition will be run in a different way this year to try to improve the organization of the evenings. There are two new documents available, one giving the rules of the competition, and the other offering guidance on mounting your prints and slides, and preparing digital images.

On Tuesday 13th February 2007 some past and present members of Sheffield Photographic Society were invited to take tea with Jackie Drayton, the Lord Mayor of Sheffield. Jackie gave the invitation after opening our exhibition at the Winter Garden last November. Here are a few photographs of the occasion.


Jackie shows us the mayoral robes	Eileen presents an AV to the mayor	Gerry Sweetman tries the mace for size	Jackie telling the story of the Bapaume vase