Cornwall Visit Spring 2009

[BarryWilkinson]

I would like to express my thanks to Neil and Jean for organising a really great weekend. There is so much to do and see around West Cornwall. It was nice to see some new and familiar faces. My personal thanks to Tony and Jean for driving me around.

The weather was not perfect but this is England! But I'm pretty sure a lot of film was used over the weekend and would really like to see some results posted here.

The Hotel proved excellent, the Doom Bar was superb! Nice to view everyone's prints in our 'private' space. Newcomer Bill's prints were superb, thanks for bringing them Bill, keep up the good work.

Looking forward to returning to this area, well done Neil and Jean.

Barry

[delphine]

Ditto.

A very heartedly thank you to Neil and Jean for guiding us and welcoming us. I had a great time, and it was nice to see old faces, and finally meet Ian, as well Keith and Roger.
The portfolios were very inspiring. For me, the highlight of the week-end were Bill's still lifes, and cornish pastries.

Saturday was a bit of a drench, and it is unfortunate that Ian and his nephew had so much hardship during the night. I understand that I am no longer in charge of the weather.

A pity that the visit was so short. The Cornish coast is a marvel.

Hoping to process my rolls soon-ish

Warmest regards to all,

Delphine

PS: I am sorry I missed the group photograph

[Mark Burley]

Hi All, both Norma and I had a great time - huge thanks to Neil and Jean for organising us all. Great venues and no grumbles. I personally loved seeing everyones prints again. So much that inspired - thank you all.

Highlights for me were Cot Valley and Gwithian? beach - great locations - or should I say amazing!

But best of all were all of your prints - magic stuff from everyone. Stoo's fantastic toned images of the Lakes and Porth Nanven. Neil and Jean's Lith prints, Tony's landscapes and a sublime portrait of Jean, Keith's superb prints of Dartmoor and studio portraits, Ian's prints from Greece including 6x17 images, Rodger's Canadian landscapes, Delphine's incredibly technical printing technique - leading to beautifully simple prints! Barry for lending an invisible hand to the weather God, Bill's wonderful studies of fish, rocks and landscapes - that will keep on inspiring me for years to come.

Thanks all, for a superb weekend...

Great location, good company, great food and drink and a lovely space to say. Thank you to everyone for making the weekend so good

- as ever , the APUG weekenfd

[Brook Hill]

Jean and I would like to say a big thankyou to Neil and his wife Jean for making the weekend such a success. Not only did Neil & Jean act as first class guides, taking us to all those special places, they also spent a lot of time in advance checking them out and planning the time table; your efforts were much appreciated by us all.

It was great to meet up again with old friends and meet new ones which made such a relaxing and interesting weekend. It was hard to drag ourselves away from breakfast on Monday to go home.

Tony

[Neil Souch]

Hi everyone!!

We are so pleased that you all had a good time (despite the weather) and made it home OK. It was great to see you all too and to see all the wonderful work you brought along for us to all see. I think we all learnt a lot from the various photo sharing sessions we had and gained much inspiration from seeing the prints in the flesh. It was also good to hear the the Queens came up to your expectations as it is always good to have a hotel that you can recommend. I know when I found the Queens, and although I had no idea what it was actually like, I was pretty assured it would be OK as I had not heard anything said about it. One thing about living down in west Cornwall you soon find out is that bad news travels fast so if you don't hear anything - it is usually OK! I have developed two of my 6x6 films yesterday and the negs look OK (Cot Valley / Gwithian / South Wheal Frances) so hopefully some prints will be produced later this week :-) The best part of the trip for me was seeing most of you tucking into hot Cornish pasties at 11.30 am which were supposed to be eaten at Gwithian for lunch!!! Then finding that this was OK as spares had been purchased for lunch and were in the cars ;-)

Don't forget if you ever want to come back again you will always be made welcome by us local fellow enthusiasts and that there are many more Cornish pasties, Doom Bars and wonderful photo loctions to be discovered and sampled :-)

Neil.

[bill spears]

So glad you all had a good time despite the weather. Hats off to all those who braved the elements with their cameras, especially on the Saturday and especially to Stoo at Botallack (that was hardcore mate !!) Hope everyone's equipment has dried out ok !

Really enjoyed meeting you all in person - seeing all your lovely prints was very inspiring and, Delphine: I don't want to hear of any more '' refusing to show your work'' episodes ! - I so admired your dedication.

Another highlight for me was seeing all the large format cameras out on location - what a lovely sight ! We're really 'starved' down here in Cornwall of good traditional (Real!) photography and this kind of event makes me feel almost priviledged to belong to the film brigade.

Hopefully get to see some of you again in the future, maybe on another meeting although time and money restrictions usually get in the way for me.

Cheers
Bill

[Stoo Batchelor]

Well, I can only echo the thanks being given to Neil and Jean for the work they put in to the organization of the weekend. They put together a list of fantastic locations to visit.

It was also great to get together with old faces, and meet some new. The sharing of the photographs is always the highlight of these weekends, and this one didn't disappoint. I hadn't seen Neil and Jean's work before, so it was great to see their wonderful Lith images. Mark's portfolio has grown and he had added some great new work, which is always a pleasure to see. Keith Tapscott's portraits are a joy, no monitor could ever do them justice. Some great stuff from Roger, Ian and Tony as well, the list is endless, apologies if I've missed you.

My highlight was the portfolio of Bill Spears. Truly delightful. I don't think I will ever look at fish the same way again!

Star prize of photo of the weekend is a joint one for me, and it has to go to both Bill's winning untitled still life of a bunch of tulips, which won him the title of Black and white Photography's 'Printer of the Year'(hope I'm right there) and Delphine's image of 'The Natural History Museum' Both truly, truly wonderful photographs.

See you all next spring (or sooner)

Best

Stoo

[Neil Souch]

Delighted to hear you enjoyed yourself Stoo :-)

Neil.

[Keith Tapscott.]

I enjoyed the weekend in Cornwall, despite the weather. It was nice to meet fellow apug members and I was in awe of the prints that I saw from every one who brought their photographs with them.
The quality of those photos made me feel very inadequate to be honest and they were very inspiring to say the least. It was also a good way of finding some of the many photogenic locations in Cornwall. I will definitely be visiting there again sometime.

We didn`t need the suncream that Bill recommended us to bring along.

Best wishes to everyone who attended and I hope you all took some good photographs.

Keith.

[Ian Grant]

Was a great weekend despite the RAIN and force 10 storm on the Friday night, James & I couldn't have got wetter if I'd jumped into a swimming pool fully clothed (we were camping)

What a great bunch of people it was a real pleasure to meet you all, I hope the next UK APUG events co-incide with one of my trips back to the UK. Thanks Neil for all your organisation.

I think you have all convinced James to have ago at B&W for himself, if anyone's shootingonDarmoor he'd like to cycle down & meet up.

Ian