Speaker – Ian Boulton -Wednesday 5th April 2021

The Society has decided this year to have a summer program with a Zoom talk once a month as a way of involving the membership in place of our popular day outings. The speaker this month was Ian Boulton from Bristol with his talk “Each to his own way, I`ll go mine”. Ian is an accomplished street photographer with an eye for the unusual as well as what some might consider the mundane. His subjects are mostly everyday people who have peeked his interest or individuals who stand out by their dress eccentricity or individuality. His advice was to walk slowly when carrying your camera along the highways and byways, by doing so you have time to observe more and are thus likely to capture someone or something idiosyncratic. He uses slow shutter speeds to  produce blurry images for effect, and prefers candid to posed pictures. If he wishes to take a close up an individual he will always ask permission first to avoid any unpleasantness.

Using reflections he captures double images which gives matching colours to enhance the visual impact of his subjects and their surroundings. Shots taken through windows, open to frame, or closed to give depth, add to the versatility of his craft. Anamorphic lenses are used to give greater dramatic effect. Ian shoots in Raw Format, sometimes using colour pictures converted to black and white to accentuate contrasts in his pictures. This most interesting of evenings finished with members questions and appreciative thanks to Ian for his candidness, vision and expertise.

More of Ian’s work can be found on https://www.instagram.com/boultonian/?hl=en

Joe Peterson