AV News 195 - February 2014
The Jessop Rose Bowl Competition
Malcolm Imhoff FRPS
This is the only regional IAC AV competition, organised by Richard Brown,
Malcolm & Maggie Imhoff, on behalf of the CEMRIAC region of the IAC, and held
at the excellent Smethwick Photographic Society clubroom where the big screen,
computer and sound system are already set up - luxury! This year there was a
significant increase both in the number of entries and the people attending, which
we partly put down to the tweaking of the rules so that entries were permitted from
anyone in the Central and East Midland region of the IAC, and not, as in previous
years, members of the IAC or affiliated clubs in the CEMRIAC region. A good
marketing move was to offer membership at a reduced rate to anyone joining on
the day.
The judges for the day were the husband and wife team of Mike and Lavinia
Hardwick, both DPAGB, who had the entries in advance and were therefore able
to give very detailed comments. Mike and Lavinia were very active AV producers
in the analogue days but found the transition to digital very difficult and faded out
for a while. They are now back encouraging members of Worcester AV Group,
several of whom entered for the first time. It was clear from their comments that
they still have a pretty good idea of what makes a good AV.
It was interesting to hear that of the twenty entries they awarded eight A’s, with
very little to separate them apart from the winner which was the fast moving ‘Men
of Iron’ by Andrew N. Gagg which also won the trophy for best sound. I'm sure
you will see this at a national event soon. Commended was ‘Send in the Clowns’
by John Holt, a song illustration featuring Venetian masks. Four AVs were Highly
Commended: ‘Angels and Demons’, also by Andrew Gagg, ‘A Walk in the
Park’ by Malcolm Imhoff, ‘Glassworks’, a beautiful Photo Harmony sequence by
Martin Addison, and Harry Hunt's travelogue ‘Land of the Midnight Sun’. In third
place was an excellent documentary, ‘Terracotta Army’ by Gordon Nicklin, while
Howard Bagshaw came second with his creative look at the new Birmingham
Library called ‘Worth a Visit’.
All the AVs were enjoyable and several narrowly missed out from receiving an
award. My favourites included ‘Inside my Mind’, an exploration of dementia by
Ray Dowding, ‘The Survivors’, by Barbara Jones, and ‘Senescence’ by Alastair
Taylor. It was a most enjoyable day and definitely ‘worth a visit’.
Iron in the Blood?
Andrew N. Gagg FRPS
"What" I say to Christine "are we going to do in Barcelona for just half a day?"
Once or twice a year I speak on board one cruise ship or another. This time the
theme is 'Cultural Italy', but to reach Italy from England you have to pass Spain,
and Barcelona's an inevitable port of call. "There's always El Corte Inglés." she
replies. Her stamina magically increases when it comes to traipsing around shops
and I groan inwardly. "I've got a better idea." I say "We've seen most of the
architectural interest of Barcelona before, when we had time to do it properly,
Güell Park and the Sagrada Família and all that - but I wouldn't mind going back
to the house Antoni Gaudí built for that industrialist chap, early on in his career."
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