Club Meeting, Photographing Northumberland - Tuesday 6th September 2022.
On the first evening of the new season, Morpeth Camera Club welcomed guest speaker, Anita Nicholson with her
presentation entitled ‘Photographing Northumberland.’ Anita, a landscape photographer, is also the author of The
Fotoview Guide to Photographing Northumberland. Taking the form of a time line Anita said that her photography
started when her granddad bought her a camera and since her arrival in Northumberland 16 years ago, her love
of the coast and countryside of Northumberland, The Lake District and beyond have been a source of inspiration
to her.
In 2014 she was invited to commission for a business support programme, and also became involved in online
stock photography, after which a publishing company approached her to supply images for a Northumberland
guidebook with text. This led to the Fine Art America accepting her images for their online gallery, which she
stated has proved to be quite lucrative.
Anita was astonished when she was chosen to provide images for the Fotoview Guide as she had deleted their
initial email thinking that it was spam, but luckily they persisted and she gladly accepted their brief. For this
series of well known guides, the publishers contact a photographer from each county to photographically tell
the story of their area, which should include landscapes, village scenes, food, wildlife, fairs and local people.
Anita, who works full time, took four years to complete the brief which had to be carefully planned. With sixty
locations, both familiar and less obvious, a reasonable balance between location and seasons had to be shown.
It was a dream assignment, she said, where she met up with local people, visited many unfamiliar locations,
explored different aspects of each area taking photographs, which included Druridge Bay’s sea frets, Sycamore
Gap at sunset, the river Wansbeck in Autumn, the Cheviots, Routing Linn, the Farne Islands, and Bamburgh.
A ‘Before and After’ section followed where she explained her equipment, software and settings adding that one
can over think and be over zealous when processing an image as the original RAW file can often turn out to be
better. She continued with humorous anecdotes of her quest to photograph badgers in their natural habitat with
a trail camera, and followed on with macro images of flora, rust and ripped tarpaulin detail.
Her grandad also instilled charity work into her, to give something back. Anita's work has helped to raise funds
for the North Shields Fishermen's Heritage Project, a memorial for fishermen who lost their lives at sea and many
other North East community charities and projects over the years. She is also proud to support The Hope Centre
at Cramlington, (a local foodbank and so much more), through donations raised from her print sales.
Anita concluded by saying that in photography there is something for everyone, get out when you can and capture
what you see; on bad weather days, look closer. Club Joint Chair, Sue Dawson, thanked Anita for her presentation
which reflected her expertise, talents and passion for photography, after which refreshments were enjoyed.
presentation entitled ‘Photographing Northumberland.’ Anita, a landscape photographer, is also the author of The
Fotoview Guide to Photographing Northumberland. Taking the form of a time line Anita said that her photography
started when her granddad bought her a camera and since her arrival in Northumberland 16 years ago, her love
of the coast and countryside of Northumberland, The Lake District and beyond have been a source of inspiration
to her.
In 2014 she was invited to commission for a business support programme, and also became involved in online
stock photography, after which a publishing company approached her to supply images for a Northumberland
guidebook with text. This led to the Fine Art America accepting her images for their online gallery, which she
stated has proved to be quite lucrative.
Anita was astonished when she was chosen to provide images for the Fotoview Guide as she had deleted their
initial email thinking that it was spam, but luckily they persisted and she gladly accepted their brief. For this
series of well known guides, the publishers contact a photographer from each county to photographically tell
the story of their area, which should include landscapes, village scenes, food, wildlife, fairs and local people.
Anita, who works full time, took four years to complete the brief which had to be carefully planned. With sixty
locations, both familiar and less obvious, a reasonable balance between location and seasons had to be shown.
It was a dream assignment, she said, where she met up with local people, visited many unfamiliar locations,
explored different aspects of each area taking photographs, which included Druridge Bay’s sea frets, Sycamore
Gap at sunset, the river Wansbeck in Autumn, the Cheviots, Routing Linn, the Farne Islands, and Bamburgh.
A ‘Before and After’ section followed where she explained her equipment, software and settings adding that one
can over think and be over zealous when processing an image as the original RAW file can often turn out to be
better. She continued with humorous anecdotes of her quest to photograph badgers in their natural habitat with
a trail camera, and followed on with macro images of flora, rust and ripped tarpaulin detail.
Her grandad also instilled charity work into her, to give something back. Anita's work has helped to raise funds
for the North Shields Fishermen's Heritage Project, a memorial for fishermen who lost their lives at sea and many
other North East community charities and projects over the years. She is also proud to support The Hope Centre
at Cramlington, (a local foodbank and so much more), through donations raised from her print sales.
Anita concluded by saying that in photography there is something for everyone, get out when you can and capture
what you see; on bad weather days, look closer. Club Joint Chair, Sue Dawson, thanked Anita for her presentation
which reflected her expertise, talents and passion for photography, after which refreshments were enjoyed.