Club Meeting, Browell Trophy Competition -Tuesday 9th December 2025.

                           
     1st. Arctic Tern feeding Chick.                        2nd. Mute Swan.                          3rd. Curlew Probing.

On Tuesday 09th December 2025, Morpeth Camera Club welcomed Peter Walton ABIPP AMP Dip.PP of Durham
Photograpic Society. A recognised nature and wildlife photographer, he had been invited to judge our annual
Pdi Natural History Competition. In this contest members compete for the Browell Trophy, a silver salver that
was presented to the club in memory of former member Jack Browell, who had a great knowledge and keen
interest of the subject.

The rules allow each entrant to submit up to three digital images in colour or monochrome, the main criteria
being that subjects must be in the wild or natural habitat and cannot include pets, farm or captive animals,
including those in zoos or wildlife parks. Among the images entered were colourful butterflies, wild flowers,
seabirds, insects, garden birds, lichen, ducks, seaweed, and assorted fungi.

Throughout the evening, Peter commented on all images offering advice on composition, depth of field, the
use of space and using ISO settings and shutter speeds to avoid softness. Peter also offered each author the
opportunity to give us an insight into their individual images by sharing where, how and why they were taken,
giving the audience invaluable background information about techniques, locations and approaches they may
try themselves.

Following his well-informed interesting critique of all the entries, Peter announced that he had selected four
images as Highly Commended with awards going to Wild Garlic and Fern by Brian Morris that was graceful in
its composition, Oyster Mushroom by Roseanne Robinson, with good light and detail. Flowers of Red Campion
by Davy Bolam that had a balance of colour and shape, Wild Wheat by Brian Morris that would make a good
picture on a wall.

Moving on, Peter stated that it had been very difficult to narrow down the thirty three images to his top five.
He had enjoyed the task and thanked everyone for their time and effort. Fifth place went to Sandpaper Vine
by Roseanne Robinson, a menagerie of flora and fauna. Fourth place was Coprinellus Fungi by Jeremy Cooper,
taken from an essential low angle. Third place went to A Curlew Probing by Paul Appleby that had captured
the moment with a good depth of field. In Second place was Mute Swan by Glyn Trueman, which showed fine
detail, with good exposure and composition. In first place and winner of the Browell Trophy was Arctic Tern
feeding Chick by Paul Appleby, described by the judge as a spontaneous natural event well captured by the
author.

Davy Bolam,
Pdi Comp Sec.