Once upon a time… in the late summer of 1977… a group of enthusiasts – including current OPC member, David Isaacs – met at the Overton Community Centre at the very first Overton camera club meeting.

Fast forward to our 2017/18 season and all of a sudden we’re celebrating our 40th anniversary!

Welcome to our 40th anniversary Exhibition

Across the three days of the late May bank-holiday weekend (26–28 May, 2018) Overton Photographic Club returned to Overton Community Centre with over 200 exhibition photographs and lots of ideas for sharing the love of photography.

As well as displaying the talents of our current members, we also featured work from members past, both on stands in the hall and in our anniversary book.

Many of our members were on hand throughout the weekend to talk photography and help people out.

Saturday – the grand opening, library fun and cool cars

For our official opening, SCPF President, Peter Rocchiccioli, delivered a upbeat speech, where he particularly commended our youngest member, Archie Williams.

We hoped to bring the enjoyment of photography to the local community with a range of workshops, talks and events for young and old.

Throughout the week, Overton Library helped us celebrate with a photographic display featuring a range of photography books and a gallery of animal images donated by club members. In the run-up to the weekend there was a photo hamster hunt. And on Saturday morning, there was photo fun for children with a silly selfies project. Such great fun – many thanks to the team there, and thanks to Jo Hatton for the following photos:

Photo display. Find the hamsters. Take a selfie

Saturday afternoon saw the arrival of a couple of magnificent old Morgans. Passers by were kindly allowed to sit in the driver’s seat and have their photo taken. It quickly brought out a lot of smiles.

Sunday – spam, bugs and birds

On Sunday, we hooked up with the effervescent guys and gals from Overton Dramatic Society for a comedy photo shoot just before their dress rehearsal for Spamalot. This was a great giggle and we were very happy to hand over some images which they used to promote the show.

Later on Sunday we met with Jane and Ken MacKenzie from Overton Biodiversity Society and took a small group to Little Meadow for a Nature Workshop. Jane explained how Little Meadow came to be and then we all went on a bug hunt! Brian showed us how it was done with some fine images.

In the evening, Alan Willis shared over ten years of experience with kingfishers at the hall with the latest version of his very popular talk and slideshow. If you have any interest in these amazing birds, you would enjoy any of Alan’s talks on the subject.

Monday – a day for winners

On Monday it was time to wrap it all up and sort out over 200 vote slips for our public ‘vote for your favourite photo’ competition. Congratulations to one of our newest members, Chris Pope, who came out tops with his image, Tunnel Vision. And further congratulations to Jenny who’s name was pulled out of the hat to win the print.

The exhibition was brought to a close with the drawing of the raffle. Many thanks to David Isaacs and Tony Coombes for their help with prizes.

And on the subject of ‘thanks’ – we have a lot of thanks to offer.

A huge thank you

First of all, many thanks to The Four Lanes Trust for their support in helping us make this happen.

Huge thanks to all the local businesses who supported us with raffle prizes:

• Oakley Hall
• Blueberri
• The Overton Gallery
• The Artizans
• Hardy’s Cottage Garden Plants
• Hobbs
• The Red Fort

Thanks also to Steve Williams for offering a kingfisher experience for auction and to Alan for his kingfisher talk.

With this help, we ended up breaking even on our costs, which means a lot to a small, self-funded club like ours.

Exhibition Committee:
John Hodge, Amanda Hepburn, David Isaacs, Tony Coombes, Virginia Langer, Sue Teagle, Allan Croombs, Dave Tanner.