First place: Purple Ceiling Glass (Photo by John Tubbs)
Third place (tie): Tucson Rodeo Flag Team 2020 (Photo by Steve Peipmeier)
Third place (tie): Happy Valentines (Photo by Monte Hudson)
Jim Burkstrand
The Photo Club of Quail Creek just completed its fifth quarterly photo challenge, which had a theme of “Dominate Color.” Each club member could enter up to three photos, which had to be taken within the calendar quarter, and the photographer/artist could post process the photo in any way—including using Photoshop filters and manipulation. This challenge proved to be quite popular and drew 27 excellent entries. Club members voted on their favorite photos. This does not replace the current Photo Contest, but adds to the club’s offerings of photo opportunities. All of the photos can be seen on our Flickr site, www.tinyurl.com/sovgenm.
John Tubbs won first place with his photo Purple Ceiling Glass.
John commented, “I went to Tubac (before the whole coronavirus situation hit) and had lunch at a popular restaurant there. As I was contemplating the menu, I also was admiring the fancy ceiling decorations they had—lots and lots of hanging glass decorations, all in various hues of purple. The lens was a wide angle, so the biggest challenge was to crop out the spurious ceiling lights. After getting a crop, I did some minor lighting adjustments, a bit of saturation and sharpening.” John shot this with a Leica Q2, a focal length of 28 mm, at 1/100 sec, f/4.0 and ISO 6400.
The photo, Zip Refraction, by Steve Peipmeier placed second. Steve wrote, “Taking photos of Zip, a male Costa Hummingbird, has been going on for three years now. Zip has become a good buddy that greets me at sunrise and through the day to sunset. Having gained his trust, I am able to photograph Zip as close as two feet. I have captured his throat color that is caused by feather iridescence and arrangement. This refraction of color lasts a split second. This photograph was shot with my Panasonic ZS200 with 132mm focal length, at f/6.4, 1/125 sec, and ISO 640, so I am close to Zip when shooting.”
Monte Hudson tied for third place with another shot by Steve. Monte’s shot was Happy Valentines, and she commented, “I took the chicken photo at my niece’s friend’s farm. I thought the chicken was colorful and would work for the required theme, dominant color. When his beak formed a heart, the title became Happy Valentines. No post processing was done.” Monte used a Canon 77D, a focal length of 265 mm, at 1/500 sec, f/8.0, and ISO 200.
Steve’s shot was Tucson Rodeo Flag Team 2020, and he wrote, “The La Fiesta de los Vaqueros 2020 has an amazing history, and the Tucson Rodeo Flag Team was having a Pink Day, to support the Breast Cancer Initiative. Incredible riders as a team, with Armed Forces Flags at full gallop! The camaraderie of the ambassadors and their horsemanship is a big part of the rodeo. This was shot with a focal length of 51mm, at 1/640 sec, f/4.3, and ISO 200. Post processing consisted of only a crop in Lightroom.”