We weren’t sure what sort of response we would get to the call out for video at our last meeting, but we needn’t have worried! There was an excellent turnout and many people brought their own videos and slideshows set to music or with a recorded soundtrack. Video ranged from static shots of moving images such as trees in wind accompanied by ambient sounds, a long, slow panning shot of a misty wharf, a very well-edited sequence of video clips of London’s roller skating community in action, and a short but tense film called Deadline set in a classroom.

There were a number of slideshows with soundtracks including a response to David Lynch’s factory photographs currently on show at the Photographers’ Gallery; a selection of hundreds of photographs documenting a day trip to Brighton, edited to highlight the frenetic pace of life in a crowded, bustling seaside town; images of an empty park bench and passing people taken over the course of a year but greatly speeded up; a slideshow of gritty, black and white street photographs of New York set to a Lou Reed track; a presentation of the South African charity project Giving Through Photography; photographs of urban London life accompanied by an unexpected soundtrack of country sounds; and a considered sequence of photographs of commuters reflecting on Jonathan Swift’s view of humanity, starting in silence, later accompanied by elegiac Elizabethan choral music.

What became evident during the evening was that the actual filming or taking of the photographs was just the first step – the success of the work is due in a large part to sequencing and tight editing, the creation of unusual juxtapositions and contrasts and the syncing of music or soundtrack to move the narrative forward or emphasise certain aspects of the story. Here are just a few stills from some of the films.

From the video Wind by Sue Czapska

Simon Butcher

From Giving Through Photography by Rashida Mangera

From Rus In Urbe by Ingrid Newton

Edith Templeton

From An Affinity by Hugh Look

From the video Brighton Rock by Alison Adcock

Our next meeting will take place on Wednesday 2nd April 2014 at 18.45 at the usual venue – The Artworkers Guild, 6 Queens Square, Bloomsbury, London WC1N 3AT. Please note the meeting is a week earlier than normal. The topic for the meeting will be Domestic – of our relating to the family or the household, familiar, tame, internal, national, native. Feel free to cast a fresh eye on your home environment! Prints or digital images on a memory stick please – maximum of 10 images. So that you will have plenty of time to prepare for the following meeting, advance notice is also given for our May meeting topic which will be Architecture.