Dear
Member,
It was
good to meet old and new friends at this years Repton, and another
good day was had by all, the weather was really good to us, but yet
again we were let down by the low turn-out of our members, only
about 27 bothered to come to the meeting, which is a very sorry
state when you think we have a total membership of over 200.
Some
very important points however were raised at the meeting as you will
also read elsewhere in this newsletter, as we will from now on be
publishing the minutes of the AGM. in the first newsletter following
the meeting. May I also bring to your attention that if you have any
points arising out of the minutes please let me have them and I will
raise them at the following committee meetings.
The
main items that were discussed under AOB, were changing the
procedure for yearly subscriptions, this new system would give our
Treasurer much more control over the club funds and would channel
your money to where it is most needed, and not just left dormant in
a Co-ordinators low interest bank or building society, and as an
added bonus it would take some of the problems of book-keeping off
that Area Co-ordinator, the discussions on this item are still
taking place in committee, but it is hoped that it will be
introduced as from the 1st April 98, as they say, watch this space!
I think we really must get the club's finances on a firmer
footing, we have trundled along for so many years living of the back
of film and chemical sales, but as these two supporting items are on
the decline, we have to turn to our only other income ie.
subscriptions, and I hope that the Committee can count on your
support when we implement these changes.
The other
major item from AOB at Repton was the Club library, and DO YOU STILL
WANT IT? Brian Asquith our librarian has done a really good job over
the last few years in cataloguing and purchasing new material for
the library, but it has been so very much under used, with only 18
enquiries over the last year.
The
afternoon entertainment went with a swing with a very good talk and
demonstration from David Smith of Tetenal, covering mostly colour
printing with the company's new RA4 material, but his latter part
did cover their monochrome products, and some of our members picked
up some very good bargains from David's sales.
We continued with some very good AV from John Batty, and a 10
for 10 from Ron Croad, and this years Slide-of-the-Year, was won by
an excellent slide from one of our new members, Barry Morson from
Area 9. and Well done to Barry!
We
had an excellent around the room display of prints both in colour
and Black & White, from Rita and John Pearle,(Area 13) and Ken
Smith and Dave Morrell from (Area 4) all excellent work, in the main
meeting room we had a very fine mono PAGB award panel from Geoff
Lowe from Area 14, Geoff displayed his fine work to show our members
the standard required to receive these awards, he mentioned that
once the awards were received they are for life, and not as the RPS
only as long as you are a member of the RPS. I would also like to
point out that as the CRC is a member of the PAGB, you are therefore
eligible to submit panels for these awards, I have not got all the
details to hand but if you are interested I would be pleased to get
all the information for you, also on a final point, I asked Geoff to
join us on the NEC committee, and he has kindly decided to accept
our invitation, MANY THANKS GEOFF, AND WELCOME ABOARD!
I
see from reading some of our main and Area newsletters, that more
and more of our members are delving into the digital imagine
technology, yours truly is at present saving all his hard earned
spare cash to up-grade the system in order to participate, but it is
a little way off yet, but after reading the various items, I thought
it might be a good idea if we had a digital imagine section with-in
the CRC, it may not be the classic method of developing and
printing, but is still a manipulating method, and I am sure it may
also draw some new members to the club, lets not kid ourselves,
digital imaging is here to stay whether we like it or not, and I am
sure that if a club like ourselves do not encompass it some other
similar club would. I would be very pleased to receive your views
and idea's on the prospect, and if there is enough interest maybe we
could get it off the ground.
Continuing
on the same theme, I have recently received a letter from Tetenal
following on from visit to Repton, stating that they had branched
out in a big way into the manufacture of papers and film for imaging
called "Spectra Jet" for inkjet printers, it is said to
receive every single drop of ink, rapidly absorbing it, and is then
immediately smearproof, unfortunately they did not send me a sample
to try, but they have offered us as a club 20% discount of these
products, I have some vouchers, but if you contact them on Tel: 0116
263 0306, Fax: 0116 263 0087, I am sure if will have the same effect
if you mention the CRC. Well all for the present, I hope I have
given you a lot to think about this time, so all now till the next
time.
Best regards.
Pete.