This season, we’ll be trying some new approaches to Speaker’s Night. Of course we’ll still have our roster of pros who address various kinds of photography (e.g., food, black & white, nature, etc.). But we start the club year with a special treat: a look at the work of SSCC’s Bob Catlett, in his own words. He’ll not only show us examples of his work, but he’ll also explain his techniques for creating such images. Bob has been a member of SSCC since 1982, just about longer than any other current member. And over these 30+ years, Bob has grown to be one of the finest of the club’s photographers.
When he was still in high school, Bob discovered photography and bought a contact printer for 620 film. That was the beginning. His first 35mm camera was a Vivitar; his next was a Pentax Spotmatic. Today, Bob shoots Nikon and has enough bodies, lenses, filters, lighting equipment, and accessories – not to mention computers and back-up storage devices – to fill a couple of large closets.
For formal training, Bob took some photography classes at Montgomery College after finishing his college studies in criminal law at Howard University and American University. But he probably learned just as much about photography from examining the landscapes of Ansel Adams, the vegetable images of Edward Weston, and the flowers of Robert Mapplethorpe.
What are Bob’s favorite subjects? From what we’ve seen of his work in club competitions, his first love is nature – anything from wide open expanses of landscapes to jewel-like detail of macro shots of flowers. He especially enjoys the constant changes in nature subjects, seasonal changes and changes in the light and shadows depending on the time of day. But Bob is almost as happy in a studio environment and has spent a lot of time experimenting with figure studies. As outgoing as Bob is, it’s no surprise that he also enjoys photographing people, capturing just the right expression that reveals a person’s essence.
Along with Bob’s career, first with the Metropolitan Police Force and then the Federal Reserve Bank, he found time to serve SSCC. He was treasurer for eight years, vice-president for two years, and field trip chairman for well over 10 years. Now, Bob serves the club as a director and uses his long experience with SSCC to advise the officers and committee chairmen of our board.
One of Bob Catlett’s golden characteristics is his unfailing generosity with information and willingness to help other photographers, no matter what their level. Thank you, Bob!
Finding a judge for this topic was a bit tricky. We wanted someone with a special interest in abstracts but someone with a new perspective to which we haven’t been exposed before. Emily Reid Campbell is just that person.
He has been married for a very long time and has five grown children, including two sons named Michael. Lew says that realizing at last that he was wasting a great deal of time working, he retired and got pretty serious about photography. (Sounds like many of us!) Since mountains, trees, and buildings don’t move very much and most wildlife moves too quickly to catch, he didn’t see either of those kinds of photography as much of a fit with his temperament. So…he began to concentrate on shooting pictures of people. He used to shoot with full frame Nikons but has switched to mirrorless cameras – Sony A7 II and Olympus OM-D E-M5. He loves prints more than screen images.