Creative Camera Club - Our Achievements

INTER-CONTINENTAL COMPETITION WAUSSAUK.

CREATIVE CAMERA CLUB - CAPE TOWN.
A LITTLE CLUB HISTORY - 3 YEARS AGO.
Inter-Continental Competition WAUSSAUK.
Western Cape photographic club CCC wins inter-continental competition.
Christel Schuttler with the image “Afternoon Catch,” which was one of two images awarded a Gold Distinction Award in the Waussauk competition.

Photo supplied.
Date: April 10, 2023
Author: Trudi du Toit Comments,
Creative Camera Club (CCC) recently not only won the WAUSSAUK inter-continental photographic club competition by a wide margin, but also won both the Colour and Mono sections and to top it all, entered the two top scoring images!
This is no mean feat as this competition is fiercely contested each year by the four invited clubs from four continents and this was CCC’s best performance since they won the competition in 2017.

Their total of 1222.5 points was a solid 35 points ahead of the runner-up, Paington CC from the UK (1187.4).
They were a mere 0.1 point ahead of Charlottesville CC from the US (1187.3), with Albany Photographic Society from Western Australia (WA) in the 4th place.
The country acronyms form the name of the competition, WA-US-SA-UK.
Michele-Ann Nel, also a Creative Camera Club member with her image “Watching you” , which was the top-scoring image in the competition.

The intriguing image Watching You by Michele-Ann Nel was the overall winner with the three judges awarding it a total of 56 out of 60 points (93%).
This was closely followed by Afternoon Catch by Christel Schuttler, which was given a score of 55,3 out of 60 (92%).
These images were also the winners of the colour category and were the only images that received a Gold Distinction award.

The intriguing image Watching You by Michele-Ann Nel was the overall winner with the three judges awarding it a total of 56 out of 60 points (93%).

This was closely followed by Afternoon Catch by Christel Schuttler, which was given a score of 55,3 out of 60 (92%).

A SELECTION OF OUR PICTURES WHICH WERE AWARDED MERETS

So, does gear make you a better photographer?
My answer is still no.
Buying a better camera won't suddenly give you a better eye.
But understanding your camera can absolutely make you a better photographer.
Knowing what it can do means you can get more out of it. Knowing where it struggles means you can adapt your technique rather than simply blaming the equipment. And knowing its limitations means you can make much better decisions about when an upgrade is actually worthwhile.
Eventually, there will be situations where your equipment genuinely becomes the limitation.
That's when I think you should upgrade.
If you need more reach, better low-light performance or faster autofocus and your current gear is genuinely preventing you from getting the photographs you want, then better equipment can make a huge difference.
But by that point, you should know exactly why you need it.

That's the key.
Don't buy a new camera because someone tells you it's better.
Buy it because you understand your own photography well enough to know what you're missing.
For me, that's what good gear is really about.
It's not about owning the most expensive equipment or having the latest technology. It's about having tools that allow me to push my photography further and respond when something happens in front of me.
Because in nature photography, you rarely get to control the conditions.
The light changes. The wildlife moves. Weather rolls in. A moment happens and then it's gone.
I want my equipment to be ready when I am.
But the most important part is knowing exactly how to use it when that moment arrives.
The more you understand your camera, the more you can get out of it.
And when you eventually reach the point where your gear genuinely becomes the thing holding you back, you'll know it.
That's when it's time to upgrade.
Back to blog.

By Kyle Goetsch