Crouch, Chavis earn nods for top photos

By Kevin Spradlin
PeeDeePost.com

ROCKINGHAM — With entries from Rockingham to London, Sheila Crouch and Miranda Chavis took were the best of the bunch as voted on by their peers in the Richmond County Photography Group.

Eight members of the group submitted photos for the September monthly meeting, held Thursday night at the Arts Richmond building in downtown Rockingham. The same eight shutterbugs offered entries into the quarterly assignment.

Photo by Miranda Chavis

For September, cameras were aimed at “vehicles” and the subjects ranged from a toy Tesla sports car on a tabletop to heavy construction equipment and from a fire truck to a tank.

Crouch, 49, of Rockingham, used her Nikon D5100 to snap a photo of a Rockingham Fire Department truck on scene of a ruptured gas line along Highway 74 Business at Wallace and Sons Tire Center. Firefighters and workers from Piedmont Natural Gas responded to the scene. So did Crouch, who remained in her vehicle while parking in the parking lot at CVS. Crouch said she leaned out the window to snap the winning photo.

Chavis, 32, of East Rockingham, took advantage of her recent trip to France and England to win the quarterly assignment, “repetition.” Chavis used her iPhone 5 while at Kensington Palace in London. The image captures an exhibit of layered etched glass that represents the Crystal Palace. The exhibit was in celebration of Queen Victoria, Chavis said. Queen Victoria was born there.

The original Crystal Place was destroyed in 1936 by fire.

Voting was close in this category, said group leader Jimmy McDonald. Subjects ranged from a set of fire escapes from a now-torn down building in Florence, S.C., to a set of encyclopedias on a bookshelf. The top five photos all were within five points. Chavis’ snapshot took first place by a margin of a single point.

Photo by Sheila Crouch

The Richmond County Photography Group meets monthly. Membership is free and open to the public. The group next meets at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 16 at Main Street Park in Hamlet. The park is located across Main Street from the Hamlet Depot and Museum.

Along with weekly Facebook assignments that are good for nothing but sharing knowledge, tips and bragging rights, the group offers monthly and quarterly assignments.

The October assignment is “wide angle.” The new quarterly assignment, due at the December meeting, is “expression.”