Alan Goldstein – Digital
A member of NVPS since 2012, Alan has been involved in some way or other with photography for the past 54 years (not bad, considering he’s only 29!) It all began with a science teacher instructing him on the art of film developing. At that time, he was using a Kodak Brownie. Veering off during his teen-age years to using an 8mm movie camera, he returned to still photography during his college years and while working as a reporter for his hometown newspaper.
Alan was supposed to call in a newspaper photographer for photos, but she lived nearly 30 miles away, so he opted to take photos himself. At first, he used a Polaroid Type 103 for photos since it made instant, crisp pictures. But encouraged by a classmate and photographer, Alan got access to the college’s darkroom, and processed Tri-X each time he had a news event or other photo request. This plus being a radio disc jockey probably contributed to his less-than-stellar GPA!
After graduating from college, Alan enlisted in the Navy, becoming a Navy Journalist and later a Public Affairs Officer.
His high school girlfriend had a Nikon SLR, and that became Alan’s Holy Grail. As a low-ranking Navyman, Alan scraped up the money and bought his first true SLR — a Minolta SRT-101. As he progressed up the Navy ranks, he upgraded to a Minolta X700.
Fast forward to 2003. Alan’s brother-in-law was getting married and Alan was the photographer. An acquaintance who was a Nikon rep loaned Alan a D100. It was love at first click! Since then, Alan has had a D100, D200, D300, and now a D800 and a D810.
Alan considers himself an advanced amateur, even though he has made more than five figures making pictures. His biggest job was making progress photos of the deconstruction and reconstruction of the D.C. public library in Georgetown.
Retired from the Navy in 1994 and retired from Civil Service in 2011, Alan is happy to spend his time making images. He loves photographing just about everything, but really likes night scenes and landscapes. His photos have been used for greeting cards by non-profits, used for proposals by environmental entities, have been used by sports web sites, have appeared in newspapers, and even hang in a gas station.
Alan says he loves being a member of NVPS. He has gained some great friends, enjoys the camaraderie, and has learned something new nearly every meeting.
Alan’s presentation is entitled:” Sweden 2013.”
Mike Whalen – Prints
Former NVPS president, Mike Whalen, will show some of his favorite monochrome and color prints taken during the past several years.
Mike is a former software engineer who took up digital photography to fill his spare time created by retirement. He purchased his first serious camera in 2006 – an entry level Canon DSLR. Ten years later he is still trying to answer the same basic question: “What makes a good photo?” He believes luck and practice are major contributors to success and notes that (golf superstar), Arnold Palmer’s statement: “The more I practice, the luckier I get!” may be just as true for photography as it is for golf.
Mike has been an active member of NVPS since 2009. He has served as Co-Coordinator of Field-Trips, Co-VP of Competitions, Assistant Webmaster and President. He has received NVPS’s “Photographer-of-the-Year” awards in all “advanced” categories, as well as “Color Print of the Year” and the “Ollie-Fife Award” for “Image of the Year”.
Mike loves to photograph all kinds of subjects in both color and black & white, and enjoys the entire photographic process from composing the image (in the viewfinder) to rendering the final print. He embraces digital post-processing tools like Lightroom and Photoshop and feels their use can expand one’s creative ability in ways that were never possible during the film era.
His influences come from seeing the great works of his peers as well as those seen on popular photographic websites. Mike believes that finding NVPS (thanks to Willa Friedman) has been the single most important factor in improving his photography skills.
He hopes you enjoy the exhibit.
