The Photography & Video Show Podcast

15: Expired Film Club, Canon EOS R1 and R5 Mark II hands-on, summer scavenger hunt young photographer competition

• The Photography & Video Show • Season 2 • Episode 3

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The Photography & Video Show Podcast, Season 2 Episode 3
Published on Thursday, 1 August 2024

Hosted by David McClelland with James Artaius, Dan Green and special guest Miles Myerscough-Harris.

In this month's show: Digital Camera World editor James Artaius has some hot takes from his hands-on with the new Canon flagship EOS R1 as well as the powerful EOS R5 Mark II; Miles Myerscough-Harris - aka @ExpiredFilmClub - reveals his favourite vintage film cameras for shooting professional sports; and The Week Junior Science+Nature editor Dan Green shares details of a summer scavenger hunt competition for young photographers with some exciting prizes.

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The Photography & Video Show is coming to London! 8-11 March 2025, ExCeL Centre.

David McClelland:

Hello and welcome to The Photography And Video Show Podcast for August 2024. My name's David McClelland and coming up today: Film is dead. Long live film! In this summer of sport I chat with expired film club phenomenon Miles Myerscough-Harris about putting vintage cameras to work in some of the biggest sporting arenas.

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Film photography is fabulous. And particularly, uh, when you're using these old completely manual cameras. So the Canon F1, for example, that I use. it's totally manual. Everything's manual on it. The, um, shutter speed, the aperture, the focus, everything's manual.

David McClelland:

Were you shooting with an F1 at the

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

I was. Yeah, absolutely. I thought it would be poetic to be able to do that. Yeah, yeah.

David McClelland:

And we hear about a photography competition that's encouraging under 16s to go outside and do something less boring instead this summer with a chance of winning some Canon cameras and to have their shots shown in London at next year's in person Photography and Video Show. But first, joining us on the news desk this month, welcome back to Digital Camera World editor James Artaius. Hello, James.

James Artaius:

Good afternoon, David. How the devil are you, sir?

David McClelland:

I am very well indeed. It is, as we record today, sweltering outside. It's the hottest day of the year, I think. Uh, lucky you, you've been away for a few days in the, in the south west of England, did you pack your camera or were you able to fully unwind without winding it up?

James Artaius:

I actually packed a number of cameras. The main one I ended up using was a compact waterproof camera, the latest from Pentax. They're like, well, it's, I say latest, it's kind of last year's model, this year's number. So it's sort of a, an upcycled version of last year's, but a waterproof compact camera is, uh, anyone about to venture on a vacation or a trip anywhere, it's an immaculate thing to have because if you want to go and jump in the river on a hot day, you absolutely can. Uh, if it starts raining, as it sometimes does in England. Doesn't matter, you haven't got to put your kit away, and it's just simple, point, shoot, press a button, no, you know, malarkey, no, no monkeying around, so yeah, that's a bit of a secret weapon for the summer holiday for me.

David McClelland:

Aha! Well, I was at Farnborough International Air Show last week working, I should add, but I had a great time. On the whole, the weather was pretty good and I should say, well, hello to those of you who came up and said hi. There is an overlap between the Aviation and aerospace and photography worlds that I guess I should have expected, but certainly looking on social media, a lot of fantastic shots that you guys have taken of all of the aircraft on display there in Farnborough. Onto the news and, well James, I think there's probably only one story from July that we're going to be focusing on for now. It's, uh, well, Canon did what Canon teased, I suppose, a couple of months ago and it released the EOS R1 just in time for the Olympics, but that's not all it released. Uh, which of the, uh, which of these two should we touch on first of all? Because you've been, well, touching, you've been hands on with both of them, haven't you?

James Artaius:

I have indeed went over to, uh, to Germany, to the land of the, uh, of the euros at the time, um, where there was kind of a switchover. So we're using the, let's start with the R1, but we're using the Canon EOS R1, the new flagship camera alongside the Canon EOS R5 Mark II, which is not the flagship, but is arguably the most important camera in Canon's lineup. Um, and so those were being used by the press, by Reuters, by all the sports journalists at the Euros, you know, European Championships. Um, and then we had them for a few days, and then they went over to London for a day, and then they went straight on to Paris for the Olympics. So basically, um, there was a very short window where a select number of the press got to play with the cameras under some, you know, really interesting conditions, and, uh Yeah, we've waited four years for both of these bodies. Let's start with the R1. So this is the, uh, the, the first one series camera in the EOS R full frame mirrorless family. So prior to this.

David McClelland:

pre to, yes, pre to the R series, the 1D, 1DX, they went up to like, was it Mark 4 or maybe Mark 5 or

James Artaius:

It was the 3, the 3. Yes, the 1DX Mark

David McClelland:

Oh, okay.

James Artaius:

flagship, which was released in 2020, which interestingly was the same year that we got the R5. So the R5 and the R1 are both succeeding, uh, well, the original R5 and the 1DX Mark III. So, um, and those are very different times, of course, because that was sort of, uh, in the middle of, uh, of, uh, the new normal as it was at the time. I remember going to see these cameras in a, in a, uh, A little village just outside somewhere in, in Sussex, um, in the back of a church hall. Um, because that was as public as we could get to things at that point. There was no big glossy event. We got to go and play with those for a little bit. This time was much different. We got to shoot some basketball, got to shoot some break dancers, got to shoot all sorts of fun stuff and really put these two cameras through their paces. So the R1. There has been a little bit of noise online about the R1, so if you're familiar with professional flagship sports cameras, they sit in this sweet spot of about 24 megapixels, and the R1 is no difference. It's 24. 2 megapixel backside illuminated stacked sensor. It's very, very fast. It's not a global shutter sensor, which Sony debuted with the A9 Mark III, which is capable of ridiculously fast shooting speeds, 120 frames a second on the Sony A93. The R1 maxes out at 40 frames per second. On the one hand, you might think, oh, that seems a bit curmudgeonly. Why isn't it as fast? It's speed, speed, speed. Why isn't it as quick as it should be? Reading between the lines from Canon, the thinking is basically, the people that need 120 frames a second are actually not professionals. Professionals, they know what they're doing. They kind of need maybe 20. 20 is absolutely fine for pros. So giving them 30 or 40, this is literally more than they need. It's much more than they need. But as far as the resolution goes, there's 24 megapixel resolution. There's been a bit of noise online. Oh, is that sufficient for a flagship camera? And I think people's notion of what a flagship camera is, is a bit muddied these days. Flagship cameras have always been cameras used by the press, by elite level sports photographers. You know, they're not for the likes of me and thee. They are for, you know, people shooting for agencies, for Reuters, for news. Um, and 24 megapixels is simply the most efficient size. We've got enough size to blow it up or crop in or do things with it while also being able to transfer this stuff from the field. I mean, bearing in mind, if you're a war correspondent, you can't rely on going to a nice cozy cafe, put your feet up, order a coffee and plug into the wifi. You need to be able to beam this stuff from the field, whether you're using, you know, 4G, 5G, um, if you've got a LAN connection, if you're lucky. So. Beaming up 50 megapixel images, you know, when especially when you're shooting thousands of thousands, it's not practical. So this sweet spot of 24 megapixels exists for a reason. So there's been a bit of blowback about that. It doesn't make sense to me because that's the nature of what these cameras are. If you do want more resolution, that's where the R5 Mark II comes in. It's 45 megapixels, which is the same as the original R5. But both of these cameras have a very clever trick. A few clever tricks, in fact. It's They have in camera neural network image processing.

David McClelland:

Whoa, neural network. So we're talking AI here, are we?

James Artaius:

We

David McClelland:

what are the subsets

James Artaius:

One of the, yes, Canon is very clear on this because I asked, um, I asked one of the Canon Japanese execs very directly, a bit of a cheeky question, but I wanted, you know, to get the answer. Would it be fair to call these AI cameras? And the answer was no, it's a bit much to call them AI cameras, but it's not unfair to call them AI cameras because for people who use software like say Topaz or these upscaling programs that you take a file, stick it in one of these upscalers and it makes it, you know, as big as the, as big as your house or big enough to print a billboard. The R1 and the R5 Mark II can do that in camera. So the R1 takes its native 24 megapixel images, and it can turn them into 96 megapixel images. You can do that in camera. You can also do it in post production, either through Canon's DPP software, or through a plugin available, or that will be available, for Adobe. With the R5 Mark II, its native resolution is 45 megapixels. It can turn those into 180 megapixel images. And there's no If you've used some of these third party software upscalers before, it's a bit hit and miss because they are using AI to fill in blanks. They're sort of scraping the cloud, looking for similar things. That's where you get funny textures, expressions may change, whatever. By doing it in camera, the camera knows everything about the image you've taken. It knows the temperature, the white balance, the ISO, the lens you've used, the optical distortion caused by the lenses you used, the frame rate, the shutter. It knows everything. So it can then reverse engineer all the steps that it's compressed to make the image as was and then go, Oh, okay. Well, we've got all the missing bits of data. It can use that to fill in the blanks and make a pristine 96 or 180 megapixel image. And I've really pixel peeped with these because to me, it's like, this is, this is magic. There's gotta be, there's gotta be a crack in the magic somewhere. If there is, I can't see it. These are, these are absolutely, Crystal clear images, there's no muddying, there's no um, artifacting. There's nothing like when you use pixel shift mode, which obviously moves the sensor a number of times. There's, there's none of that. It's literally, you press three buttons, wait about four seconds and your image is four times bigger than it was.

David McClelland:

So from a, I guess a few things to unpack there, first of all, and if the processing is on camera, I guess over use, over time, it's going to be consistent. You know, if with this tool, pretty much what its limitations are, what its capabilities are, and what it is going to do. You put something in, you get something out that's, that's upscaled. Whereas if you were to send something up to the cloud with all of the hallucinatory AI, generative AI stuff that we see, there is. A lot of the unknown out there, so it's altogether less consistent. You dunno what you're gonna be getting. I wonder, given that we're talking about the professional uses for these cameras and, and you mentioned the, the, the, the, the R one there in particular being used in newsroom type, uh, well not in the newsroom, but actually to be being back to newsroom from, uh, sports Stadia and so on, um, what their take is, would they accept images that have been upscaled. They probably wouldn't need them, but would they even accept them given how tightly controlled they are with any image manipulation?

James Artaius:

This is a very good question and one that I actually think there's not an answer for just yet, because obviously this is emergent technology, we know that these cameras were used at the Euros, we know they've been used, um, they're being used at the Olympics as we speak, and there's 40 R1 units, and there's another 40 or so R5 Mark II, so they're being used at the moment by newsgatherers, by Reuters, by Getty, by all of the big boys and girls, and that's going to be one of those questions, especially we had, you know, the, the Royal incident not that long ago, where there became all these questions about what constitutes a manipulated image. Upscaling to me, it's, it's, uh, it's not a sinister manipulation, but it is a manipulation. Um, uh, also, pardon past all this, there's a, there's a facility where you can denoise an image by two stops. If you're shooting at a high ISO, you can denoise it, again, in camera by two stops. Again, that's not a sinister use of technology, but it is nonetheless manipulation. And I think as we get into things like content credentials, and people having to declare and digitally watermark the changes, yes, you could quite reasonably say that's unacceptable. I think the general context of what image making and image recording is going to be, that's probably going to be a thing that we come to accept, I personally feel. Um, but you're right, it's absolutely a question that doesn't yet have an answer, we may find. In a couple of months time, you know, Reuters and Co are going, actually we can't accept these for this purpose. Maybe other purposes will be sort of come clear.

David McClelland:

And then just referencing back to, uh, the noise that you mentioned online about, oh, the R1 isn't this, it doesn't have that. I guess this is where, really, where you come back to the definition of what flagship means, and it would be easy to conflate flagship with maximum technical capability. Uh, in terms of, in terms of frame rate, in terms of megapixel count, in terms of all of the other things that you could in theory throw at a camera. It'd be very easy to say if it's the flagship camera it must be the most technically capable camera, but I think to your point that would be a mistake. This flagship, it is, it's the warhorse. Uh, it is literally going to the most dangerous, the most, uh, action packed places on earth. And you've got to get in, and you've got to get that footage out. And that doesn't necessarily mean, to your point, that you need that 50 megapixel, 120 frames a second capability. You need to get something that's going to get the job done, and then get it out and get it back to base.

James Artaius:

Absolutely. And this speaks to the other part of that equation where I think this, as you say, this conventional understanding, I think we've all been spoiled by, you know, things like a GFX 100 megapixel camera. Why aren't all cameras 100 megapixels? That must be the new standard. Okay, for some things maybe it is. Canon is playing an interesting game by not chasing frame rates, by not chasing resolution, except for this AI version. What they're instead doing is this, this. Uh, neural network type stuff. And the other place this comes in is with autofocus. So we saw with the Sony a nine three, now I can't remember their clever name for it, but it was, let's call it predictive or skeletal predictive autofocus. Essentially what Sony's tech would do was kind of predict what the human skeleton does in the case of locomotion. It would go, Oh, someone's running. That must be a runner. And it would, it would have an algorithm to follow that. But if somebody actually turned out to be hurdling and then a leg came up, the camera would be thrown off. Canon has done some very interesting, the three case uses it's got, it's called Action Priority AF. You turn this mode on, specifically for ball sports, specifically for ball sports involving a circular ball, and in specific at this particular time, it's for basketball, soccer, and volleyball. So at the moment those cases are quite limited, but what the camera then does is it says, I'm in action priority mode, and I know there's a ball on the pitch. Therefore, I know who's the priority in this situation. Probably the person with the ball. If it's a person with a ball playing basketball, I recognize dribbling. I recognize going up for a shot. I recognize going up for a dunk. It's also been programmed to recognize, um, cooperative moves. So I don't know if you know what an alley oop is, David, in basketball. It's one player lobs the ball up towards the hoop. Another player comes in, catches it and slams it home.

David McClelland:

I, I know the move, but I didn't know the name for it, but I do now. Every day's a school day, James.

James Artaius:

So it can recognize, now an alley oop is something that most cameras would be thrown off by, because it was either, the camera would either detect the player, or it would follow the ball. This camera, and I've tested it, I tested it photographing people doing alley oops, it understands the motion of a player throwing the ball up, and it knows that someone's going to come in and catch it and slam it. It's just one of the routines it's been trained with. The same as if, you know, in football, it understands when a leg gets cocked all the way back, it's going to kick a ball. It's just been deeply, it's been trained. Deep learning. It's all about AI training. It knows these movements in volleyball. It knows when a player is going to go up for a spike, it recognizes specific skeletal movements. And so it can predict, it can anticipate, and it is ungodly good. I'm not even exaggerating. I took something like 3, 750 shots. Every single one was in focus on the subject that it was supposed to be. And this is a sort of a multifaceted thing, because on top of action priority, we also have a face or face priority AF, I think is what it's called. Essentially you can program in a bank of 10 faces. So you can either, if you're on the sidelines, take photographs of 10 people's faces, or if I know I'm going to be photographing a specific sports team, I can photograph their pictures from the internet.

David McClelland:

Right.

James Artaius:

then recognises those 10 faces and it stores them, and you can put them in order of priority. So your star player can be your top priority, maybe the bench player can be number 10, and if those two people are in frame at the same time, the autofocus will prioritise The same if you took this camera to a wedding. You say, okay, bride and groom, they're number one and two, maybe auntie Ethel is number four, and the reverend is number eight. Whenever all of those faces are in frame, it will prioritize whichever one you've told it is most important. It's so clever and so good and so reliable. And that's the thing. It's easy to say 120 frames a second. People understand what that is. If I say to you face priority recognition AF, that doesn't mean anything. And we've got to go through this routine now of explaining. This takes a lot more explaining, but that's a lot more impressive and a lot more useful than having a few more frames for a few more megapixels.

David McClelland:

I'll tell you where my head's at the moment, uh, and my head is taken back to the photography show, perhaps one of the earlier ones just after the pandemic or maybe just before, but it was a Canon concept camera that you and I would both have seen. It's probably, uh, Canon's Dave Parry who was showing it to us and it's, it's one of these PTZ, PTZ cameras that can just follow the action around whatever space it's in a party or something else and I'm thinking of what you've just described with that face priority programming it with some important faces and then mixing together that kind of PTZ consumer camera and say right okay I want whenever these four people who I've just shown you the faces of all appear in frame Just take some shots. You start bringing all of the AI machine learning capability, the automation, and some of the camera PTZ stuff, which Canon already does very, very well, then that creates a really interesting, and for all I know, they're already doing it, uh, capability there that almost takes photographers, uh, a bit out of the picture, as it were.

James Artaius:

Well, we've, I think I say this to you every time we talk about a new Canon launch, which is that for a serious chunk of time, Canon was sort of quite conservative in what it was doing. It sort of knew its workhorse cameras, it knew what people needed and wanted, it would make those, and that was all well and good. It wasn't really pushing any boundaries, especially in the days where it hadn't yet embraced mirrorless fully. Canon was very much a conservative kind of, we make what people buy sort of thing. In the last five years or so, these conceptual things, this AI stuff, it's. It's really impressive. It's really mind blowing in a sense, the kind of innovation that Canon is now sort of double downing on. The first thing I thought about the, obviously the in camera upscaling, there's plenty more about these cameras to talk about, but I think these are the most interesting features. The in camera upscaling is interesting to me because, okay, on the R5 Mark II, it shoots 45 megapixel, that's already a lot of pixels. If you're shooting jewelry or beauty or fine art landscapes or something, you can up, up res that to 180. Fantastic. So why do you need that on a 24 megapixel sports camera? Well, if you haven't got the right lens on, And you need to crop into your picture of a bird, or the player is a bit too far down the pitch. Okay, so you've just, you've just reduced your 24 megapixel image to a 10 megapixel image. Now it might be too small for publication, but not if you up res it. Now it's all of a sudden back to 24 megapixels. So that gets you thinking. If you don't need a 96 megapixel camera, because you can have a 24 megapixel and up res it, do you need a 24 megapixel camera? Can you just have a 6 megapixel camera, And use the up resing to quadruple the resolution. Because if you do that, if we have the line now, I'm not saying Canon's going to release a six, the six megapixel camera. Um, but if they choose to. Wouldn't that get rid of a lot of the problems with overheating, of sensor noise, heat dissipation, 4K, all the stuff that causes cameras to be big and need all this stuff. If we just, you know, that will improve ISO noise because the pixel sites will be larger. There's a, there's a lot of ways of looking at this both ways. Oh, how can we get more resolution, but also how can we lower the resolution to get cleaner resolutions? So, this tech has a lot of potential applications that are really, really quite exciting.

David McClelland:

So, given the leaks, given the pre announcements, let's say, were there any surprises when these cameras were finally announced and you were able to get your hands on them? Obviously, you've mentioned some of the capabilities of the autofocus there. Was everything else pretty much as expected or did Canon manage to keep some of its cards close to its chest?

James Artaius:

I think probably the biggest surprise was what the camera wasn't. Because there were crazy rumors ahead of launch, this is going to have 80 megapixels and it'll be, uh, you know, quad pixel, dual, instead of dual pixel AF, it'll be quad pixel AF. And there were all these pie in the sky notions of what it could be. And, um, I think for me, the big surprise was they weren't. They weren't the sort of spec sheet technical numbers innovations. They were like, okay, how can we, we've kind of done all of that. Let's double down on what AI for the lack of a better term, or what deep learning can really do for us in terms of making this autofocus. Now the autofocus can recognize things. That's not hard. It can recognize dogs and cats and airplanes and trains. That's pretty easy. How can it put all those things together? How can it recognize the driver's head in the cockpit of an F1 car? How can it recognize, you know, a cyclist or can it recognize, Someone riding a tandem bicycle. You know, I don't think any camera can quite manage that just yet. It gets very confused. And I think that's where we're going now. We're going away from the megapixel arms race. You know, we're going away from the frame rate arms race, um, probably for the best because there's only so much those things can get you, but I'm really interested in what this AI stuff can do for us. It does, you know, you raise a really interesting point there of what, what we can do with PTZ type technologies in terms of taking the photographer or the videographer. And, again, that brings up all sorts of questions of like, are we all threatened by that? Or if I'm a wedding photographer, does that help me? Because I don't need a videographer anymore, I can have a camera set up that can recognize people. You know, there's lots of Pros and cons, but I think they're exciting. Probably because we're at the beginning of this journey, not in the middle, where we see all the things that have gone wrong. But at the moment, it seems really exciting. And yeah, these cameras were at once what we expected, and at once nothing at all what we expected.

David McClelland:

all right. So to wrap things up on this, I think I've got two questions. Uh, the first thing is the, the R1 has been a long time coming and since 2018 when Canon first, uh, went out with its, with its mirrorless system, it's been a gradual process in terms of the camera bodies and the camera lenses to fill out the full system. Is Are we there now, and is anything missing from the line up now that we've got that long awaited flagship camera? Is there any niche that Canon doesn't have covered with its, with its line up, particularly now that it's already iterating on some of its initial releases?

James Artaius:

if there is a hole in the lineup, it's just a more fully fledged, Cinema EOS representation. So for those unaware, we have EOS cameras, which are photography and sort of a little bit of video cinema EOS for the high end filmmakers, movie makers, um, documentarians. Um, and we do have, you know, we have the C400 recently released, which is along those lines, but as far as, you know, one of the, one of the real big guns, I think there's still room in that area or indeed at the lower end, so we've got things at the C70, which is a brilliant camera. But I think, yes, it's, it's the cinema EOS line that needs to be kind of more populated, if anything. But at the same time, that's a weird sector of the industry, because the EF mount, the old EF mount, is still very dominant in, uh, in cinematography and filmmaking. So trying to get the cinema industry to migrate over to RF is, uh, probably more of a long term challenge, I think, than photographers.

, David McClelland:

my second question to you really as a, as an upsum is, so we've spoken about the specs, we've spoken about the capabilities, you have, uh, a broad view of the industry, of the competition, what Sony's doing, what, what Nikon's doing, what the others are doing. Where does this sit? Where does this put Canon? How, how do you summarize what these two cameras really mean? And if you were looking to move in a particular direction, whether these should be the cameras that you would be looking at?

James Artaius:

Basically, if you photograph the Olympics, or if you photograph the NBA, or if you photograph, you know, Premier League soccer, you're someone who needs this level of camera. If you don't do those things, you don't need this camera. You just don't. There's no point. So if you're one of those people, or you work for Reuters, you're shooting for news desks and things, to me, this is a bit of a no brainer. Yes, it's a six grand camera, but that's what these cameras cost. It's just what they are. Um, it's going head to head with things like, you know, the A9 3, the A1 in some respects, the Nikon Z9 and Z8. If you shoot sport, there is no better camera in my personal perspective. Um, There are faster cameras. I don't know if you need the speed. There are higher resolution cameras. I don't know if you need the resolution. What you do need is the autofocus. This also has pre capture as well. So you get the 15 frames before you shoot. Uh, it also has the eye detect AF, so you can use, move your eyeball around the viewfinder and it'll focus on what you're looking at. So it's got all kinds of crazy clever things. If you are that person who needs elite level performance, this is worth the investment. Where does the R5 Mark II sit? I always thought the R5 was completely overpowered in 2020. And I think it's still pretty overpowered in 2024. And the R five mark two is the same story. It's a, it's a crazy good camera, you know, 45 megapixels off the memory card. 196 in camera if, or 180 in camera if you want it to. Does eight K 60 in camera, has some overheating stuff, but it's also got a grip that calls the camera down. The shooting times are longer than they were. Again, it's got the, um, eye control af. Um, if you are looking for a high resolution camera for stills or video. If you shoot 8K, you probably want something like the R5C, which has slightly longer recording durations. The Nikon Z9 has longer 8K durations. Um, but if you're primarily shooting stills with a bit of video, and the R5 II does have more Cinema EOS components in terms of some of the features that are rolled over, Um, it's a fantastic hybrid camera, probably the best hybrid camera there is, but specifically for stills, shooting sports and wildlife, absolutely fantastic. Um, if I had a few grand, I would buy one. I bought the R5. Um, I don't quite these days shoot enough sport to make it completely worth my while, but this is certainly, the next camera I buy will be the R5 too. I just can't afford it right now.

David McClelland:

Strong words there. And it's, it's difficult not to draw comparisons to the first digital EOS run. And I think back to how the 5D Mark II, it changed the game for, for a number of industries, really, uh, for, for indie filmmakers, for filmmakers, the video capabilities that were introduced with that camera. And that's not to say it, it stayed. being the best camera, but because it got a foothold, because everyone, even people outside of the industry, had heard about this 5D Mark II and, wow, this is great and we're doing things that we weren't able to do before. It, it changed the direction for a lot of filmmakers and I'm sure for Canon was an on ramp on to things like the C300 that came out shortly afterwards. So as we Now see a, uh, uh, an R5 Mark II. And you mentioned some of the video capabilities there. Obviously we're in different times. We're, uh, more than 10 years on from, from those days, probably 15 years on from those days. But it'd be interesting to see if cameras like that, hybrid cameras like that, just because of the heritage. Also, you've got people who are going to be shooting a lot of videos with the R5 Mark II, just like they did with the 5D Mark II. James, I'm in. Incredibly jealous of the cameras that you get to go hands on with there in your job and the places you get to go to try them out. I'm sure you've got lots of stories about the R1 and the R5 Mark II over on Digital Camera World. Where is the best place for people to keep up with Canon news and news about all of the other fantastic cameras that you get to get your mitts on?

James Artaius:

If you head over to digital camera world. com, that's the best place to go. And there's a lot of, there's a lot of my write ups and think pieces and, you know, a little bit of conversational stuff like you and I having now as to like, is this worth it? Would I want to use that? Um, you know, we've got all sorts of stuff over at digital camera world. com. And, um, yeah, if you enjoy my ramblings, that's a place to get more of them.

David McClelland:

Fantastic. Always love your ramblings, James. Fantastic to have you on the show again. Speak to you again soon.

James Artaius:

Thank you, David. Bye bye now.

David McClelland:

Miles' mice of Harris is a photographer whose work under the expired film club handle rose to prominence online in the early 2020s. After leaving school, he worked in and around the music industry as a photographer, filmmaker and producer burnt. It was a passion for film that developed during the pandemic that helped his career find a new groove capturing tier one sports on antique analog cameras.

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Expired Film Club, I suppose, is, uh, an online, I guess project might be the overall word for it, but it's, it's sort of, it's, as I'm known in the social media world, I started it in lockdown. Um, and I, so to throw back to pre lockdown and everything else, I worked in the music industry for a long time. And obviously when the pandemic hit, uh, that all ground to a halt and I was furloughed. So I, uh, really got back into film photography as a real sort of passion. I hadn't done filming in a while. I shot stills and video in the music industry digitally, obviously. And, uh, yeah, but then the lockdown hit, you know, looking for things to do. So I found an old, uh, it was an Olympus OM 10 on Facebook marketplace from somebody near me. Um, and just delve right into that and got really interested in exploring, you know, You know, all different types of film stocks as people do when they, you know, get into photography, uh, film photography anyway. Um, and so I, I found a real interest in, uh, old vintage expired films. I just love the designs of the, the boxes and the feel of them, the fact that there were so many different, uh, film stocks of weird and wonderful variations you could try. So, yeah, I just got really into the idea of just experimenting with Finding really old, you know, roles of film and see what I could get. So I started documenting my journey in this way through social media called the account expired film club. Um, and it all just kind of gained, gained traction from there. It was amazing. I gained a following a lot faster than I could ever have imagined. Um, I think on TikTok, I hit a million followers in, in about the first year I was doing things really. And so to start with, I was just, uh, I've got like a typical sort of style of video that I do where I show a kind of first person POV of me. hopefully somewhere particularly interesting,

David McClelland:

Mm.

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

uh, loading, uh, an interesting roll of film, whether it's expired or fresh, um, and then showing the process of, you know, the box, taking out the box, showing the camera I'm using, putting in the camera and then showing the view through the viewfinder and then the results at the end. And obviously with expired film, it's quite random what you might get. So everyone was different. And yeah, so I started doing that and, um, being a lover of sports myself, uh, and music as well, I go to a lot of sports games, particularly football is my. Kind of, uh, my choice sport really, I suppose. Um, and, uh, I would go often with my younger brother, Dylan, who's also interested in this film. And we take point and shoot cameras and stuff like that into the crowd. And, um, I would do some bits of my content when we were at football games as well. So like show it again, show myself learning role film, and then the results through the, through the viewfinder. And through that, uh, I was very lucky, you know, some of my content went down really well online and I got approached by, sports clubs to then start doing it for them, uh, professionally. Um, luckily I had a lot of the professional film gear that I needed. So, um, uh, my camera of choice these days, I've got two. I use a Canon F1 a lot and a Canon EOS 1V, which is, which is beautiful. Uh, and I luckily had the big telephoto lenses and things that I need to use. Yeah, and so I started getting invited down to sports games and now somehow I call this my career.

David McClelland:

Living the dream there, really. And, uh, I mean, I've followed your work for a long time, probably not long after lockdown. And, uh, as a sports fan myself, just seeing you in whichever national stadium, you mentioned the EOS F1 there. You were recently at, uh, at the F1 shooting. Uh, were you shooting with an F1 at the

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

I was. Yeah, absolutely. I thought it would be poetic to be able to do that. Yeah, yeah.

David McClelland:

But your background up until then was largely in music though. So how, how, why is sports become the place where the expired film club has really found its following, do you think? Or is it just that the fact that there's a lot of sport most weekends at least, so there's a lot of opportunity for you to take those

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Yeah, I suppose so. I like the whole nostalgic vibe. I think people are on that now. Funnily enough, I'm wearing a vintage Man United shirt for this interview. Um, but that kind of, particularly in football, I think that like, Football nostalgia is a real kind of tangible thing now. It's a bit, a bit of like a, I don't know. It's like a fashion statement. I was just at a festival yesterday, actually, and the amount of vintage football shirts that were around was amazing. so I guess it kind of plays into that a little bit. Um, sport, obviously, like you say, There's no end to the amount of sport that's on any given week. Um, and particularly, you know, this year we've had the Euros and now the Olympics are going on. Um, and then there's been, you know, I've been at a lot of stuff recently. I've been, like I said, the F1, I've been at the golf in Scotland. I've been at the tennis has been Wimbledon and Roland Garros and loads of stuff. So I guess there's always opportunities, um, to be shooting sports. Um, so and I think maybe just a combination of that, you know, the old vintage style photography on the modern day sporting world is a bit of a juxtaposition and it adds to that kind of nostalgia to it, I suppose. So, um, so yeah, but I couldn't pinpoint exactly why. This is the thing, like, I seem to have hit on this weird niche that I, I kind of created for myself and didn't even really realize that I was doing it. None of this was intentional particularly. I didn't set out and be like, I'm going to do this to. You know, get loads of followers on social media. It just kind of all happened quite naturally, which is quite nice

David McClelland:

But as you say, a big sports fan yourself, it's not something you're going to turn down when those opportunities come along and one job's led on to another there. In terms of the image output, you know, the name is Expired Film Club. You are working with some film that maybe you don't know where it came from or what state it's going to be in. does that kind of give you a bit of jeopardy?

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Yeah, uh, there is an element of that absolutely what I tend to do now obviously when i'm doing these these bigger sports shoots professionally is to make sure that I've got plenty of film that I know I can rely on and get results out of. And I always bring some, some weird stuff just to see if, uh, if I can get some, some decent results out of it. Because there's always a fun story there. I mean, it's um, it's been nice recently what I've done as well. I use loads of very old cameras as well. And I've got this camera from 1897 that I found at an antique store that still works. It's amazing. And I've managed to adapt it to take, uh, 120 film, which you can get readily nowadays. And that, I mean, it's this crazy thing. It folds out, it's got this big bellows that you pull out like this. And the only way you can tell what you're focusing on is the, the bellows have a little metal arrow that points to how far away, you know, feet and inches you're focusing. There's got this little range find a little mirror in the top. using stuff like that, I find really fun. I went to do a shoot in Sweden recently with a team who had a, they had the special centenary kit that they released and they really wanted me to take it on this old camera. But again, at that, in that moment. What they really wanted of me was to take the team photo before the game of them in this hundred year old kit using this hundred year old camera. Um, and so obviously that's, so they, you know, they shake their hands before the games. They come and they, they stand, uh, what, I had my brother with me for this shoot as well. We had to, we had to measure out how far away from me they needed to stand so that where I could set the focus. Anyway, look down through the, the viewfinder, take one photo, and then the goalkeeper was like, okay, that's it, and they run off. And so I was stood there and I was like, I've come all this way. I've taken one photo and I've got no idea if it's in focus. So that was a nerve wracking one. And like, again, that was, we have one where I was thinking, you know, if I, if this doesn't come out right, then, uh, I'm a bit screwed. But, uh, there's, there are moments like that. I do take a lot of expired rolls to games now, but, um, they're always best when you use them in, uh, like bright conditions. So typically an afternoon game, it's not got full sun. You'll be able to get some sort of good results out of it, but I always make sure I've got lots of other fresh film and other bits of pieces that I know I'll get results out of as well when I do a shoot.

David McClelland:

Where do you get all of these cameras from though? And it strikes me, you mentioned modifying a camera there as well. You've got to be pretty handy when it comes to knowing how these cameras work and how to mod them to get modern films to work in them, for example.

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Yeah, I mean, I was lucky with that one, uh, that I found. So basically a lot of the cameras and things I find, uh, mostly online. So eBay, Facebook marketplace, auction sites, that one, to be fair though, I did find physically in an antique store. I actually, I say, I found it, but my wife can take credit for it. Cause we were in. There together and she spotted it on the shelf and was like miles. This looks like a bit of you and yeah, and amazingly it still worked with that one. I got quite lucky actually, because so, um, the film it took originally, I think it was called 104 film. Um, and if, uh, if you know, film stocks very much, basically, um, 104 film used to be made in the, I guess, late 1800s to early 1900s. And it was essentially a four by five. sheet film, but on a roll. So it would be four by five film with a paper backing and you could get, I think it was six exposures out of this. So very amazingly nice quality film. If you think, you know, each frame you're getting was like four by five. So really nice stuff. Obviously it doesn't exist anymore, unfortunately. So, um, there were two options I could go down with this camera, which was literally if I got into a dark room or in a changing bag, I could physically tape one sheet of film. 4x5 film on the inside of it, which was a bit finickety. The other op the other option was, I wonder if anybody, you know, designs adapters to use in these cameras. And incredibly, there's a guy on eBay who 3D prints, uh, adapters for 104 to 120 film. So I was like, this is meant to be. So yeah, so I've got these little, they're like orange, orange, like, they're kind of just like spacers that go in either side of a roll of 120 film. And it means that obviously when I'm using the camera, the film doesn't fill the whole frame that it could do. So you get kind of a bit of a panoramic type of effect to it. But it means that then, um, when I'm out shooting whatever, I can change rolls of film really quickly. I get more, more exposures off a roll. Uh, and also it means that I can use like, yeah, the 120 rolls of film that are really easily available. You know, other cameras, I tend to try and find cameras that I know I'll be able to use modern film with. So 120 film goes back. I mean, it's been around for, yeah, like it must be a hundred years at least. I think 120 film goes all the way back. So a lot of the older cameras from the early 1900s do take 120 film, which is amazing. I recently got this, um, panoramic. Uh, medium format camera, uh, it's called, I'm trying to remember the name, number one Kodak Panoram, I think it is. Um, and, uh, yeah, it's, it's this amazing thing. Uh, and it takes panoramic, uh, images. It's got this lens on the front of it that sits in, in its own sort of bellows thing. And when you press the shutter, the lens flips around like this, the lens moves and you get this panorama from it. And again, that, that back in the day, it took a slightly different variation of film but the same size as 120. So, uh, it means I can just use 120 film in it now. I mean, you have to like wind the film on a bit more for every shot, because obviously you're filling up more than one frame with this panorama. Um, but yeah, so when I'm looking for stuff like that, I do tend to try and find cameras that I know, if even if they don't take modern film, I'll be able to adapt them quite easily to be able to take it. It just makes my life easier, I guess., I've done a lot of developing myself at home. Uh, I'm in my little home setup here and I've got a film scanning station just over to my right hand side here. Um, and actually I don't know if you can see, there's some fresh negatives hanging in my cabinet behind me there. That's a black and white roll of 120 film that I developed. Recently. So yes, I do do some of it myself. Unfortunately, now I shoot so much that it just isn't realistic for me to do it all at home myself. So I use a fabulous lab called analog Wonderland who do all my stuff for me now, uh, when I do my professional shoots, but yeah, sometimes if I've shot like a, a very weird roll of film or with a weird camera, and I'm like, I don't know if I'm going to get anything out of this, I'll develop it at home first and see if I can get, you know, usable results out of it. And then if, if it's all working well, then I'll maybe take that on and then send them off. But yeah, so I do do a lot of it at home myself. Uh, less these days though, because I just, you know, if I come back from a football game, I've shot 25 rolls of film. It's going to take me days to go through it all myself. So, uh, so I use the professionals for that.

David McClelland:

How has your experience with analogue over the last few years, how has that changed your view of photography, how you photograph and do you think it's actually made you a better photographer or is it, you know, has it modified your approach to it when you do go back to shooting digital?

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

I think it absolutely has made me a better photographer. There's no doubt. I think, um, film photography is fabulous. And particularly, uh, when you're using these old completely manual cameras. So the Canon F1, for example, that I use. Um, it's, it's totally manual. Everything's manual on it. The, um, shutter speed, the aperture, the focus, everything's manual. And obviously when you're shooting a roll of film, you've got 36 photos on that roll of film. So I'm sure you've heard this many times before, but I do feel like it just makes you a lot more selective about what you shoot and when to fire the shutter. And then, you know, from, from a totally manual camera, it gives you a bit more intuition about like how to select settings, I think, in other situations. Okay. Outside of that. So I definitely apply that to my digital photography, obviously, you know, with digital, you've got the luxury of just bursting the shutter button and choosing your favorite from the 200 photos you took at that particular moment. But I do think, yeah, composition wise, I think just, yeah, sort of intuitively picking moments. I think it does make you a better photographer because I think it, you kind of have to be when you shoot film because particularly there's, there have been occasions, you know, if I'm on the touchline at a football game or you have to with film, it's so easy. to want to take photos all the time. But with film, what I don't want to do is for there to be a really important moment that happens in front of me. So there's a goal that goes in, in front of me and there's a celebration and I'm clicking the shutter and suddenly I get to the end of the roll and then I can't capture what's going on in front of me. So that, that's a really difficult discipline to learn because particularly at the start, you know, I'd be sitting in this incredible football stadium and I'd like, I just want to take photos of everything. But then if I miss the moment, the really important moment, because I've just been snapping away so much. Yeah, it's an interesting conundrum to have with film, but again, I think that really makes you then in digital photography I find that that makes me a lot more selective and it means that I Can't kind of only try to take photos of stuff that I know Hopefully will like make the cut or whatever rather just having and also it takes so much time afterwards with digital if you've taken Thousands of photos to go through all of them And to choose all the ones that are in focus or best framed and stuff like that. So, yeah, I do think, definitely, he's maybe a better photographer, I would say, for sure.

David McClelland:

Sounds to me like everybody should be

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

ha

David McClelland:

to shoot on film for 12 months. The first

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

ha, maybe. I, I, yeah, yeah, I saw a good YouTube video. There's a really good YouTuber, uh, photographer, YouTuber called James Popsis. And he obviously shoots digital and, uh, he did a really interesting video recently where he imposed upon himself, the idea of he was, shooting a roll of film using a digital camera, if that made any sense. So he went out on a, on a walk to take some photos and he was like, I'm only going to take 36 photos on this. And, and, and to, to, to teach, to sort of teach that discipline and see what it's like to, to know that you have to be so much more selective about it. It was a really interesting watch, I thought.

David McClelland:

You've mentioned some of the cameras that you regularly shoot with. You mentioned that 1897 camera as well. Are there any cameras that, or lenses, I guess, because that that's part of the story here, that are on your wishlist? Are there any holy grails in, uh, film photography folklore that you'd like to get your hands on for a

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Yes, I think so. Uh, I've always wanted to try an X Pan, a Hasselblad X Pan. Uh, so that's a panoramic 35mm camera. Um, a lot of the time with, so there are quite a few panoramic film, 35mm film cameras on the market. But really what, all they do is they just take the frame and just put like this sort of shutters at the top and bottom. So, so it's actually, it's not, it's making the, you're actually getting less. Value for money essentially, but there are a few panoramic cameras that actually do spread the panorama out over several frames and the Hasselblad X Pan is one of those I'd love to, I'd love to give that a try. I've never used one of those and I think maybe possibly, you know, doing some stuff at a football ground where I'm up in the stands and getting a big panorama of the stadium might be quite cool with one of them. Um, otherwise it's interesting with what I, like to use because I, I tend to just, I kind of just go on a journey and I just, I like, a lot of the time I'll see somebody using a really interesting camera online possibly, or if I'm just browsing as I do sometimes through like eBay or whatever, and just, you know, seeing what's available and I'll come across a camera and think, oh, you know, so this with that, the, the Kodak Panoram that I've just started using that one. Yeah, there was a guy on Instagram who was using a camera similar to that. And I was like, oh, that looks really cool. And so I delved into that. So I kind of get inspired to try new stuff all the time. And I wouldn't say there's like necessarily a specific camera. I'd be like, I'd love to, I'd love to give that a go. Cause I think I've managed, I've been very lucky. I've managed to use a lot of the cameras that I, I really enjoy. Uh, Pentax six, seven, I love using as a medium format camera. I actually. don't use it as much these days because a football game as well. Um, it's just, it's so massive and heavy and like, um, yeah, uh, and also I think the shutter speeds only go up to 500th of a second, which is okay for sports, but you really want to get like, obviously when the movement's fast. Um, so I love that. That was always, I'm very lucky. My dream cameras were always, I can't, I don't know why I've always loved the Canon F1. And it's just, it's just something about it. I've always just really, really loved it. The modularity of it. Cause you can interchange the viewfinder comes off, uh, and you can attach different things to it. And I just, I really love it. Um, so that and the Pentax six, seven was my two, like these would be like my dream cameras. I'm very lucky to have them both now, um, which

David McClelland:

F1 certainly has a big fan club still, and I guess, you know, there's still a fair degree of availability for it as well, which helps. I seen you shoot with an action man before?

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

have. Yep. Um, in fact, I think I've got my hammer behind me.

David McClelland:

seen that, try and describe what this Action

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

So, it literally is an Action Man doll, um, but it's, it's, it's, it's adapted so that he's in his back. You can take the back off and you can insert a cartridge of 110 film. I actually have it here. Do you want me to get it? It's behind me.

David McClelland:

Yes, yes, please

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

on. There might have to be some pixelation on this because I've actually lost his trousers, so Yeah, yeah, I'm sorry about that. Anyway, here he is. So you can see in the back, that's where the cartridge of film goes and then in the front that that's the lens there so you

David McClelland:

Oh, I

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

so and then to take a photo you hold up like this

David McClelland:

so for anyone who's listening but not watching, this is your, this is your, Commodore Garden action man, but he's got what looks like a back to the future camcorder on his shoulder uh and filming but the actual lens for the camera that you're shooting with is

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

in his chest that's right yeah

David McClelland:

Top cam but that that looks like really

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

It's great.

David McClelland:

What were the images

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Oh, awful, but that's part of the, that's part of the beauty. I mean, I did look a bit like a bit weird wandering around my local town taking photos with an action man as I was getting a coffee, but there we are. Yeah, but I love stuff like that. I love yeah, all the weird and wonderful cameras. I've actually, um, I've got a Game Boy camera, um, that I, Yeah, which I, I love to use again, the quality out of it is atrocious, but, um, it's really good fun to use. And when I, when I take that out of games, it always, I always get comments from people, you know, saying, Oh, you know, that looks really cool. It's, um, it's amazing actually, because I think, uh, I'm not proved wrong on this, but I saw something online that it was technically the first ever commercially available digital camera. Because it was released in like 1998, possibly. So I might be getting my, my dates wrong, but yeah, um, apparently, so it's like, I think it's the equivalent of 0. 3 megapixels or something around that, and uh, it's all in grayscale, but yeah, it can be, it can be very fun if, if you can use it. I actually, I was doing some stuff for the, uh, Honda racing recently at the British Superbike Championship. I took that with me and did some stuff there and it was, it was a lot of fun.

David McClelland:

I haven't worked with too many sports photographer, but I know they are a close knit group. So here's you coming in with your expired film and with these cameras. Are they, what is all this about? Or are they actually quite excited by the fact that you are with cameras that maybe some of them were using 20, 30 years ago, uh, taking shots of the same match? How's the reaction been from the, from that professional side of the community?

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

it's positive, I would say. It's interesting being at games, like you say, because, yeah, it always draws comments. And there is definitely a divide between the more seasoned photographers who have been doing it for decades and they'll be looking at me and just like, why the hell are you still shooting film? We're so glad we don't have to do that anymore. And then the younger photographers look at it and they're like, Oh my God, this is so cool. You're shooting film. It's so interesting. Um, no, but it's actually, you know, it's what, it's been really lovely and I've made some really good friends in the, in the sports photography world now, which is great. Cause obviously, you know, I kind of, my, my pathway into it was very unconventional and I circumnavigated a lot of like the grafting that I, you know, I realized so many people do for the years and years. And I'm very lucky, uh, to have just kind of scooted in. Um, no, but overwhelmingly it's been really lovely. I, yeah, like I say, I've made some really nice friends and it's really nice now as well because, you know, the more games you go to and the more sports you do, you bump into familiar faces and you see the same people shooting the games. And it's nice, there's a, there's a nice camaraderie around it all. Um, so no, I've, I've been loving it. I mean, being able to go and shoot these, these sports games and everything. I mean, it's, um, Yeah, I really am living the dream. I can't lie. It's incredible. Particularly, um, I'm a Man United fan and I've, I've managed to, to work with them, uh, a few times in the, in the past few months. Particularly, I was there for the FA Cup run this past season. So I was there for the Liverpool game at Old Trafford, which was honestly one of the best days of my life. It was incredible. And then the Coventry semi final, which was such a dramatic game. And then obviously the City final. And I was there and it's um, yeah, I, I, I just, I count my lucky stars every time I, I, I walk into one of these amazing stadiums because, you know, football and photography, but I mean, sport generally, but particularly football and photography are my two real passions and, you know, to be able to combine them is just the most amazing feeling. I love it.

David McClelland:

So what's next for you and Expired Film Club then? You've built up this terrific following online across Instagram and TikTok. You are getting invited to these fantastic sporting events. Um, where do you, where do you hope the project will take you next? Or are you just riding the wave and seeing where it goes next?

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Yeah, a little bit of that, I think, riding the wave. I mean, it's, it's great. Obviously I've got, got goals and I've got dreams. I mean, I'd love to, you know, one day possibly shoot something like the World Cup final on film and, you know, Um, you know, do a lot of those, those, you know, really massive events like that, I've done motorbike racing, F1, golf, tennis, um, lots of random stuff. And I, I love the variation of it. So yeah, I think, I think possibly just, yeah, just riding the wave and, uh, carry on going. I just want to do as much of this as I possibly can. Um, and yeah, fingers crossed that we, we keep, we keep going up upwards and we'll see where everything takes us, I guess.

David McClelland:

Miles, if anyone wants to keep up with you online, see where on earth you are next and what on earth you're shooting with. Where are they best to head to?

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Uh, just search Expired Film Club. Uh, I'm at Expired Film Club across all social media. So yeah, TikTok, Instagram, X, uh, Facebook, YouTube, all of that. I've got my own website as well, expiredfilmclub. com. Just about to launch a, uh, print store on my website as well. So you can buy prints of some of my work, uh, very soon. But yeah, just search up Expired Film Club and hopefully you'll find me.

David McClelland:

Miles, thank you so much for joining us today. All the best.

Miles Myerscough-Harris:

Thank you very much. I've really enjoyed it. Thank you.

David McClelland:

And joining us now on the show is editor of The Week Junior, Science and Nature, Dan Green, with news of a competition that might help provide some welcome respite to parents this summer and some exciting prizes for young photographers. Dan, thanks for joining us. What is the Scavenger Hunt Photo contest?

Dan Green:

Thank you very much. Yeah. And thanks for having me. Um, it's, a welcome respite for parents, as you say, like filling those very long summer holidays can be a bit of a stretch sometimes. So, uh, we've got a bit of guilt free parenting fix here. Uh, this holiday we're challenging our readers to head outside and have some close encounters with nature.

David McClelland:

Maybe we take a bit of a step back here first of all. The Week, The Week Junior, The Week Junior Science and Nature. What is that and who's it for?

Dan Green:

So we are part of the, uh, week family of magazines. And, uh, our sister title, The Week Junior is a weekly magazine for children. And we are a monthly title that, um, celebrates nature and the wonders of our world and sort of tries to explain and make sense of the universe for eight to 15 year olds.

David McClelland:

As far as the competition itself is concerned, it's a scavenger hunt photo contest. So what is it that you are hoping that young people will be able to hunt for and take pictures of?

Dan Green:

Well, it's really simple. Joining in the competition couldn't be easier. Basically. We have a scavenger hunt checklist which has 10 natural treasures to go out and search for. So you can, go to the competition website and download your scavenger hunt checklist. Take it out wherever you're going, whether you're going on holiday to the beach or just in a local park, wherever you are this summer holiday, tick off all of the items off the list. And then, as you are doing this, you can take photos either on your own camera equipment or, you know, steal your parents smartphone. We're asking children to look at the beauty of nature and try to find something that captures those adventures that they're having. And then their adults can upload their best ones to the competition website and the best photo wins.

David McClelland:

Who are the judges and what sort of things do you think they're looking for?

Dan Green:

Well, we've got, a great judging panel, Team members, from, the Week Junior Science and Nature team, our photo editors and designers, but also we've got a very special member of the judging panel who is wildlife expert photographer, Ellie Rothney, who is also a Canon ambassador. we'll be looking for well composed, colorful, creative images that really show the beauty in nature. And, one of the prizes. In fact, the top prize, and this is the first year we're doing this, is the winning photo is going to go on the front cover of, Science and Nature magazine. So that's a really big one. I mean, imagine seeing your winning photo there on a monthly magazine on the newsstand for everyone to see.

David McClelland:

That's really exciting and not only do they get that accolade, you mentioned that, that Canon is part of this competition. There's an opportunity to win some Canon kit as well, isn't there?

Dan Green:

That's right. Canon have been super generous with us. They've given us an immense load of kit. The first prize alongside the front cover is, um, Canon EOS R100 camera. And a lens as well as a selfie CP 1500 compact printer. Uh, second prize is a Zoe mini. S2 Canon camera and that's a kind of, compact camera and printer. And then alongside that in issue 79, which is where we reveal the winners. Uh, we're also going to reveal, our shortlisted winners. set of, winners. Everyone featured will get a book bundle, a nature book bundle of, five different nature books which have been kindly donated to us by various publishers, and also complimentary tickets to The Photography and Video Show next year. And there will be an exhibition at the photography show as well of all of those pictures. So the, I mean, the, the prizes are bigger and better this year. It's excellent.

David McClelland:

Yes, and that is the big reveal. the shortlisted entries from the Scavenger Hunt competition will have their work displayed in London at the in person photography and video show in March 2025 at the Excel. That's very, very exciting news. How do people go ahead and enter them? What kind of timescales are we working to?

Dan Green:

Okay. So, our competition website is pens at the ready, science nature dot the week, junior. co. uk forward slash scavenger hyphen hunt, and all the information you need about. how to get involved, get your scavenger hunt checklist, what the judges are looking for, and also how to enter your photos is on that website. the competition is open right now and it runs through until the August Bank holiday, August the 26th.

David McClelland:

Dan, I'm looking at the shortlisted entries from the 2023 version of this competition on The Week Junior Science and Nature Facebook page, and they're incredible, and I think it's a great place to go to to get an idea as to the, like you say, the kind of colourful, the impactful images that do well in this competition. But I tell you what, if I didn't know that these were taken by young people, There's no way of knowing. They're fantastic, yet each of them is incredibly accessible. You don't need to go to some far flung corner of the world. To get a, an image here of, of a cat and a mouse in the back garden or a ladybird on a flower or, uh, even a crab at the seaside there. These are fantastic images and I think are inspirational in their own right but also for people who are looking to enter this competition. Might also serve as inspiration as to what they might be able to find when they're out on their own scavenger hunts.

Dan Green:

One thing I would say is to think about how this will look on the front cover. I mean, we obviously want bright, dynamic, interesting images that fill the space, but also, I think composition is really important. How the thing is shown, what's in the background.

David McClelland:

You know, I think you put it superbly there looking at these images and I'm sure the judges will be doing the same when they look at the images that are submitted this year. Each one of those images is an adventure. There's a whole story behind each one of those, a journey that the photographer has been on to capture that image. So I'm so excited to see what comes out of this year's competition and I look forward to seeing all of those shortlisted finalists in The Photography Show next year in the Excel. Thanks again for joining us Dan

Dan Green:

Well, my pleasure. Thank you so much for having me on.

David McClelland:

And if you know a young person who'd like to enter that competition, perhaps you are a young person, then a reminder of that website sciencenature. theweekjunior. co. uk forward slash scavenger hyphen hunt. And that's where you'll find a full list of prizes, eligibility rules, terms and conditions, and links to see previous year's winning photos. We'll pop that link into the show notes too, along with links to Miles's expired film club work and, well, all of the stories that we've been covering today. That is almost all for this month though. A big thanks to everybody who's been in touch on text message, on social media, and as I said earlier, even in person. It does mean a lot, so keep your suggestions on interviews, angles, even accessibility. Keep all of that stuff coming. coming in and we'll do the best that we can to make all of it happen. I mentioned text message there. That's right. You too can SMS us like it's 19. 99 all over again. Make sure you have the bill payers permission. First, uh, the number is included in a lot of people's call plans though. But, uh, just make sure you double check and to, uh, yeah, send that text in the show's show notes. Just tap on the link from your mobile and text away, we'd love to hear from you. Social media, well that's always free though. Or is it? Well maybe that's for another day. Uh, do get in touch with us though at the Photography Show on Instagram where, well, speaking of expired film and the summer of sport, you'll see details of a genuinely remarkable find. At the photography and video show event in March last year, some undeveloped film was found in the Disabled Photographer Society's donation box. Well, somebody has kindly scanned the film and the results are incredible. None other than wonderful trackside shots from the first post WWII Olympic Games held in London in 1948. That's, uh, 76 years ago. I think expired film club miles would have been proud of those but the problem is that we don't know who took them or indeed what the story is behind them so do they feature a family member perhaps somebody that's uh well today somebody might recognize have a look on the instagram and also on our facebook page as well and well hopefully we can watch that mystery develop A reminder that the next in person photography and video show takes place in March in London. That's right, next year the show is taking a trip to the capital, 8th to the 11th of March 2025 at the Excel in London. More on that soon. We'll be back on the first Thursday of next month with more news, more chat. But for now, have a great August. Bye bye.

People on this episode

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David McClelland

Host
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Angela Nicholson

Co-host
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Basil Kronfli

Co-host
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Hannah Rooke

Co-host
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James Artaius

Co-host
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Mark Baber

Co-host
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Peter Dench

Co-host