TRIBUTES were paid last month to one of the founders of the Atworth Camera Club, Jim Marsden, who died in December last year.
On behalf of the camera club, Alan Lee reports, “It was with great sadness that we heard that Jim Marsden had died at home on the 28th December having been in RUH, Bath for a short while before being discharged just before Christmas.
“Jim was a Yorkshireman, hailing from Holmfirth, the home of ‘Last of the Summer Wine’. He was academically gifted, winning a scholarship and subsequently graduating with a degree in chemical engineering from Manchester University. Following this he ended up working in Avonmouth for what later became Rio Tinto Zinc. From then on, he lived in Bristol until a little over 30 years ago when he moved to Atworth.
“In 2014 together with Derek Mason and Paul Tyler (who at that time had a photography business in Atworth), Jim started the Atworth Camera Club deciding that the club would be non-competitive, instead concentrating on passing on their joint skills to anyone that wanted or needed them.
“Paul covered modern techniques, Derek camera craft and subject history while Jim focussed on the story-telling aspects of photography.
“Jim was also involved in the Bristol Photographic Society and the Royal Photographic Society in which he had the distinction of being a Fellow, such was his skill at telling a story in pictures. One of his main interests was making action pictures of sports such as cycling, steeplechasing and motocross where getting covered in flying mud was an occupational hazard.
“He was always very keen to help others along their photographic journeys and in that role was a qualified camera club competition judge. Many of his own images were taken in the Bristol area, where for example he did a series of pictures showing how some of the properties in Bristol had been decorated in bright colours, which Jim extended with colourful beach huts from along the south and east coasts.
“Jim grew up in the era of film photography and only came to digital much later. Film cameras in his early days would probably only give 12 shots per film and a day taking pictures might result in just 36 to 48 images, as opposed to the many hundreds that can be achieved by the end of the day with digital. And with film there was still a lot to do. The film had to be processed (using some pretty revolting chemicals) and then finally printed on specially manufactured paper in more (but different) revolting chemicals. All this in the dark and Jim was a master of film work and darkroom processing.
“He will be sorely missed in this club and beyond. He was a very kind and gentle man as well as a brilliant photographer, always keen to help others.
“The Camera Club held a tribute evening to Jim on the 31st January in Atworth Village Hall, where we were able to show some of his work along with some memories of him by other members.
“Although Jim had been isolating from the start of the pandemic he had continued to take an active interest in the club’s activities. As part of this he had provided a memory stick containing over 200 of his images in case we needed some additional material for our meetings which had resumed last summer.
“These had never been shown and so with the kind permission of his family we used these as a backdrop for our evening. His family also provided a number of his prints for us to display and to offer for sale, with the proceeds going to the Ménière’s Society.”