Camera Club Competitions

Tonight I took place in my first judging evening at the Mold Camera Club. I really did not know what to expect from this. I wondered what the standard(s) would be like and just how critical the judge would be.

The judging was split into two classes (amateur and advanced) and two types of entry (mounted and electronic images or slides).

On the basis that I had just joined and never been a member of any club before I was placed in the amateur category for this year (fine by me!!).

The standard all throughout was very good, with a real bias towards particular types of images (interesting to see judges individual tastes coming into play).

I was over the moon to come out with a 3rd place in my first judging evening. This was for the image below which received a score of 18/20:



The other two entries that I put in are below:

Contemplate (16/20 I think)
Sun Sets over Lynnau Mymbyr (18/20)

A good friend of mine Eddie Miller (also new to Mold Camera Club) also grabbed 3rd place within the advanced category for his excellent image of Manchester Chinatown

I made some notes however on critical points to be aware of when submitting entries in future. I hope that these are of use to anyone submitting images to any club(s).

• If there is lots of sky within a landscape image, ensure that there are items of interest within the sky i.e colours, clouds
• Do not over sharpen
• No lettering on the print mount (Image title)
• Smaller images that are sharp are better than large images that have lost their crispness due to over enlarging
• In full body shots, do not cut off any limbs (keep feet in image)
• Pay particular attention to detail lost through blown highlights and pure blacks
• watch for colour cast
• Avoid strong lights in corner of compositions this detracts from the main subject.