Contact details for the current Competition Secretary can be found in the 'Submission for Competitions' document in Dropbox > MemberShare > Competition Documents.

The purpose of the Club is to promote interest in the taking of photographs and to educate members in the art, science, appreciation and assessment of photography.

Assessment sessions may be led by outside speakers or by the members themselves in various ways. The aim of this process will be to draw attention to each picture's individual merits and discuss any areas in which it may be improved.

Competitions: general

1. There are five internal competitions a year.
2. Of the four single-image internal competitions, two have specified themes and two are open. Themes will be announced at the AGM and posted on the website.
3. For each competition, there are two categories, (a) Colour/Monochrome Print, and (b) Projected Digital Image. Members may enter up to two pictures for each category, and may enter both categories.
4. The panel competition is open.
• Members may enter one panel of prints and one panel of PDIs, each containing between three and five images.
• The images in a panel should have a unifying theme: story, subject matter, tonality and colour etc. The theme should be made clear in a title and, optionally, a descriptive statement. The set will be judged as a whole.
• Prints may be presented as a set of individual prints, in which case the layout and order of presentation must be made clear, either with an accompanying printed sheet or a sixth mounted composite. Alternatively, they can be collected together on a single mount, in which case the mount must conform to the usual size requirements for competitions. In this case it is necessary to upload another two 'dummy' images to PhotoEntry.
• PDIs shouild be presented as a sequence of images that must conform to the usual size requirements.


5. As one aim of the Club is to encourage members to develop their photographic skills, it is hoped that, in general, members will show recent work.
6. Trade processed/printed and home processed/printed entries shall be allowed in all sections.
7. No work may be presented for more than one internal competition unless it has been substantially altered, except that images submitted as part of a panel may have been submitted previously in a single-image competition and vice versa. (Unaltered work may be re-submitted for external competitions – see ‘External Competitions' notes below).
8. All parts of images submitted must have been produced by the photographer or by means of a digital imaging device. Any modifications made to the original image must have been made by the photographer or under her/his supervision.
9. Guidelines are issued to judges, including aspects of impact, composition, light/colour management and workmanship that the judge should take into account – and a request that the judge reduces marks for images that have no apparent relevance to the theme (where the entry is for a themed competition). The judge is asked to nominate one print and one PDI as the 'best image' in that category. The Guidance for Judges document is available in the MemberShare folder in Dropbox.

Requirements

1. Prints.The maximum print size, including mount, is 50cm x 40cm: this is consistent with Welsh Photographic Federation standards – and ensures that prints will fit into the carrying box.
• Labels must be fixed firmly to your print mounts, stating the date of the competition and the title of your print. To help with sorting it is useful if labels are fixed in the top right-hand corner. A template for club labels is available in the MemberShare folder on Dropbox. In an emergency, it is acceptable to write your details (as above) onto the print without a club label, but you should also add ‘Abergavenny Camera Club’. You do not need to put your own name on your prints unless you wish to, or unless the session is specified as being for attributed work.
• Only approved mounting/frame backing tape should be used.


2. Projected digital images PDIs).The pixel dimension for digital images must be no greater than 1400 pixels in the horizontal plane or 1050 pixels in the vertical plane and must be resized accordingly. Images must be in JPEG (.jpg) format and for optimum display should be saved at a resolution of 300 dpi Please see the Resizing for Digital Projection document for further help.

The pixel dimension for digital images must be no greater than 1400 pixels in the horizontal plane or 1050 pixels in the vertical plane and you should resize them accordingly. Images must be in JPEG (.jpg) format and for optimum display should be saved at a resolution of 300 dpi Please see the Resizing for Digital Projection document if you need further help.

Submission procedure

The Club uses PhotoEntry software (http://photoentry.uk/index.html) for all internal competitions, both prints and PDIs and including panel competitions. The PhotoEntry website has full instructions on how to use it; there is also a slide show on the Club website.

A competition will be open for entries at least four weeks before it is due to take place.

Members will be advised of a forthcoming competition two meetings (i.e. four weeks) before it is due to take place and this will be backed up by an email in the week following.

Prints for competitions should physically be handed in to the Competition Secretary before or on the hand-in date (i.e. the meeting two weeks prior to the judging date). Prints can also be delivered to the home of the Competition Secretary prior to the hand-in date (phone the number in the Dropbox 'Submission for Competitions' document for directions).

Inclusion on the club's website

All images that receive a score of 19 or 20, and any other images with a lower score judged as 'best image', will be included on the 'Inspiration' page of the club's website. Members with high-scoring prints will be asked to provide the Competition Secretary with DPI versions of their images. These images will also be included as entries for the ‘Photograph of the Year’ award (see below).

Other images may be included on the club website, for example in slide-shows of competition entries. If any member does not want an image displayed, they should contact the webmaster.

Annual awards

Three awards are made at the end of the year:

1. Certificates to the members with the top three highest cumulative scores in each of the Print and Projected Digital Image categories. Cumulative scores are based on the full number of points awarded for a member's highest-scoring entry in each competition, plus half the marks awarded for the other entry. So someone who gets 16 and 14 would get an overall score of 23 for that competition. As you can see, this means you get more marks this way than someone who puts in one image only and scores 20. The idea behind this is to encourage people to take and show a good number of pictures and to do it regularly, as this is one of the ways we improve as photographers. The annual winners of our print and projected digital image competitions are people who have entered every competition and put in two pictures each time.
2. An award for ‘Photograph of the Year’ chosen by members from the year’s top-scoring images, both Print and Projected Digital Image. This includes all images that scored 19 or 20 and, if necessary, any other 'best images' from each of the four competitions.
3. The Chair's Award for the most deserving member, solely at the Chairman's discretion.

If you require any further information about club competitions, please contact the Competition Secretary at a meeting or by email.

External Competitions

The club also participates in external competitions, both "battles" with other clubs and general competitions organised by members of the Welsh Photographic Federation.

In general, the high scoring print images (17 and higher) are retained by the Club for use in external competitions, rather than being handed back to members after each judging session. If you are not happy about this, then let us know.

In addition to using internal competition images, we also encourage members to submit images specifically for the external competitions. Members will be notified of the opportunities to do this prior to each external competition. Mounted prints for external competitions should be delivered to the Competition Secretary on or before the notified hand-in date. See the Requirements section above for instructions on size, labelling etc.

The club always aims to represent as many members as possible in external battles. For example, if a battle needs 10 pictures, we like to represent the work of 10 photographers, or as many as we can. However, we cannot guarantee that we will use any particular member's submitted work.

If you are interested in how we select images for external competitions, please tell us – and you may be invited to help!

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Revision Date: March 2016
(Reflecting use of Photo Entry to enter images into competitions.)

Copyright 2004- Abergavenny Camera Club. The copyright of images on this website belongs solely to the photographer. Images may not be copied, downloaded or used in any way without the specific written permission of the photographer.