Print version (Word doc) here

This is a competition with online submissions only, with a different theme for each month  through the season. The main purpose is to give the incentive and encouragement for you to get out and take a few photographs that adhere to a theme, to meet a deadline and to format your entries properly - just as you would have to for an outside competition. The entire management of the competition will be online and reminders of deadlines will only be promulgated here and/or on the KPC Update emails. Those deadlines are always a Sunday, regardless of the last day of the month.

This is not the official Club Competition and should not be taken as being particularly important - it's mainly something to keep your camera occupied through the season, but gives practice in shooting to a theme, deadline and correct format - as you'd find in external competitions.

The main changes  for 2011-2012 are:

• The removal of one round - December - as it's just too busy at that time of year. November's Round, which is also for CAPA competition submissions (so it's their theme) will have a late deadline in the first week of December. So there will now be SEVEN Rounds, with the scores from each member over their best SIX rounds being added for an aggregate total (so the lowest scoring round, over the seven rounds, for each member will be 'dropped').

• This season only TWO images are to be submitted per round. (The judging and critique can be overwhelming when there are 80+ images so this is something to reduce the load. It may also improve the overall standard by allowing members to select two good images).

• There will be four categories for the Judges - Impact, Technical Quality, Composition... and now - 'relevance to the theme'. Each category gives a maximum score of five points, giving a total maximum per judge of 20 points.

The Themes for 2011-2012 will again be quite abstract in their definitions and open to interpretation.... and this time it can very much include 'abstract images'. You have a free licence to use photo-editing software to create whatever you want - but the images must adhere as closely as possible to the monthly theme. Creativity, either in camera or in editing, is welcome. However, creative editing may not help if it's not well done - the "Pig's Ear, Silk Purse" conundrum. We're now looking for the 'complete' picture, as it might be presented for exhibition - and can include any special effects that suit the subject. Subtlety is the key.

Some legal stuff...... Members agree to permit Kingston Photographic Club to publish their images on the club website and the 'Camera Capers' Newsletter, or use their images at any time for exhibition, publication, promotion, education. Entry into the Online Competition implies acceptance of the above. Photographers are credited for their work. The Club recommends that, where necessary, the photographer obtains a model release for presentation and publication purposes, prior to submitting the entry. (In general, photographs of people taken in a public place are not considered to require 'model releases' unless the image is to be used for the purpose of sales promotion - which, in the case of the club, they are not. Similarly, pictures of any building, taken from a public place also do not need any copyright regulation unless the images are to be sold).

OK, the nitty-gritty..... (don't worry, once you've done one it's easy)

a. A maximum of TWO digital images, in colour or mono, per person, per month, may be submitted. These images may be used in other club competitions and/or submitted for the Annual Exhibition. They should be recent pictures, taken in the course of the season.... to suit the themes.

b. The rules for sizing and saving are closer to the rules for the main Club Competitions and therefore should help to simplify matters..... however, I won't need to be quite so picky with them, so something approximate would be acceptable. They should be at 72ppi and no more than 1024 pixels on the long side for a horizontal (landscape) oriented image and not more than 768 pixels in height for vertical (portrait) oriented image. The file should be saved in the sRGB colour space (sRGB is the standard web colour space as well as what most digital projectors use). Note that most computers can only display at 72ppi (or 96 at best), so just save at 72ppi. Higher 'resolution' will just make for larger file sizes.

c. Save with the title of the image as the filename, with no other information, in Jpeg format - if you set your compression (or 'Quality' level) to around 8 or 9 you should end up with a file of around 300kb... if you end up with a file bigger than 500kb you've probably got it wrong. Do not save them with the "Save for Web" method - I need to see the exif information and that method removes the exif - so use the normal Save method. Various instructions for sizing and saving are here or via the menu above.

d. Send them as email attachments (not 'pictures in text') to me at gchalcraft@cogeco.ca or to  web@kingstonphotographicclub.ca, clearly identified (saved) with an image name, but preferably with no other identity (like a photographer's name, signature, date or watermark) either in the filename or on the picture. [Please - an appropriate name makes it a lot easier to put straight into the competition's monthly image folder and easier for the judges to identify.... and using the month's theme, like "Danger 1", "Danger 2", "Danger 3" isn't helpful - lots of people might be tempted to do the same and we end up with about eight shots named "Fall.... something or other". ]

e. There is a different theme each month, as shown below. Once the monthly deadline has passed, the images are posted online to allow the judges (and only the judges) to view the images. They will be shown anonymously and the panel of three judges will award points (I will not be scoring, but will  collate judges' comments) with a maximum of 5 points in each of the following categories:

• Picture impact - the overall creativity, originality, mood - the subjective things... will it make the judges' eyes light up a little, raise an eyebrow or make them yawn?

• Technical quality - sharpness, exposure, colour rendition, tones etc. If there's a sky, does it have any details or colour or is it washed out? Exposure, focus and sharpness are explained fully in the list of useful information on the Workshop page, or via the menu above.

• Composition - comprises Points, Lines and Shapes - are they pleasingly distributed? Will the viewer's eye look along lines, settle on shapes etc or will they wander around the image in vain, get bored and look for another picture?

• Adherence to the theme - it has to be relevant to the theme of the month (and, ideally, taken for the purposes of the competition and not just 'found' among older images - so the EXIF should be saved with each file). This aspect was a little vague before - this season the age of the picture and relevance to the theme will be taken into consideration.

f. Each of the three judges will therefore give a maximum of four sets of five points, so that's a maximum of 20 points each, giving a maximum Grand Total of 60 points per image, between the three judges.

g. Images can be accepted in the month prior to the month in question, e.g. I can take April's images in March, but please make this clear on your email. All images must be with me by midnight at the end of the deadline day. Note that the deadline day is not necessarily the last day of the month, a fiscal month, a new moon, or any other kind of month...... it is midnight at the end of the day promulgated in the schedule below.

h. The three judges return their monthly results - with critique - to me. The scores will then be collated in the spreadsheet and then published on a PDF file, linked to from the 'Month' column below. The critique will be forwarded individually (and privately) to each member who has submitted images.

i. The scores - but not the critique - will then be available for all to see on the website and there will also be a 'running scoreboard' of all scores. The images themselves will become available in a Slide Show each month.

When all the rounds are completed, I will put up a slide show of the 80 best-scoring shots of the year (rather than how they ended up each month). It will show off the club and your work. The TOTAL SCORES (from each participating member's highest SIX monthly scores) will be added together for a GRAND TOTAL for the competition, with the lowest score being discarded. This will make it interesting right to the end.

Small prizes have, in the past, been generously donated (in the form of Gift Tokens) by Henry's Photo Store (in the Rio-Can, Kingston), and we hope they will do the same this season - to be confirmed. They will be for the top five scorers, with a $50 1st Prize, $40 for 2nd, $30 for 3rd, $20 for 4th, $10 for 5th.

The competition is open to all 'full' (paid up) Members of the club.

Programme/Schedule 2011-2012

These themes are as abstract as last year but I hope the suggestions work. All are completely open to your own interpretation. The judges will be aware of the Theme and will be looking for images that adhere to the theme in some way.

This 'competition' is really an exercise in shooting to a theme and it requires NEW images. It's all about getting members out and about to take pictures of things they don't usually try, so sending a picture that was taken years ago is not what it's about. However, I won't be actually rejecting any older images, unless they've already won a club competition in the past, but judges score independently and may deduct marks for a picture that must have been made before the themes were published.

A little more detail on sizing....

Once editing is completed, make sure that the digital file that is being submitted is sized to no more than 1024 pixels on the long side for horizontal images and not more than 768 pixels for verticals. This applies to both portrait (vertical) and landscape (horizontal) formats. The ppi (pixels per inch, or 'resolution') should be 72.
Alternatively, ensure that the file is saved as a JPEG at 72ppi and a maximum of 15 inches on the longer sides. Save the digital file as a high quality JPEG, i.e., lowest compression possible. NOTE: Image quality will be compromised if the resolution is less than 600 Pixels across the widest dimension. Using the recommended resolution and level of compression, the file size for the JPEG file should be approximately 200-450kb in size.

As is often the case for the simpler techniques for Photoshop and PS Elements, Paint Shop Pro and others programs, there are several videos available on YouTube. I've put a few links to resizing tutorials/videos on the Workshop page. If you're using a program other than PS, Elements or PSP, try going to YouTube and entering something like "Resizing in (your program)" in the Search box. Or tell me what the program is and I'll try to find the instructions. I will be quite strict about sizes but I can correct some images - not difficult when 'sizing down' (although I'm not keen on my email inbox getting filled with 10Mb+ files), but 'sizing up' is often just not possible. Bear in mind that, if it were an important National or Provincial competition your image would just be rejected if it didn't fulfil the criteria precisely.... so it's good practice.

I also came across a PDF about resizing on another club's website, which my be of use.

If you have a question, drop me an email or give me a call.