Overwhelmed by high standards
Feb 14th, 2009 by Keith Chaloner
John Burt has asked for his thoughts, as follows, to be posted:
Our club has a considerable range of talent and the less experienced members might find themselves overwhelmed by the very high standard demonstrated by the very talented senior members.
The Bromley ( Surrey) camera club, is a large club of a very high standard, but ran their competitions at three levels. In this case your work is being judged with others of the same experience. Success at your own level was assessed and the leaders in their group could then progress to the next higher level.
The advantage of this scheme is that the newer workers can see how their work progresses compared with others of similar experienced and would indeed be rewarded.
John Burt
John has a very valid point. In past seasons there was the ’small picture’ category to enable less experienced members to get involved. This opportunity was removed and it will be a very brave ‘novice’ to be prepared to put their work forward for comparison with the majority of the work produced.
With an increasing membership, large number of images to be judged and the plans to include prints, DPI,s & slides into each ‘Points Cup’ evening it might be difficult but the issue should be addressed.
One positive note is the intent to include ‘appraisal’ evenings in future programs that will allow images to be discussed by experienced Club members in a non-competitive context. This should be an excellent way to gain confidence, knowledge and a means of improving ones work; particularly for the newer member.
On a related issue perhaps the Competition Committee should consider the basis on which they select images for inter club competitions. The basis of selection applied now is probably ‘We want to win, period’, this within the constraints of the rules that dictate a maximum of 3 images per photographer. This could result in the Club being represented by 4 photographers (for a maximum of 12 images per Club). It could even be that the same few photographers represent the Club on each occasion. This perfectly properly based on the superb quality of a few members work. However, it can be argued that there is another consideration other than winning. If club members are to be encouraged to provide images for consideration, and to seek to improve their standard, there should be the possibility of more than just a very small number of members representing us.
How about a maximum number of 2 instead of 3 images per member. That would enable at least 6 members to contribute. Perhaps we should lobby SAPA to change the rules?
p.s. On reflection, why not be more radical and limit the prints/photographer to one? That would ensure a much wider representation of the membership’s work and probably a wider variety of images. What do others think?
Keith
I have taken some time to think through a response for the very valid points raised and although there is obvious merit for what is proposed, the very nature of our club, its size, the diverse motivation and aspirations of our membership, all have a bearing on possible solutions. The following represents my thoughts only and in no way is the view of the committee.
Competitions between local clubs are governed by SAPA, which is our Regional body. Much of the standing of any given club within SAPA is geared to its competition success against other clubs, so it goes without saying that clubs put forward their best work. In the past, we have trialled representative work from all members willing to submit their work for competitions in friendly “battles”, such as the annual Camborne & Redruth competition, fully aware that the opposition only submitted their best work. Our results were often mediocre, which is not surprising when we were competing at a disadvantage. Some eighteen months ago, we only submitted our best work and won, with repeated success more recently.
Against SAPA clubs, we have played within the rules and generally always win the prints, but don’t fare so well with the slides. That’s not intended as any criticism against our slide workers, more the reality that many of our members have succumbed to the flexibility of digital, rather than the harsh discipline of slides. We know that many clubs use slide conversions of digital originals, but we try not to. We have tried, but the results aren’t satisfactory, compared to the originals, and we have generally only used them to make up the numbers. I do consider that to arbitrarily reduce our clubs chances of success would be detrimental to the standing of the Blandford Forum Camera Club. However, if the SAPA rules were changed to two entries, or even one per member, I would welcome that. All clubs would be using the same benchmark and that would be a fairer representation of the club, rather than their talented four. I would go even further with the rule changes to include no digital slide conversions and all marks count. At present, from twelve entries within each section, the lowest three scores are discounted. Therefore, it is possible to win based on the work of the clubs three most talented photographers! We have a SAPA representative and this could be put forward for consideration. With regard to the comment “We want to win” ……….. yes! I wouldn’t willingly enter into any endeavour that was doomed to failure. But, notwithstanding that objective, we want to play with a straight bat, not only within the rules, but within the spirit of the rules. Our few digital slide conversions were entered after much soul searching and the certain knowledge that with insufficient entries, every slide short would cost us somewhere between 6 – 10 points.
Whilst external competitions are chosen on merit, entries to internal competitions are the right of every member. With over 70 members, under the current rules they are able to submit two entries for colour prints, black & white prints, 35mm slides and digital projection. In theory, that would be 560 entries. Last night’s projected images competition consisted of 38 digital and a dozen or so slides and although the judge was fairly quick with each entry, it still took up most of the evening. A reasonable judge should be able to cope with around 80 images during an evening and that could take 7 evenings a month to cover. Thankfully for the logistics, many of our members have different aspirations towards competitions; ranging from content to watch but not enter, to entering only their preferred media, to entering everything possible.
There was also much recent comment amongst members that we were spending far too much program time on various competitions, rather than on photography and by now you should be aware of the rule changes to limit the club evenings spent on internal competitions. I also note that the long running small prints section, designed for newer/less experienced members, has only received a couple of entries for the whole year, so bearing that in mind, are we trying to do the right thing, but from the wrong angle?
We have had an “informal mentoring” arrangement within the club for a few years. This is above and beyond the more formal arrangements in the summer program and is more akin to Norman’s recent evening on night time/low light photography. The results from that exercise were superb and many points’ cup entries resulted from members that would never have attempted that avenue of photography. Their newfound enthusiasm from that evening seems to have provided greater confidence to tackle other subjects outside of their comfort zone. The informal mentoring has been for members who express an interest in certain aspects of photography being teamed up with more experienced members in that subject, outside of the normal club curriculum. I am aware that John Burton, Dionne, Norman and myself have had various spells at mentoring.
Perhaps we could offer this on a more formal basis within the club, rather than relying on members requesting some assistance. In my opinion, it would be better to provide those that are interested with the skills and expertise to make the most of their hobby (some would say passion) and compete on an equal footing with other members, rather than tinker once again with the competition rules, when it appears that many members prefer to spend more club time “doing”, rather than watching competitions. Aware that the 2009/10 program is now complete and awaiting printing, any alterations to our program would not take effect until the 2010/11 program, so mentoring may be an effective short term solution.
Obviously there is much to consider and I would welcome other members views, either through this forum, Email, or personally. Depending on comments received, if there is a consensus, I am more than willing to bring this up for discussion at the next committee meeting.
I for one would enjoy more informal evenings in learning photography skills and techniques and I for one learn more from “doing” rather than listening or reading. I was one ‘learner’ who got a great deal from the Night photography shoot and also Peter Gafney’s print mounting and Norman’s slide mounting evening.
I enjoy the competitions, listening to the views of the judges and what could be improved and enjoy seeing other people’s work. I learn much from those evenings and want them to continue, a balance in between as well as our other activities and talks I’m sure could be achieved
A late response to the above but I fully endorse Marilyn’s comments and value the input and patience of those willing to share their knowledge and expertise wih me in my quest to better understand photography