The Livingston Camera Club holds various photography competitions each year.
Members of Livingston Camera Club belong to one of three classes. ‘B‘ for serious photographers, or those new to the club. ‘A‘ members are the more advanced members. ‘Salon‘ for those members who have shown consistent success in prior years and participate in all formats available to them in the competitions.
The number of images that can be submitted by each member are limited, to ensure adequate time for the judges’ comments and other club business. For themed competitions participants in all classes will compete in a single contest. Images awarded a score of “9” (Equal Merit) cannot be used in any other open or theme competition within the club (However, they may be used in “Thru The Lens”).
Open competitions are generally held once per month. Members in each class have the opportunity to compete in both Prints and Digital contests. The total number of images that can be entered into the Print or Digital categories are the same for all three classes. Members are encouraged to compete in both the Print and Digital categories. Members in all classes will be working to improve their image making skills in camera and in the digital darkroom.
In the ‘A’ and ‘B’ classes color and monochrome may be entered into the same contest. The Salon class members working to hone their image making skills have opted to separate monochrome contests from color. To provide for this difference, and to maintain the same number of contests for all classes, the Salon class contests will alternate between mono and color on a monthly basis. Monochrome Images are defined as a single-toned image such as Black and White or Sepia, with no additional accent, spot, or selective color. Infrared images may be used in Monochrome contests.
Images that receive a score of 5 or 6 may be resubmitted using the comments of the judge and/or other corrections. Images receiving a score of 7 or more may not be resubmitted in an open competition. All images in open competition receiving a score of 8 or less may be used in a themed competition.
Competition Scoring
Each contest will be judged using the following procedure:
The judge will provide comments that will provide the maker with suggestions on improvement. In reaching a score the judge will consider “story telling” aspects of the image, technical attributes, difficulty in making the image, as well as overall creativity and impressions.
When initially presented with the images, the judge will grade the image with a 5, 6, or 7 score using the outline above. After all of the images of each contest have been presented the judge will re-score only the 7’s which may remain a 7 or receive an 8 or 9. This second pass will be without comments. Eights will receive an Honorable Mention and all nines will receive an Equal Merit award. Images that earn an Equal Merit award in a monthly open competition cannot be entered into a Themed competition.