The primary purpose of monthly camera club competition is, in my opinion, to select (within an appropriate time constraint and using a “reasonable” set of guidelines) and rank a specified number of exemplary photographic images from those images entered. The secondary purpose is educational. The competition should be responsive to the needs of the judge (to be informative, accurate, and fair) and to the audience—participants (to receive timely, useful, valid, and fair comments about all their images) and to non-participants (to be educated about what makes worthy [and unworthy] photographic images and good photographic practices.) Consequently, the roles of a photographic competition judge are to 1) fairly analyze, evaluate, and adjudicate photographic images; 2) explain decisions to assure the audience that the image evaluation was impartial, valid, and fair; 3) educate them on appropriate photographic practices and visual design; and 4) make suggestions to some participants about how their images could have been improved. However, the skills needed by a competition judge are more like a university instructor than a district court judge. Although both need knowledge of the subject (e.g., photographic techniques, composition/visual design, and craftsmanship) and to be impartial in judging cases or grading students, the monthly competition judge also needs to be enthusiastic, sensitive to the participants’ needs, concise, and (most of all) articulate in what makes a good photographic image. (In retrospect, this is none other than a restating of Joe’s “A Good Camera Club Judge.”)

What criteria should a competition judge use? (Let me say that I don’t think there is much question that the four C’s (Craftsmanship/technical, Composition/visual design, Creativity/uniqueness, and Communication/emotional impact on viewer) are the correct set of guidelines a judge should use.

When I look at the do’s and don’ts in Joe’s handout, I believe most of them are problems of (im)proper articulation, with the exception of the ones using inappropriate, biased factors: “I don’t like cats.” “I have seen better sunsets.”) I think the real problems are associated with the weighting and handling of these criteria. Are they gates or weights? Do you start with the technical and throw out ones that have technical flaws, then follow up with visual design problems, and then uniqueness considerations? Would you throw out an Ansel Adam’s print that had bad matting or a couple of minor dust spots in the printing? Which should be rated higher a very grabbing and novel/fresh picture with some visual design imperfections or a superb, technically crafted and composed image that has modest emotional content? (The latter might even be novel in approach.)