Appraisal and Competition Rules

Mid Calder Camera Club runs four Internal Appraisals, a Portfolio Competition, an Equaliser Competition, and an Image of the Year (IOY) Competition each year (September – May).

All appraisals and competitions will be appraised by external judges, recognised by the Scottish Photographic Federation (SPF) and selected by the club secretary.

Organisation

From session 2018/19 the club membership will be split into three groups which were drawn at the 2018 AGM.

Group A consists of members from the previous Advanced Group drawn at the AGM
Group B consists of the remainder of the Advanced group, not drawn in Group A, and Intermediate group member drawn at the AGM.
Group C consists of the remainder of the Intermediate group, not drawn in Group B, and all other members wishing to take part in the appraisals.
Groups A and B are made up of 10 members each with Group C made up of all other members. Any person who joins the club will be assigned to Group C.

There will be promotion and relegation between the groups. At the end of the session the 2 lowest scoring members within Group A will be relegated to Group B with the 2 highest scoring in Group B replacing them. A similar system will operate between Groups B and C.
In the event of a tie there will be a count back system. The member with the highest combined score in the last appraisal will remain in their existing group or be promoted.

Members may be in separate groups for PDI's and Prints due to either, only previous submitting images for appraisal in one category, or being drawn in that section during the recent AGM.

NOTE: On becoming a member you are automatically given an ID Number or 'Competition' number which you must use when submitting any images for all appraisal/competitions.

Internal Appraisals

The 4 internal appraisals are open to all members of the club. There will be no set themes to allow any images to be submitted.

Each member is allowed 2 images per section which must meet the following criteria:

Projected Images

All digital images must be emailed as an attachment to the Appraisal Secretary.

These must be submitted with the following criteria:

Images must be resized, with the horizontal side being no more than 1600 pixels, the vertical side no more than 1200 pixels and a dpi (dots or pixels per inch) of 96dpi.
Images must be in the sRGB format.
Each filename must be in the following format
- image title_membership no_section.jpg
- e.g. Almondell in Autumn_013_Proj.jpg

NOTE: Please ensure an underscore between each part as this makes it easier for the appraisal secretary to sort and analyse the sentries after the appraisal is complete.

Printed Images

These must be submitted with the following criteria:

The maximum print size with mount is 16x20 inches (40x50cm).
There is no set minimum size of print.

Each print must be labelled on the rear of the print with the print title, appraisal entered and membership number on the rear of the mount. The Appraisal secretary can provide sheet of labels for the competitions if required. (See example below.

A digital version of the print should be supplied as above in the Projected Image, except the section name shall be “Print”:

e.g. Almondell in Autumn_013_Print.jpg

Entries will be accepted by the appraisal secretary up to and including the 2nd last Friday (12 days) before the Wednesday night appraisal takes place. This allows delivery to the Appraiser over the weekend allowing more than a week for his appraising.

Digital entries can be submitted as an email attachment and sent to the Appraisal Secretary.

The Portfolio Competition

The Portfolio Competition will require each entrant to submit four projected images each to a set theme of the members own choosing.

These must be submitted with the similar criteria as the appraisals.

Each image must be resized, with the horizontal side being no more than 1600 pixels, the vertical side no more than 1200 pixels and a dpi (dots or pixels per inch) of 96dpi.
Each filename must be in the following format:

theme_image title_ membership no.jpg

e.g. Cars_Porche_013.jpg

None of the images entered into the portfolio competition should have been used in any previous internal club appraisal.

The Equaliser Competition

The Equaliser Competition, which is for the Ross Alpin-Smith Trophy, will require each entrant to submit one projected image on a theme or format decided at the final EXEC Meeting before the session begins.

This must be submitted with the similar criteria as the appraisals.

Each image must be resized, with the horizontal side being no more than 1600 pixels, the vertical side no more than 1200 pixels and a dpi (dots or pixels per inch) of 96dpi.
The filename must be in the following format:

Equaliser_image title_ membership no.jpg

e.g. Equaliser_Almondell Weir_013.jpg

None of the images entered into the equaliser competition should have been used in any previous internal club appraisal.

Entries for the Portfolio and Equaliser competitions will be received by the appraisal secretary on the same timescale as for the internal appraisals. i.e. the 2nd last Friday before the Wednesday of the competitions.

Image of the Year Competition

The Image of the Year competition involves the best projected and printed images throughout the four internal appraisals.

Any image scoring 18 or above in any club appraisal will be eligible to be entered into the Image of the Year contest. At least three images will be eligible from each section (beginners, intermediate and advanced) in each of the appraisals. In the event that there are less than three images scoring 18 or above the next highest scoring images will be eligible to enter.

General Notes:
Please ensure that, if images are being submitted on a USB Stick, that the stick is clearly marked with your name.

To enable the appraisal secretary to easily identify the member’s entries I would suggest that a directory structure be set up by the member on their USB stick as follows:

\Member name\Membership No.\Appraisal No.\Print and Projected Directory

\Jim Reid\013\Appraisal No1\Print

\Jim Reid\013\Appraisal No1\Projected

Nudes - What are MCCC's rules?

There is much debate about what is acceptable or not so this section aims to clarify our camera clubs' policy on this.

Mid Calder Camera Club promotes photography for all and this includes junior members. To this end we will only accept "implied nudity" for appraisal or competitions. This includes other club's images in inter-club competitions.

For those that don't know what the term means here is a plain english definition:

"Implied nudity is just what it sounds like: photos where nudity is suggested, but the viewer can't be certain precisely how undressed the model is. There are no naughty bits on show, only a carefully constructed intimation toward their presence."

Our Appraisal Secretary's decision is final.