Fort Wayne Photographers Club
	Calendar
	Newsletters
	Membership
	Links
	About Us

 

GENERAL COMPETITION RULES

Click HERE for a PDF file of this years categories.

1. To be eligible for club competition, a club member’s annual dues must be paid on or before October 1st of the competition season. After October 1st, new and previous members may compete upon payment of their dues. The club treasurer shall give the competition club chairs a list of members whose dues are paid on October 1st.
2. Only club members in good standing may vote in club competitions.
3. Digital entries must be submitted no later than midnight of the Sunday before competition night. Prints must be submitted no later than 6:45 pm the night of competition.
4. The print or digital imaging competition chairs reserve the right to reject any print or digital file that is deemed not to qualify for the category/theme in which it is entered. The chairs have the right to disqualify images that are deemed in poor taste or are not family friendly.
5. Any entry must contain only the club member’s image.
6. Judges: For each monthly competition, three judges will be used with two judges coming from outside the club and one from the club membership. The exception is for the annual competition at which time all three judges will be from outside the club. Judging will be by electronic instrument. The judges total score for each print or digital image shall be announced to the club. The highest score determines the First, Second and Third place. The exception is the end of year competition where the judges will discuss and determine the First, Second and Third place winners as well as approximately 10 honorable mentions.
7. First, Second or Third place winners’ images, in either print or digital monthly competitions, MAY NOT be re-entered in any future club competitions, except in that year’s end of year competition (see #8). Any image placing in the top three may be submitted in a different format the following year. So, for example if an image came in 3rd place in prints, the following year it may be entered as a digital image.
8. All prints and digital images entered in club competition during the current competition year will be eligible for the year-end judging for Print of the Year, or Digital Image of the Year. The digital chair will enter all the images previously submitted in the 5 digital competitions. Of course, for the print competition, each club member will need to submit their prints, on the night of the end of year competition. The annual competition will be judged by three outside judges. The Digital Competition will have a First, Second and Third place and approximately 10 honorable mentions for both Novice and Digital classes. The Print Competition will have a First, Second, and Third place and approximately 10 honorable mentions. The Print Competitions are not divided into separate classes. All prints will compete together.
9. For the end of year competition there will be cash awards presented at the Annual Banquet for First ($50), Second ($30) and Third place ($20) in Digital Advanced & Prints. There will be no ties for the end of year competition. Digital Novice & Honorable Mention awards do not receive a cash award.
10. Nature category/theme rules – PLEASE READ CAREFULLY.
    • Nature photography is defined as the use of the photographic process to depict a subject in its natural setting. Human elements (hand of man) may not be present. This would include fencing, landscaping (mulch, mown grass etc.), house siding, lattice, obvious trails, wooden walkways, street lights, power lines, etc.
    • Zoo animals, as well as domesticated plants/flowers may be entered in the nature category provided there is no hand of man visible.
    • SMALL amounts of digital manipulation are allowed to remove hand-of-man objects. For example, a light pole or phone wire may be removed by cloning from the surrounding area. However, you may not use manipulation to move an object (such as a bird) from one side of the image to the other for esthetic purposes.
    • Nothing is allowed to be ADDED to the image that was not already there. For example, you MAY NOT replace a gray sky with a beautiful blue sky.
    • SMALL amounts of removal are allowed. NO ADDITIONS are allowed.
11. Classes of Competition
    
    • 1a. In the Digital Division, there will be two classes for competitions, a Novice Class and an Advanced Class. The Novice Class is meant to encourage members who are beginner/intermediate photographers to compete and hone their skills. With competition against other photographers of like skill levels, it should make Novice’s more comfortable to submit images for competition.
    • 1b. Guidelines for the Novice Class:
      • i. To be eligible for the novice class, you must consider yourself to be at the beginner or intermediate level, with little or no competition experience. The Executive Board reserves the right to move you to the Advanced Class if they deem your work belongs there. You may also advance yourself to the Advanced Class at any time.
      • ii. Categories/Themes will be the same for the Novice and Advanced Class.
      • iii. Once you have moved to the Advanced Class, you may not return to the Novice Class.
      • iv. If a novice moves to the Advanced Class by his/her own decision, or at the boards discretion, all images entered that year, whether in the Novice or Advanced Class must be entered into the year-end competitions in the Advanced Class.

    • 2. The Print Division is not divided into classes. All prints will compete together.

Special Instructions for Print and Digital Images

Prints:

1. A label must be attached to the back of the print in the upper left-hand corner (as you look at the back of the mounted print). The label must have the competition date, entrant’s name, and the print title and competition category/theme. Do not fill in the entry number, the print chair will put the entry number on the label. Also points and placement are not filled in by the member.
   
   
2. Click HERE to get a page of labels to print in PDF format.
3. Members may submit one print in each of the 4 categories/themes
4. The photographic print entered in competition must have been photographed by the entrant. However, all finishing and/or mounting of the print may be done by other parties.
5. Print sizes shall be a maximum of a 72-inch perimeter. There are no minimum limits on size, but generally larger prints do better in competition.
6. Prints must be mounted on sturdy mount boards (mat board or foam core recommended), and should match the size of the print.
8. Framed prints, canvas, glass or metal prints are not allowed and will be disqualified.
9. The First, Second and Third place winner in each category/theme will have their winning image judged by the club to select the Print of the Month. The prints are laid out for viewing by the club members who will then will vote for their favorite image. Once the votes are tallied, the First, Second and Third Place Print of the Month winners will be announced. In the event of a tie, both winning images will be considered the Print of the Month. The Print of the Month will be displayed on the club’s website for that month.

Digital Images:

1. Members may submit one entry in each of the four categories/themes.
2. Digital files must be JPEG files.
3. Longest axis: no longer than 1600 pixels on the longest side. Click HERE for a helpful guide on how to prepare your digital images for competition.
4. Color space must be SRGB (not Adobe RGB).
5. Digital entries must be submitted no later than midnight of the SUNDAY before competition night. Entries submitted after midnight are ineligible for competition.
6. Images must be emailed to the Digital Chair at digital@fwphotoclub.com. A confirmation email will be sent by the digital chair confirming the number of digital images received.
7. Label each digital file with class, category/theme number, (space), First Name, (space), Last Name (.jpeg). Do not use any characters such as a comma, period, asterisk, slash or parenthesis in the file name.
   Examples:
   1. Advanced would look like this: A2 John Smith.jpeg
   2. Novice would look like this: N3 John Smith.jpeg
8. The First, Second and Third place winner in each category/theme will have their winning image judged by the club to select the Digital Image of the Month. The winning digital images are shown to the club members, who will then vote for their favorite image. Once the votes are tallied, the First, Second and Third Place Digital Image of the Month winners will be announced. In the event of a tie for first place, both winning images will be considered the Digital Image of the Month. The Digital Image of the Month will be displayed on the club’s website for that month.

Copyright© 2013-2018. All images are copyrighted and cannot be reproduced in any manner without written permission.