COVID-19 Notice: To ensure the safety of our members and external judges all entries into this season's club competitions (2023/24) will be digital images until further notice. Additional print images may be required for the Advanced League in later rounds.

League and Photographer of the Year Overview

The League is a graded competition with a separate competition for each of the Novice, Intermediate and Advanced grades.

The Novice and Intermediate Leagues

This season all entries for the Novice and Intermediate leagues will be Digital Projected Images (DPI) and there will be three categories in each round:

• Colour (Open)
• Monochrome (Open)
• Themed (see below for the themes)

There will be six rounds in the league.

For each round of the league, each member will be entitled to enter up to three images - One Colour image, one Monochrome image and one Themed image.

Gold, Silver and Bronze medals will be awarded in each of the categories.

Your score for the year in each category will be the sum of your best five scoring images in that category.

The score for the Photographer of the Year (POTY) is the best combined score across the three categories, and the Novice and Intermediate Photographers of the Year will receive a trophy and a gold medal.
All entries must be submitted by email, following the instructions here. Any images submitted that do not follow the instructions may be disqualified from that round of the league.

The Advanced League

This season entries for rounds 1,2 5 and 6 of the Advanced league will be Digital Projected Images (DPI). Round 3 and Round 4 of the Advanced league will be Print rounds. In order to facilitate projection over Zoom, we will require a corresponding electronic image for each print. The judge will, however, be assessing prints in all categories for these rounds.

There will be three categories:

• Colour (Open)
• Monochrome (Open)
• Themed (see below for the themes)

There will be six rounds in the league.

For each round of the league, each advanced member will be entitled to enter up to three images - One Colour image, one Monochrome image and one Themed image.

Gold, Silver and Bronze medals will be awarded in each of the categories.

Your score in each category will be the sum of your best five scoring images in that category.

The score for the POTY is the best combined score across the three categories, and the Advanced Photographer of the Year will receive a trophy and a gold medal.

All entries must be submitted by email and/or print, following the instructions here. Any images submitted that do not follow the instructions may be disqualified from that round of the league.

This season, themes will apply to all Grades, one themed image per round. The themes are listed in the table opposite. Each photographer is invited to interpret the themes as they see them. Some such as different perspectives, capturing the light and the decisive moment are based more on how the photographer sees the the shot and their skill in capturing it. Others reflect more on wide genres such as landscape and people photography. A couple of common interpretations are listed below.

The Decisive Moment is a term coined by Henri Cartier-Bresson, one of the most influential photographers of the 20th century. It refers to the moment when all the elements in a photograph come together perfectly to create a meaningful image.

Capturing the light is a reference to the magic effect that all photographers see in their best photos when light falls in the right way on the right parts of the subject. This is the essential art of photography.

Round	Theme	Judge
1	Different perspectives	Tony Murray
2	Capturing the light	Michelle La Grue
3	People and their environment	Pauric McGroder
4	The decisive moment	Paul Stanley
5	Land and sea	John Hooton
6	The human face	Eileen McCausland

 

On each competition judging night the judge will award marks out of 50. For the purposes of scoring the league, points will be allocated based on the placing of each entry in that month’s competition. This is done according to the adjoining table (a process referred to as Normalisation).

Internal league points (normalised) will be allocated on the placing of each entry.
Joint placing will be allowed from 2^nd place down. E.g. if two images are placed 2^nd then both will get 19 points normalised. Also, in this case the next normalised score will still be 18.

All entries after 11^th place will be awarded 10 points normalised.

Results will be published by the Competition Secretary.

Placing based on Judges score	Normalised Score
1st	20
2nd	19
3rd	18
4th	17
5th	16
6th	15
7th	14
8th	13
9th	12
10th	11
All other	10

Trophies and medals are awarded in each of the ‘Novice’, ‘Intermediate’ & ‘Advanced’ grades as outlined above.
In each of the leagues: Where no more than four people compete, medals will only be awarded to 1st and 2nd place and a certificate for third.
Where no more than three people compete, a medal will be awarded to first place and a certificate for the other places.
It is deemed unlikely that this situation will arise very often as most members in each grade enter at least one league competition, they may then “drop out” for various reasons but they have competed in the league.
In the event of a tie in a category: Medals will be awarded for tied positions. However, once at least three medals have been awarded, no further medals will be awarded in that category for lower placings. For example, if three people tie for 1^st place, then three gold medals will be awarded, but no further medals will be awarded in that category.
In the event of a tie for POTY: Where there is a tie for POTY, then the award will go to the person with the most highest placed images (considered in order from 1^st to last until a resolution is reached). Only counting images will be considered in this process. If there is no resolution by this means, then the award will go to the person with the highest gross (non-normalized) score for their counting images. If there is still no resolution, then a joint award will be made.