I’ve set myself a bit of a challenge lately – to see if I can gain a credit award with the Photographic Alliance of Great Britain (CPAGB). To achieve this I need to submit 10 images that will score 200 points. The images will be assessed by six judges who will give each image a score typically between 2 and 5. So, with each image having to score 20 points on average I probably need to get three judges scoring four and three scoring 3 to make it a success, and fours are not that easy to come by. As I am in a camera club that is affiliated to the L&CPU I can apply for a mentor to help me through this process and I have been allocated Mike Lawrence, a well respected photographer in this region. I contacted Mike a few weeks ago and sent him 25 images to review and comment upon. Mike selected what he thought were the strongest images and gave me some tips on how I could improve them. I undertook the task of reworking quite a few of the images over a number of nights. I then sent Mike a further small selection which he agreed were better than some of the original images that I sent. I have now added three of those additional images into the panel of 10 and I feel this makes for a much stronger portfolio.
The next stage is to attend a mock adjudication on 10th of November where the images will be assessed using the same format and scoring mechanism as in the real thing. This should tell me whether I have a realistic chance of making the CPAGB or whether I need to add some improved images to the portfolio, I’ll keep you updated. The panel is shown below.
Steve Proctor 