Print Competition Observations
I entered and watched (two days) my first print competition at SWPPA. I have an extensive background in judging things of subjectivity (womens gymnastics) and walked away with a few observations.
1. How can a print first get a 87 and then be talked up to a 100 with two challenges? You gotta be kidding me.
2. One member can really build a frenzy. Scores can rapidly go up or down quickly. Sometimes by 15 points. Thats TWO catagories.
3. Some prints were judged a 87 and another judge gave it a 72. Thats a huge swing.
4. Prints in the 75-85 catagory where nearly indistinguishable.
5. They average ALL the scores. They should surely drop the low and high and average the middle scores. If they are within 5 points, a challenge should not be allow.
6. It seems if a print is challenged, it can only be upgraded ONE catagory – not two.
7. It seemed landscapes, trees in snow, alligators, birds, tulips, old men with wrinkles, …. scored well.
8. Prints that scored above a 90 were obviously superior.
9. I was highly impressed with the tone of the conversations, the language used (image maker), and the formalities.
10. It was interesting to say the least. Not sure how educational it was.
11. The most used words were “muddiness in the shades”, “cropped too tight”, “too much of the image is soft”, …
12. Judges can surely make up wild stories to support their scores. They read into the portraits WAY more than the image maker probably intended. The talk behind the scenes about how the images were actually created (sometimes with a point and shoot through a door and not even looking really) were nothing close to the what the judges “made up.” It was strange.
13. One judge actually said, “If that was a print going in the newspaper, it would be amazing.”
14. They did seem to like images with a lot of DOF & strong saturated colors.
15. Ohh, don’t print on metallic. 
16. And…. How many times I heard, “Ohh, I didn’t even notice that.” once a print was challenged. I was thinking to myself, “How did you not notice that?”. Some of the things that “Ohh I didn’t notice that” made you really think about the validity of their opinion at all. I was impressed but the candor to admit it though. Truly.
17. Ohh yeah, one judge said, “Folks, this is an art piece so just throw all the rules out the window.”. I guess I need to make more pieces that resemble “art pieces”.
Just a few thoughts.
George
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