Tag Archives: competition

Summer Break

On 13th April we held our Annual Print competition for the first time in two years, having previously been unable to meet in person due to Covid restrictions. There were no leagues, with all members competing equally, and 4 categories: open colour, open monochrome, nature and people.

Due to the competition being for physical prints I sadly have no digital images to show you, but huge congratulations go to all our winners which were:

Open Mono
Bill Pickard with ‘Maasai Warriors’

Open Colour
Gordon Mills with ‘Sunset Klong Muang Beach’

Nature
Gordon Mills with ‘Dalmatian Pelicans Lake Kerkin’

People & Portrait
Ann Bench with ‘We Can All Be Different’

In addition, we hold an annual Lakeland Trophy competition which consists of a panel of 3 prints depicting Lakeland or Cumbria, and our 2022 winner was Jeff Bagnall with ‘Wansfell ponies’ – well done Jeff!

Our season has now finished and we are embarking on a summer break. Although formal meetings won’t be taking place, Club members will be meeting regularly in small, informal groups for days out and details can be found on our private Photoshoots Facebook page.

Our 2022/23 season starts in September. Details of the new programme will be available on the programme page of our website shortly. In the meantime, we hope you all have a wonderful summer – fingers crossed the weather will be kind and we can get out and about with our cameras!

Competition: Annual PDI

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On 30th March we held our annual Projected Digital Image competition judged via Zoom by Caroline Preece. There were no leagues, with all members competing equally, and 4 categories: open colour, open monochrome, nature and people.

Starting with the nature category, big congratulations go to Gordon Mills whose adorable image of a ‘Grey Seal Pup’ stole the show.

Next up was the monochrome category, won by beginning photographer Kim Rigg with her image of ‘The Boxer’ – well done Kim!

Following a short break, we resumed judging with the open colour section, which was won by Jeff Bagnall with his stunning landscape shot ‘Wintering’.

Last, and definitely least with only 4 entries, we finished with the people category which was won by Jo Knight with ‘Evacuee’, although she says it was a hollow victory with so few images competing.

Our thanks to Caroline for her excellent critique of our images, which contained a carefully considered mix of positive attributes and constructive ways of the improving each shot.

This Wednesday we are joined by speaker Vincent Scothern who is talking ‘From The Other Side Of The Fence’. The first half of the evening will concentrate on sports photography, and the second half covers Vincent’s DPAGB entries alongside wildlife, landscape and people photography so there’s something for everybody! Guests are welcome, either at the community centre or via zoom – see our membership page for fees and how to join in. See you all on 6th April 😊.

Competition: Panels

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Club favourite Gerald Chamberlin EFIAP DPAGB of Morton Photographic Society was our zoom judge for this year’s Panel competition, held on Wednesday 9th March.

Members had clearly taken on board all the recent advice offered on how to build a successful panel and we saw well balanced images, with matching tones and saturation, which told strong stories in creative ways.

I’ll start this week with advanced colour, where the top spot was shared between Bill Pickard with ‘Dancing on water’ and Gordon Mills with ‘Brown Pelican’. Both superb panels and well deserved winners. Second place went to Dave Nelson with ‘Ready Steady Go’ and third place was shared between Maureen Smith with ‘Sunrise on Meathop Moss’ and Jo Knight with ‘A Disabled Experience’.

In the Club colour section, first place was shared between Peter Kennedy with ‘Sunflowers’ and Bill Lowis with ‘Who ate all the seeds’ – well done both! Second place was awarded to Kim Rigg with ‘Mary’s Shell’ and third place to Suzy Braye with ‘Swaledale Barn’.

After a half time brew we resumed with Club monochrome, where big congratulations went to Suzy Braye with ‘Old Gang Smelting Mill’. No second place was awarded, but 18 points went to Kim Rigg with ‘Splash’.

Last but not least, we ended with Advanced mono where Bill Pickard scooped his second 20 points of the night with his panel ‘Shades of Blackpool’. Second place was awarded to Maureen Smith with ‘Storm’ and third place went to Jeff Bagnall with ‘Getting ready to play’.

Our thanks to Gerald for his careful consideration and constructive critique of our images 😊. This Wednesday prepare to get wet with our competition on the theme of ‘Water’. Look forward to seeing members and guests (click here to attend as a guest) at 7.30pm, either on Zoom or at Castle Street Community Centre.

Competition: Funny Faces

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We were treated to a riot of funny faces in our themed competition on 16th February, judged by Kylie-Ann Martin CPAGB EFIAP BPE2* of Great Barr Photographic Society. Despite storm Dudley and a howling gale, several members braved it to Castle Street Community Centre while the judge and everyone else joined on Zoom, including Jo via candlelight as her electric had gone off in the storm!

We’ll start this week’s blog with Club Mono where big congratulations go to Peter Kennedy who hit the double, being awarded 20 points for both ‘Angus’ and ‘Me and my gal’. Ann Dallaway was awarded second place for ‘Masked Man’, with Kim Rigg in third place with ‘Who you looking at’.

In the Club colour section, a big well done to our winner Kim Rigg with ‘Stumpy’, while second place went to Ann Bench with ‘We can all be different’ and third place was shared between Derek Mackie with ‘Look Who’s Coming’ and Kim Rigg again with ‘Funny Man’.

On to the Advanced mono section, with a well deserved win for Maureen Smith with ‘Egg Heads’. Second place was awarded to Phil Drayton for ‘Water Bombed’, and third place was shared between Gavin Lowe with ‘Cat Woman’ and Maureen Smith again with ‘Side Splitter’.

And last but not least our Advanced colour section. Well done to Gavin Lowe with ‘Hot Dog’, which should have won for the title alone 😁. Second place was shared between Jo Knight with ‘Identity Crisis’ and Phil Drayton with ‘Merry go round’, while third place went to both Jeff Bagnall for ‘Fell Pony’, Jo Knight for ‘Tears of a Clown’ and Maureen Smith for ‘Oh no’.

Next week we are being visited via Zoom by Adrian Almond, a photographer recently moved to Cumbria, with his talk entitled ‘A Man For All Seasons’. The evening promises to be wide ranging, with subjects including landscapes, military jets, birds, steam locomotives and nature! Guests are very welcome to join us either at the club or on Zoom – please see our membership page for prices and how to book. Look forward to seeing you all on Wednesday 😁.

Competition: Perspective

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Gerald Chamberlain EFIAP DPAGB of Morton Photographic Society was the judge for our Members’ Evening competition on Wednesday 1st December, which had the theme of ‘Perspective’. There were two ways of interpreting the brief: perspective can either represent a point of view, or be the art of representing a 3D object on a 2D surface and we had a mix of both definitions in the 80 images submitted to the competition.

Starting with Advanced mono, first place was shared between Gordon Mills with ‘Taj Mahal’ and Russell Millner with ‘Life and Death’. Congratulations to Gordon, whose stunning image was chosen by Gerald as overall winner. Second place and 19 points was also shared between Jeff Bagnall’s ‘Pyramid Du Louvre’, Maureen Smith’s ‘St Anne’s Piers’ and Dave Nelson’s ‘Hanger Cosford’.

Congratulations to Peter Kennedy, whose well seen photograph ‘Take a left’ won the Club mono section. Second place and 19 points was shared between Elaine Elrick with ‘Criss Cross’ and Derek Mackay with ‘The Cutter’, while third place went to Kim Rigg with ‘The Old Railway Tunnel Keswick’.

Well done to Jo Knight, whose creative image ‘Courage’ won the advanced colour section. Second place was awarded to Dave Nelson with ‘A Sideways View’, while third place and 18 points was shared between Jo Knight with ‘Not Waving But Drowning’ and Gordon Mills with ‘Hudson Boulevard Subway’.

And finally, congratulations to Kim Rigg who won the club colour section with her cleverly seen ‘I’ll take the red one’. Runner up was Derek Mackey with ‘Bird’s eye view’, while third place was shared between Martin Rower with ‘Amble Houses’ and Kim Rigg with ‘Kendal Castle through Batman Bridge’.

Our thanks to Gerald for the obvious time and attention taken to judge all our images and his helpful comments.

Next week members are putting on their judging hats and offering constructive critique on images sent to us by North Fylde Photographic Society. It’s easy to sit and slate judges but when you judge photographs yourself it does give you a new perspective on how difficult a task it is and how hard it can be to remain objective and put aside your own personal likes and dislikes. Guests and new members are always welcome – see our membership page for details of how to join in.

Competition: Knockout

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Wednesday 17th November saw our annual Club knockout competition, where pairs of images are displayed against each other and members keep one in and knock out one, finally culminating in just one remaining image.

Under normal circumstances the knockout is one of the most fun nights of our calendar with lots of ribbing and banter, however Covid has scuppered the usual run of things so the competition was carried out via Zoom. To vote, members had to raise their hand for their chosen picture and banter was unfortunately missing as we all had to mute ourselves so that the titles etc. could be read out (some club members would say that muting me is one of the perks of Zoom and they wish they could do it in real life 😆).

Eventually, only 4 excellent images remained and it was incredibly difficult to choose between them. ‘Grey Seal Pup’ by Gordon Mills, ‘My Family’ by Russell Millner, ‘Sea Channel’ by Jeff Bagnall and ‘Shambles of York’ by Ann Dallaway. Our congratulations to Russell whose gorgeous image of a family of polar bears was chosen by the Club as their winner, while Gordon’s ‘Grey Seal Pup’ was runner up.

The evening was technically difficult event to run, with half our members attending from home via Zoom while half attended in person at the Community Centre watching Zoom on a big screen, and images having to be removed from the competition after each round and a track kept of the scores. So huge thanks goes to Jeff for managing to juggle everything and Gavin for helping with the scoring.

Next week we will be visited via Zoom by Roger Hance FRPS, DPAGB, AFIAP, BPE5*, a multi award winning photographer with a special interest in Natural History. The theme of Roger’s talk is ‘Photographing wildlife in your garden’ and most of the images in the talk were taken during the initial lockdown in the Spring of 2020. In addition to showing some of his successful photographs, Roger will explain how to attract wildlife into your garden, including how to use hides, and how the shots were set up to obtain the best results. Guests and new members are welcome – please see our membership page for details of how to join in.

Competition: L&CPU Annual Knockout 2021

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Each year, our Federation which is the Lancashire & Cheshire Photographic Union (L&CPU) hold a Knockout competition. Up to 8 images from each Club can be entered, though usually only 4 are used by the Federation due to the high numbers of images sent in, so as a Club we have to decide which of our 8 images should be shown as the first 4. These 4 images can be on any subject but must be by 4 different authors. The images are then either kept in or knocked out during several rounds of judging, culminating in the final round of highest scoring pictures.

On Saturday 13th November 2021, Kendal took part in the Knockout for only the second time and I am beyond thrilled to say that we came joint 2nd out of 42 Clubs 😮 and double 😮. Congratulations to Jo Knight, whose image ‘Queen Bee’ made it to the final judging round.

Below are the 4 images which were used by our Club. Seamus Bryans’ ‘Batman’, Jo Knight’s ‘Queen Bee’, Jeff Bagnall’s ‘Bir Hakeim Bridge’ and Russell Millner’s ‘Polar bear at sunset’.

We would also like to thank Dylan Reynolds, Maureen Smith and Gordon Mills whose excellent images were part of the Club selection but unfortunately not used by the Federation in the competition due to the volume of images received.

There are some superb and very successful Clubs within the L&CPU federation and it’s a huge achievement to have come 2nd out of 42 Clubs in this regional competition on only our second entry. Massive congratulations to the authors of the entered images! I’m off to celebrate with a brew and a Twix 😁.

Competition: Song Titles

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North Fylde Photographic Society returned for a second visit this season, with Paul King CPAGB judging our Members’ Evening PDI competition on Wednesday 27th October via Zoom. The set theme for the competition was ‘Song Titles’ and although we were expecting the winners to sing us a few bars, every cat in the neighbourhood was thankfully spared the ordeal 😁.

With over 90 varied and diverse pictures in both colour and monochrome Paul had a tough job which must have taken hours ahead of the competition to analyse, so our thanks go to him for all his dedicated hard work.

Starting this blog post in reverse order with the results of the Advanced League (colour), big congratulations go to Russell Millner for ‘You can’t catch me’, who shared the top spot with Dave Nelson’s image ‘Cold as Ice’. It was Russell’s night, though, as not only was he chosen as overall winner he also scooped joint second place for his images ‘Arctic Dreams’ and ‘Into the Light’. Well done Russell!

Russell’s success continued in the Advanced Mono section where he was awarded first place with his image ‘Under a big sky’, with Dave Nelson’s ‘Jet’ in second place with 19 points.

The Club Colour section was strong with some great conceptual ideas for Song Titles, and our congratulations go to Phil Drayton who was awarded first place with his creative picture ‘Stairway to Heaven’. Second place was shared between Gordon Bramwell with ‘Free as a bird’, Kim Rigg with ‘Ice Ice Baby’ and Liz Bagnall with ‘Please release me’.

Last but not least is our Club Mono section, where 20 points was shared between Kim Rigg with ‘The Boxer’ and Peter Kennedy with ‘Walking in the rain’. Peter was also awarded 19 points and second place with his image ‘Pedal your blues away’, which was jointly shared with Martin Rowe’s ‘Black Rose’. However, our congratulations go to Kim whose Boxer picture was declared by the judge as overall winner.

Next week club member Jo Knight is once again diving into the often bewildering world of Photoshop, this time focusing on colour. Her previous tutorials have been aimed at beginners, but as the Club is made up of a range of abilities this time she will be including slightly more complex techniques which she hopes will include useful editing tools for all members of the Club. Guests and new members are always welcome – please see our membership page for more information. See you all on 3rd November!

Members’ Achievements: IPA

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Club member Jo Knight has been awarded in the 19th International Photography Awards which “conducts an annual photography competition for professional, non-professional, and student photographers on a global level, creating one of the most ambitious and comprehensive competitions in the photography world today. The IPA recognizes photography’s leading talents who are creating, shaping and defining the world of photography.”

There are many diverse categories within the IPA, ranging from Advertising through Editorial to Fine Art and Nature and sub categories within each section, eg. Nature/Macro, Fine Art/Portraits, Editorial/Press and Advertising/Beauty, so opportunities exist for photographers right across the spectrum, both amateur and professional.

When entering competitions Jo is usually classed as an amateur as she doesn’t make more than half her living from photography, however in the IPA the rules are slightly different and anyone who has been widely exhibited is classed as a pro, therefore Jo entered the professional category. Three of her images were awarded: ‘Gravity’ in the Fine Art/Still Life section, ‘Child Bride’ & ‘Lockdown’ in the Special/Digitally Enhanced section – click on each picture to see the image on the IPA website.

There were nearly 14,000 images from 120 countries entered in the 2021 IPA and the standard was world class. Pictures included a portrait of Barrack Obama and a creative photograph of Angelina Jolie, so for a Cumbrian photographer to receive recognition for not 1 but 3 photos is worthy of celebration. Our congratulations go to Jo on her achievement.

Competitions: Novice Cup & Oldham Mono

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Kendal Photography Club is part of the Photographic Alliance of Great Britain (PAGB), which has over 40,000 individual members all over the UK. PAGB affiliated Camera Clubs are grouped into regional Federations and Kendal PC falls under the Lancashire & Cheshire Photographic Union (L&CPU) which is one of the most successful Federations in the country.

Every year, the L&CPU hold competitions for individual camera club members in their region with images chosen by the author, and also for Clubs as a whole with images chosen by each Club’s committee usually from those which have done well in that season’s Club competitions.

It’s a huge honour to have an image picked to represent your Club at Federation level and if an image does well in a Federation competition it can be used in that Federation’s portfolio, used in inter-Federation competitions against other regions, used to represent the Federation in nation-wide PAGB competitions, or even to represent your country in global competitions such as the FIAP world cup. It’s a great way to get your name known by your Federation or even the PAGB and gives kudos to your Club.

Last year, Club member Russell Millner was awarded gold with his Bears on Baffin on his very first entry into the L&CPU Novice Cup, which is a Federation print competition designed for members without any photographic qualifications or distinctions, and goes to show that our Club members have as much chance of success as anyone else in our region.

It was, therefore, disappointing to see the low number of entries from our Club in the 2021 annual Novice Cup. We could have entered 12 images but we only had 10 entries, which meant that our combined score was low compared to the other Clubs who had all submitted the maximum amount of photographs.

A big “thank you” to Kim Rigg, Liz Bagnall, Phil Drayton, Ann Dallaway and Heather Mallinson who made the effort to enter and a selection of whose images are below, and to club Secretary Maureen Smith who helped with the printing of the entries.

Oldham Mono

Each year, Oldham Camera Club invite all the clubs in the L&CPU Federation to enter a monochrome competition, which is usually a print competition but this year changed to PDI and held via Zoom due to the ongoing Covid pandemic.

Judges who visit our club often comment on the strength of our monochrome pictures and again it was disappointing that there weren’t more entries from Club members, so our thanks go to Russell Millner, Derek Mackie, Maureen Smith, Jeff Bagnall, Gordon Bramwell and Peter Kennedy for taking the time to submit images, a selection of which are below:

We did well as a Club in last year’s Federation competitions coming mid way down the leader board despite our region containing some of the most successful Clubs in the country, so although we’re small we have the potential to pack a punch and I hope that next year we see more members submitting entries into Federation competitions and helping the Club to succeed.