To Dimitri and other photographers who expressed their concern about WPPI scoring:
There's something wrong with you guys if you actually care about the scores from the 8x10 competition. They are scored by the magazine editors and not wedding pro photographers
It's just as stupid as going to those seminars on How To Become a High End Photographer, run by "photographers" who became "high end" by doing seminars on How To Become a High End Photographer: dead end circle!
The only reason you should enter this 8x10 competition is to brag about it. If you really care about the scores and what actual wedding photographers think of your work then you should submit your images to other competitions{gasp} which are scored by the working pros and not the magazine editors and their bias opinions.
Seriously, 16x20 for WPPI is the only competition I would ever enter if I ever cared about the scores.
Now, start blogging about your accolades and get some fame out of it. This is the only thing this competition is good for. This is the only thing you can get from the money you wasted on the entry fees.
reason wrote:
To Dimitri and other photographers who expressed their concern about WPPI scoring:
There's something wrong with you guys if you actually care about the scores from the 8x10 competition. They are scored by the magazine editors and not wedding pro photographers
It's just as stupid as going to those seminars on How To Become a High End Photographer, run by "photographers" who became "high end" by doing seminars on How To Become a High End Photographer: dead end circle!
The only reason you should enter this 8x10 competition is to brag about it. If you really care about the scores and what actual wedding photographers think of your work then you should submit your images to other competitions{gasp} which are scored by the working pros and not the magazine editors and their bias opinions.
Seriously, 16x20 for WPPI is the only competition I would ever enter if I ever cared about the scores.
Now, start blogging about your accolades and get some fame out of it. This is the only thing this competition is good for. This is the only thing you can get from the money you wasted on the entry fees.
DmitriM wrote:
I got 4 accolades
This time I disagree with their judging decision on these images. Disappointing as I did expect to get better scores for these 2:
Many of our favorites did not do well. It is often like this, images that gain you clients and make you a lot of money don't always do well. If you want, pm me and I will give you a few things you might want to think about changing on them for 16x20 if you are resubmitting.
reason wrote:
The only reason you should enter this 8x10 competition is to brag about it. [...]
Now, start blogging about your accolades and get some fame out of it. This is the only thing this competition is good for. This is the only thing you can get from the money you wasted on the entry fees.
Cheers,
R
what incredible wisdom!
evan baines, fame whore. that has a nice ring to it.
reason wrote:
The only reason you should enter this 8x10 competition is to brag about it. [...]
Now, start blogging about your accolades and get some fame out of it. This is the only thing this competition is good for. This is the only thing you can get from the money you wasted on the entry fees.
Cheers,
R
what incredible wisdom!
evan baines, fame whore. that has a nice ring to it.
and fyi - jenn hudson - who won a handful of first places and is wppi's first international photographer of the year - is a good friend of mine and one the most humble individuals you'll ever meet. she's interested in making amazing art - not building a following or a trophy case.
Bragging about it is not a bad thing. I am all for it and allowed myself to bring my fees even higher. All I am saying, you should not fool yourself on why you are entering into this one. It's not like you are getting any feedback from it or they tell you how they judged it and how your image could've been scored if you changed something. For that you need to enter the 16x20 or other respectable competitions.
Getting scores from WPPI is THE SAME as getting feedback from me. Sometimes I am right and sometimes I am full of shit. It's an opinion of just 1(or maybe 3) man and doesn't mean it's right and you should agree with it.
A year ago a friend of mine got a score of 75 on a print that won 4 major awards in other competitions. To me he should have at least gotten 82 for it as it was a very unique and emotional photo. 8x10 folks didn't think so.
reason wrote:
Bragging about it is not a bad thing. I am all for it and allowed myself to bring my fees even higher. All I am saying, you should not fool yourself on why you are entering into this one. It's not like you are getting any feedback from it or they tell you how they judged it and how your image could've been scored if you changed something. For that you need to enter the 16x20 or other respectable competitions.
Getting scores from WPPI is THE SAME as getting feedback from me. Sometimes I am right and sometimes I am full of shit. It's an opinion of just 1(or maybe 3) man and doesn't mean it's right and you should agree with it.
A year ago a friend of mine got a score of 75 on a print that won 4 major awards in other competitions. To me he should have at least gotten 82 for it as it was a very unique and emotional photo. 8x10 folks didn't think so.
I was trying to get my head around when you wrote "This is the only thing you can get from the money you wasted on the entry fees." Right after you say you can get fame out of it. How then is the $15 entry fee a waste of money?
Now you tell us it allows you to put your prices up too (So fame is not all it's good for). Sounds like that $15 entry fee is a very good investment. You should be an evangelist for this competition.
Since Evan was so kind to congratulate me, I'll post my images here. Please, pardon the fact that they're not wedding photos. Here's the email and brief critique from WPPI:
Dear Brian of Brian Lingle Photography,
Thank you for entering the 2009 8 x 10 2nd Half Print Competition.
The WPPI Monthly Newsletter will run the Accolades of Excellence list and the First, Second and Third Place print winners. Your print titles and scores are shown below.
74 L991 Weaving the Threads of Tradition
hotspot on forehead; color balance is off
Interesting note - At the Kansas Professional Photographers Association's fall conference, competing with some of the best pros in the state, including my mentors who've won many Fuji and Kodak Masterpiece awards and PPA Photographer of the Year awards, the weaving photo won 3 awards - Best Technical Excellence, Best Story Telling and a Judges Award.
Judging does vary considerably from one competition to the next and this time it went in my favor in the Animal Portrait category. Regarding the low score on the weaving print, it was probably a combination of the hotspot (Thought I'd fixed it. Maybe I had the wrong version of the image printed.), an average quality print, and maybe the color was a little too red. At KPPA the print lost points from some of the judges because her nose breaks the line of her cheek and the white patch in the rug was too hot. A couple of judges apparently argued that it's an environmental portrait and shouldn't be marked down for the nose, but three of them disagreed.
At this level, competing with the best photographers in the world, the best are so good and so close to each other in excellence that small things make a big difference. Kind of like Olympic diving where they take off points if you wiggle your toe. BTW, I don't think I'm the best at all and I'm not consistently as good as my mentors. But it is really nice to get some validation for parking in the neighborhood. And, thanks to my mentors and the excellent work and wisdom posted by many of you, I'm learning
Regarding what I wrote about judging being really critical like the Olympics at that level of competition: there are 10 main criteria the judges consider and different judges give more or less weight to different things, depending on the judge and the print. Technical excellence is only one of the criteria considered. If you want to do well in print competitions, I recommend joining your local PPA affiliate and getting professional critiques and recommendations from the members who judge competitions and who win awards. Teaching and helping other photographers develop is part of the ethics of the PPA. Ed Pignol is an example of one of the more generous PPA members in his willingness to teach others.
