Pointless Scoring System

[Mike Farley]

I have just seen this article, a reprint from 2015, in the most recent issue of PAGB News which was published this morning. It is topical, given that we will be discussing competition scoring at tonight's AGM.

"Clubs use all sorts of systems for judging their competitions. Some mark out of 10, some mark out of 30 but probably a score out of 20 is the most common. However, they don’t really mean what they say and most Clubs do not expect a judge to give a score much under 13. A growing number of Clubs have stopped asking the judge to award points at all and this is the “Pointless Scoring System” that you heard about. Of course, if your Club runs a League system over several rounds, you probably need points to decide the overall winner at the end of the season. This isn’t a problem. Ask your judges to pick First, Second, Third, some HC and some C. You can give guidance on how many of each might be appropriate and you could have, for example, up to 2 2nd= and up to three 3rd=. Later you allocate scores, 1st gets 20 points, 2nd gets 19 points, 3rd gets 18 points, HC, of which there could be lots, gets 17 points and any number of C get 16 points. Everything else gets “Nul Points” or, better still, 15 points for entering. Judges mostly love the system because they don’t have to find a reason to separate (say) a 14 from a 13 when really there is very little difference. Entrants mostly like it as the judge can concentrate on making helpful suggestions for improvement rather than being obliged to make negative comments to explain the very low score."

Such a scheme would reduce, although not entirely counter, one of my concerns about club photography competitions. The awarding of marks has little meaning when the judging process is so subjective. Against that, this system still requires that images are ranked.

[Rose]

Mid Somerset Camera Club has a pointless scoring system. Judges are asked to select and rank the top five images, which get 6,5,4,3,2 points respectively - every other image scores 1.
At the end of the year the club awards a Photographer of the Year trophy to the person who has amassed the most points over all competitions, so theoretically that could be someone who has not actually won a comp outright, but been placed in the top 5 more than most. There are also a range of individual trophies awarded for individual competitions of various sorts, including one for anyone who has not had an image placed in the top five in any comp.

It seems to work. Members are focussed on judges' feedback and not the score, although everyone wants to be placed in the top 5 of course. The other difference is that judges are sent digital versions of all images a week ahead of the comp, giving them more time to think about the feedback (one judge even prepared written feedback for every image - all 108 of them in that particular comp !!). Judges here are no better or worse than those I experienced at Croydon, but they do seem to be able to give more considered feedback without needing to score every image, they concentrate on holding back a shortlist and then ranking the top five.

I'm not saying it's the best system around, there are many ways of doing things, but it's been an interesting experience and one I've got used to very quickly. My only suggestion would be to award HC to the rest of the images held back but not selected for the final five.

[Mike Farley]

Thanks for recounting your experiences, Rose. I once sat in on a similar pointless competition* at Dorchester Camera Club and it seemed to work well. Dorchester has gone a step further than Mid Somerset and does have any awards for best aggregate score over a season. People are only competing for certificates on the night, nothing else.

One weakness of such a system is that a judge might have nothing critical to say about an image, but not choose to hold it back for further consideration. Admittedly that is more a failure on the part of the judge than the process. It happened to me in an external competition recently and left me wondering what was lacking in my shot to make the judge prefer others. It would have been helpful to know**. Just in case anyone might think that the judge lacked experience, he is actually one of the top people in the country.

*

** My suspicion is that the image did not progress any further simply due to subject matter. It was a landscape, a common genre. I get the impression that judges, at all levels, see so many that they instinctively prefer subjects which are less usual whatever the relative merits. I had two images in the competition and the other, the only sports shot on view, did make it to the final selection and an award. The eventual winner was of a herd of elephants and a good composition, but to my eye marred technically by poor post capture processing which went unremarked.

[walterconquy]

I don't know about everybody else but all this about scoring to me is quite uninteresting. The point of being judged is the actual criticism not which position you have attained.
After all we do photography because we like being creative and we put pictures in to be seen not necessarily admired. The CRITICISM is the important part, its where we learn, if we have good judges.
Why be so fixated on points or no points. I have noticed if you try something new you would normally get more feed back from an intelligent judge because he gets bored by the usual. By an average judge he can't be bothered to say anything. I don't always agree with judges about mine or someone else's but nobody can be as objective as yourself. The proof is in yourselves, to me you do very well
if you work at it. Most of us go forward in leaps and bounds, our new intake these last few years have got imagination and great photographic skills, you have an EYE.
We have no need to worry about scores except to win trophies and they are as important as you make them. Perhaps we don't need them. Except wouldn't life be boring.
Wally

[Mike Farley]

I don't know about everybody else but all this about scoring to me is quite uninteresting. The point of being judged is the actual criticism not which position you have attained.

Exactly. Your comment supports the contention made in the original post.

[Rose]

One weakness of such a system is that a judge might have nothing critical to say about an image, but not choose to hold it back for further consideration.

In the last comp of our season we can re-submit any image which failed to place in previous comps. That gives us a second crack at the whip and a chance for a second opinion.

[Rose]

The point of being judged is the actual criticism not which position you have attained.

Exactly. Your comment supports the contention made in the original post.

I'm sure that's the whole point of our system at MSCC... I'm certainly seeing more focus on feedback here. No-one gets hung up on scores or the lack of them. Even though the top five images achieve points, there is no scorecard produced and points were not announced at the annual presentation last week - just the name of the photographer who had amassed the most over the year.

It's the feedback that tells you how the image is received by the judge - if it doesn't make the final five, or get held back, it's just one of many on the night. We regularly have 60-80 images judged in a single comp.

[Tina]

Hi All
I think we are in for a very interesting debate at the AGM tonight.
I urge as many members as possible to attend because we need to hear everyone's ideas and opinions.
The competitions are a big part of the club so the scoring system we adopt is important for everyone.
I look forward to seeing as many as possible tonight and to a lively discussion.
Tina

[Compsec]

For those not at the AGM last night club members voted by 13 to 10 (1 abstention) to change the competition scoring system to points out of 10. This means that there will be fewer certificates awarded from now on, as 12 to 10 gave us 5 (12/11.5/11/10.5/10) while 10 only gives us 3 (10/9.5/9). Members may have to brace themselves for scores of 4 or 3 points being awarded as well!!

As those on the forum have said earlier, the critique of images is the most important part of any competition. To that end, for the 2017-18 competition onwards, judges will no longer be able to preview images before judging. They will be asked to award points after each image has been commented on and to only hold back images when absolutely necessary for further comment/scoring.

Historically Croydon has tried quite a few different ways of scoring competitions, : heres the last 37 years worth.

1980-1985: 1st/2nd/3rd places only awarded.

1985-1988: A pointless system was adopted with the judge awarding certificates to 'favoured pictures'. The trophy went to the person holding the biggest bundle of certificates on the final round of the competition.

1988-1994: Points awarded in the order of 1st=5 2nd=-4 3rd=3 and an Hon Mention=2. Also every other picture entered gained a point.

1994-2017: Scored out of 12 points.

2017-: Scoring out of 10 points.

Let battle (and critique) commence!

Chris

[Mike Farley]

As those on the forum have said earlier, the critique of images is the most important part of any competition. To that end, for the 2017-18 competition onwards, judges will no longer be able to preview images before judging. They will be asked to award points after each image has been commented on and to only hold back images when absolutely necessary for further comment/scoring.

Thanks for this resumé of the club's scoring systems over the years, Chris. Clearly, this is just the latest round in a debate which has been going on for many years.

For myself, I agree that the main benefit of entering competitions is to get constructive feedback. Overall, I find that lacking when it comes to the finer points of analysing an image. In my experience, there are very few judges at any level who can do it well. For that reason alone, I believe that judges should be given every assistance possible and allowed to look at the submissions beforehand rather than assessing our work blind. I would have said something at the AGM, but the announcement came as something of a surprise and I needed a bit of time to think it through.

I will also speak to Tom about this, but I am making a formal request that ahead of next season Council revisit what I see as an ill considered decision. In my opinion, it will be counterproductive and have the opposite effect of what is intended.

As you say, the topic of how we score competitions has been previously debated on the forum and, for anyone interested, the discussion can be found at this link - viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2241.