Annual Nature Competition - 13 February

[Mike Farley]

The annual Nature Competition (for the David Eaves Trophy) will take place on Wednesday 13 February.

The judge is Mick White LRPS and entrants may submit up to three prints, DPIs or slides in any combination. All images must be of NEW work - that is it must not have been used previously in any internal club competition or exhibition. Titles should convey the correct common name and/or the Latin name, of the subject. The highest total score for all three images will win.

DPI entries should either be handed in on CD or memory stick at the club's meeting on 6 February or be sent via e-mail to croydoncameraclub@gmail.com by midnight on Saturday, 9 February. The usual criteria for entries in digital format apply.

This is an open competition with members competing in one class.

The following (based on guidance notes prepared by Chris Davis) may be of some help:

Both the RPS and SPA rules define Nature photography as depicting observations from all branches of natural history, which encompasses botany, mineralogy and zoology, and includes any natural phenomena. The inclusion of human or man-made objects within the picture is discouraged. The image should convey the essential truth of what the photographer saw at the time it was taken. No radical changes or additions should be made to the original image, whether through darkroom processing or digital or electronic manipulation, except for removal of minor blemishes or distractions. All subject matter must be properly identified and “twee” titles will not help.

Bearing in mind the above, entrants should also note that nature expert Peter Brandham who judged a previous competition a few years ago advised us that, ideally, he was looking for subjects shown complete, together with their natural surrounding wherever possible.

Among the things he did not expect to see are -

Obvious garden flowers or plants;

Evidence of the subject(s) having been photographed in captivity (such as Owls tethered to posts);

Out-and-out pictorial work (i.e. flowers with completely black or bland backgrounds);

Animal portraits or images showing merely parts of birds, animals, butterflies etc.

While the final arbiter of what constitutes a nature image will be the judge on the night, the above advice is offered to help entrants when shooting and selecting their entries for the competition.

The competition rules are available in the printout distributed with the club bulletin at the start of the season or can be viewed on the website - http://www.croydoncameraclub.org.uk/Web ... es2012.pdf

Update - 4 February: The definition of permitted categories has been extended to be more inclusive of the types of images sought for the competition.

[davidc]

Great advice, particularly since I'd been caught out by a number of "standards" in nature competitions that are not official per se but are more like unwritten rules

Quick question about one in particular -

Out-and-out pictorial work (i.e. flowers with completely black or bland backgrounds);

Am I right in thinking this would only apply to images that are clearly in a staged environment rather than with a bland background that strongly suggests it was taken under natural circumstances?

For instance, borrowing one of Mark Monckton's images as a good example to illustrate my point,



This is a bland background but used to good effect and in keeping with the spirit of the unofficial ruling, so to my mind is OK?
Must admit, I'd prefer it if these rules had been made very clear in the rules pack rather than being enforced by the judge, it can feel particularly unfair to have them announced on the night - maybe we can look into adding this guidance into the official rules pack? At least people will have an idea of what expectations are.

[Mike Farley]

I am not a nature expert, so my response is based on what I have observed over the years. Neither do I know how Mark achieves this out of focus effect for the background, although one of his lenses is a 180 mm macro which I believe he frequently uses. Given the focal length and use of not too small an aperture, coupled with a relatively close focussing distance, depth of field would be minimal. In the case of the example illustration, the butterflies have been photographed side on, which is a well established ploy to ensure all of such insects are sharp.

Mark is an excellent and well regarded nature photographer and from what I recall of his successful ARPS panel, the images were all in a similar style, with a sharp subject and an out of focus background. When I have seen such images judged in nature competitions, the judge has never made an adverse comment to suggest that it was out of keeping and has somehow been incorrectly manipulated either at the taking stage or afterwards. It is what it seems, the background which was there at the time rendered unsharp through photographic technique and is acceptable in a nature photograph.

Had this been a studio shot and a piece of white card placed behind the butterflies, as you suggest that would be an example of an inappropriate background. In that instance, the judge might well mark the image down even though it could score well in general competition. With nature, the emphasis is on realistic depiction with artistry being a secondary consideration. What amazes me is how many images we see where the photographer has managed to combine both.

With nature, there are some "gotchas" which might not be obvious to those who are less experienced. These notes have been added to the forum as it is available to all members so that they can be aware of the sort of adverse comments from judges and consequently lower marks which can arise through the photographer not knowing what is expected in such a competition. You will find that any nature judge will be aware of these considerations and will apply them to the images put before them. Since judging is a subjective endeavour, however much people might wish it to be otherwise, there will always be a degree of variation which no amount of rules and guidelines can take into account. We can only go by what the judge adjudicates on the night based on their expertise.

[davidc]

That was exactly my thinking but wanted to be sure. Also, bland isn't what I mean't in describing how Mark did I, it looks wrong reading it back now! I totally understand the technique and think it's applied very well and to my mind is entirely appropriate. Exactly the reason of why I thought it ought to be alloweable

BTW Mark's just launched his new site, looks brill - http://www.markmonckton.co.uk/

[Mike Farley]

Following David's and my earlier posts about Mark Monckton's technique and the use of different types of out of focus backgrounds in nature photography, I received the following response from him, which I am publishing here in full with his kind permission. It has a lot of useful information and I am grateful to Mark for taking the time to explain how he gets his distinctive images and give his views on the rule about bland backgrounds.

"Hi Mike,

"I noticed on the CCC forum a question was posted about one of my Nature photograph of Adonis Blue butterflies.

"The photograph was taken with a Canon 1Ds Mk III, 180mm f3.5L macro lens, ISO 200, 1/640 sec at f6.3. The day I took the photograph was windy and I would have liked to stop down to f10-11. So I compromised and used f6.3 and made sure I was 100% parallel to the butterflies to get a fast shutter speed. So as a result of the lens, full frame camera and aperture combination the back ground was out of focus. The background is not bland, because there are out of focus buttercups in the background and a blade of grass in the bottom left corner (see attached photo). I have had no problems with photographs being accepted in international and national nature exhibitions, taken in the way I have described above.

"My ARPS panel was 15 Orchids all taken with the same lens (180mm macro) at various apertures ranging from f11-f22 depending on the background. I used the same camera and lens to achieve a similar ‘look’ for the entire panel of photographs.

"My interpretation the bland background rule, is to stop people cheating by using false backgrounds (i.e. an A3 piece of green card or a photograph of out of focus green grass) behind the subject. Completely black backgrounds can be achieved by using total flash, i.e. using your flash gun as the light source, so the background goes completely black due to the lack of flash range. These sorts of images don’t do so well due to the un-natural lighting."

[Mike Farley]

BTW Mark's just launched his new site, looks brill - http://www.markmonckton.co.uk/

+1

Mark told me that he designed and created the website himself and has a number of enhancements which he plans to implement. Definitely one to watch.