If you’re not a camera club type then please just scroll down to the images. This weekend I went to Wales with a box of prints for a distinction assessment in Lllanberis. Last month I applied for my ARPS distinction with the Royal Photographic Society and wrote about that in a post, so this month it was my DPAGB assessment with the Photographic Alliance of Great Britain, which is the national body for all of the camera clubs in the UK.
There were 15 images required for both distinctions, but thats where the similarity ends. For the ARPS they were looking for 15 images in a cohesive, balanced panel that showed creativity and a distinctive style of the author, and these images are generally artistic in nature. They are judged as a whole with the judges spending as long as they wish looking at the images, and looking at them from a normal viewing distance as well as from very close up.
For the DPAGB they are looking for images that are likely to be regularly accepted in national photographic exhibitions. The images are seen one at a time, mixed in the images from other authors applying for the distinction, and images with impact generally do well as the judges look at each image for a relatively small amount of time. Thee are 6 judges marking from between 2 and 5, giving a total of between 12 and 30 for all of the judges marks added together. A 4 is given if the image is likely to be regularly accepted into exhibitions, 2 unlikely to be regularly accepted, 3 a near miss and 5 for outstanding images likely to be accepted for the highest level of distinction the MPAGB. You need an average of 20 marks from each image, or a total of 300 to be awarded the distinction.
So needing 20 from each image things started well with a 22, but then went decidedly shaky with a 16, a 20 and 21 leaving me 1 behind where I needed to be. Unfortunately things then headed south again with a 19, 18 and 19, so that at around half-way I was now 5 points behind where I needed to be. So here are the first-half images with their scores:
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| Path To The Mill – 22 |
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| Blue Angel – 16 |
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| Branches – 20 |
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| Golden Angel – 21 |
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| Morning Light – 19 |
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| Cwm Orthin Impressions – 18 |
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| The Acrobat – 19 |
It’s safe to say that I was not feeling hugely optimistic at this point, as I had not put the images in any particular order and I thought the second half images were of similar quality to the first half. So here’s the rest of the images and their scores:
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| Reflection In Red – 23 |
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| Simply Red – 28 |
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| Through The Doorway – 18 |
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| Pearls – 28 |
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| Alone In The Woods – 24 |
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| Pool Of Light – 25 |
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| The Skylight – 23 |
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| The Piano – 23 |
Well talk about a turnaround, with the last eight images I went from a miserable 5 behind to an amazingly comfortable 27 points ahead, and I was awarded my DPAGB distinction. The two 28 point marks were also only beaten by one other author’s image which received 29. Phew is all I can say!!
As usual I would like to thank the real stars of the show in order of appearance – Holly, Joceline, Raphaella, Nanette and Fredau. Oh and the windmill and slate mine barracks as well :)
My thanks also go the judges, they are heroes to those that pass and rather less well thought of by those who do not pass. By having 6 judges they balance out the marks so that one judges personal opinions do not carry that much sway, and on balance I think they did a good job of marking both my and the other authors images – and that’s not just because I did so well :)
It really was a bit of a roller-coaster, now I know why I went for a shoot instead of attending my ARPS adjudication.
5 Comments
Brilliant Tim – well done and well deserved on your ‘D’ and your ‘A’
There’s no stopping you on your meteoric rise into photographic stardom
Graham
Thanks Graham, I wouldn’t quite call it meteoric, more steady improvement.
Well done Tim. Really pleased that things went well for you. Congratulations.
Great work Tim have now had time to study them you are very talented and have a good eye.
Pearls and Simply Red extra special
Frank W
A superb selection of images Tim and I can fully understand why you finished near the top in the end. Some of the individual scores came as a surprise. However, your talent shows and I particularly like ‘Simply Red’ and ‘Pool of Light’. Excellent work.