Running and judging a digital image photo contest - Kodak Camera Club

PSA Journal, Oct, 1995 by Rick Zuegel

A few years ago Kodak Camera Club (KCC), like many other PSA clubs, recognized the value of digital photography. KCC conceded that, indeed, the new technology offers new and fascinating possibilities for imaging exploration. On the other hand, also like many camera clubs, KCC didn't jump right into active involvement in digital imaging photo competitions, because of the inexperience of its members and the high cost of computers, not to mention the questions surrounding categories, requirements, and what is and is not acceptable in such a contest.

Unlike other clubs, Kodak Camera Club got a boost from its parent organization, Kodak. This club has a background in both photographic competitions and Kodak ingenuity.

KCC discussed DI with PSA's Techniques Division and decided to continue to accept altered images in competitions as long as the makers used commercially acceptable technology. Still, digital imaging activity remained at low level until the Kodak Photo CD Software Department started looking for hundreds of images to use on a demo disk. Thus came the real impetus for organizing KCC's first Digital Imaging Photo Contest which took place on September 15, 1994. The club offered to manage a photo competition among employees, retirees, and family members to provide these images. The software engineers accepted KCC's proposal and sent them off and running on the project.

While your club may not aspire to amass hundreds of digital images for a company project such as this, a similar contest may be quite possible, and practical, for clubs interested in digital photography.

KCC's purpose did, however, place special requirements on the event. The organizers wanted several hundred usable images, a variety of subjects that would be legally usable by the company and users of the resulting disk, and extensive background information about each image. Background information was recorded on the Photo CD along with the image, because the software has search capabilities by various criteria, e.g., subject, location, major color, etc. All images were straight, unaltered (no cropping, burning or dodging).

There are several types of Photo CD formats. The KCC used the Catalog Photo CD, because it stores so many images and is the format that will be distributed. Images of all CD formats can be displayed on a TV screen, using the appropriate Photo CD player. They can also be input into a computer using a CD-ROM drive.

KCC's first DI contest was a special learning experience. Contest organizers noted the similarities and differences in judging a DI competition compared to a conventional slide competition. They got the reactions of the judges, observers and competition administrators.

The judges noted: (1) there was little difference from judging a slide competition; (2) TV viewing was not a problem; (3) they liked seeing the large image with the option of seeing the full image when needed; (4) they would prefer to have cropped, burned, dodged, or retouched images in the future; (5) not having "adjusted images" is a more rigorous test of initial camera work.

The judges were: Robert Clements, past president of KCC, retired Kodak professional photographer; Dr. Albert Sieg, FPSA, past president of KCC, past president of Kodak Japan, executive vice president of PSA, top PSA stereo participant and Kodak Ambassador; and Rick Zuegel, past president of KCC, Kodak Ambassador.

Observers' reactions were similar to the judges'. Specifically, they liked the Photo CD capability to crop or enlarge portions of an image to illustrate how to improve it.

Competition Administrators commented that there were lots of new participants who had not competed before; some even won prizes. There were also many more competition observers than normal. Other administrators' conclusions were: (1) you don't have to worry about losing or damaging the original slide; (2) all of each person's images (for a particular category) were together, not scrambled up as they usually are; (3) there was no need for judges to ask for "focus"; (4) reviewing images for multiple rounds worked fine with one disk per category (this might be a challenge with one disk per participant).

Because individual images cannot be physically stacked by "first round score," a scoring sheet was used. Competition administrators advanced the images and recorded the scores. Our usual 1-5 scoring system for each judge was used. Multiple rounds of judging distilled the images down for final judging. The event ran about the same speed as a regular slide competition. This is usually dependent on the judges, who in this case were decisive, communicated well, and came quickly to consensus in a way that was educational to the audience.

Regardless of the similarities to a regular slide competition and the ease of handling the DI competition, there were, of course, some striking differences in the two methods. Instead of a projector and screen there was a Photo CD player and two TV's - one 25-inch TV on which the judges viewed the images and another TV for some of the audience who were too far away to easily see the first TV.