Getting Started
If you are a judge, please skip to our Judges Instructions page.
There are five competitions per calendar year, one every other month. All current Wasatch Camera Club members may enter the competitions.
Members new to the competitions must first be placed in a division by the Competition Committee. In order to be properly ranked and be competing with your photographic peers, you should send a link to your website or online galleries. As an alternative, if you do not have a website or online presence, you can send five jpeg images representative of your photography through the link above. You will then be notified within one week of submission the level you will be competing at. Each level is listed below:
- Novice: Beginner and minimally experienced photographer.
- Intermediate: Previous competition experience or placement, or demonstrated expertise.
- Advanced: Earned through competition results or placement, or demonstrated expertise.
- Master: Earned through competition results or placement, or demonstrated expertise.
After each club year, the winner of each rank automatically advances to the next level (except at the Master level). At the Competition Committee’s discretion other competitors may be placed at a higher level as well.
Categories
For all levels and divisions there are two general categories:
- Open: Submissions for the Open Category can include any subject matter.
- Assigned: Submissions for the Assigned Category must meet each Competition’s Assignment. The image will receive a lower score at the judge’s discretion if it does not meet the Assignment’s definition or spirit. Each Competition’s Assigned Subject is posted on the Wasatch Camera Club website calendar.
Artificial Intelligence-Generated Images
Please note that the Wasatch Camera Club is a camera-centric photography club and as such only images generated by the photographer with a camera should be submitted for competitions. Therefore, unless otherwise noted, AI-generated images are not acceptable for any competition.
How to Submit
Sign in with your e-mail and competition password.
note: the Competition Portal is independent of this website - you will have a different username and password.
- Click Submit Images
- Select a category (Open or Assigned).
- Drag and drop your image file.
- Images should be in JPEG format (.jpg) at a maximum size of 1920 pixels on the long side and at a resolution of 300 ppi.
- File size should be no greater than 5MB.
- Give your image a title.
- Check box to hide title from judges if desired.
- Check box to have image critiqued by judges.
- You can only have 2 images critiqued per competition.
- The Competition Director may suspend some or all critiquing during competition if he/she feels the number of entries would cause the time limitations to be exceeded.
- Judges can comment on entries at their discretion.
- Click Save Entry.
You can submit up to six total images; no more than three for the Open Division and no more than three for the Assigned Division. Images entered may not be submitted in future competitions.
Please do NOT place a watermark on your images.
Scoring Criteria
For all competitions, up to three judges (typically comprised of professional photographers) will act as a panel to score each image submitted for each division using the following points scale:
- 9 Superior – Best use of photographic technique possible. Perfect composition, perfect technical merit.
- 8 Exceptional – Exhibiting very good to excellent photographic technique. Very good to excellent composition and technical merit; however is lacking in a small way.
- 7 Very Strong
- 6 Strong – Some merit, notable as the worthy image
- 5 Very Good
- 4 Good – Exhibiting average photographic technique. Composition and technical merit are good, however can use improvement.
- 3 Acceptable
- 2 Fair
- 1 Tech Defect/Poor Content – Exhibiting poor photographic technique. Composition and technical merit are below standard and needs much improvement.
Scores will be tallied for each image. Ribbons will be awarded for 1st, 2nd, 3rd and Honorable Mention for each category (Assigned and Open), within each ranking: Novice, Intermediate, Advanced and Master. The image receiving the highest score, regardless of division, level or category will be awarded Best in Show.
A member need not be present on the evening of the Competition to enter.
Year Long Points
At the end of the competition year; 1st, 2nd and 3rd place awards will be given to the top three in points at each level, in each division. These points are cumulative by Division.
Points are earned based on the following scale:
- 1st - 10 Points
- 2nd - 8 Points
- 3rd - 6 Points
- Honorable Mention - 4 Points
- Any entry which does not place - 1 Point
Display of Your Submissions
By submitting images to the club's competition program, you are agreeing that your entries may also be uploaded to the camera club's competition gallery on our gallery site. Additionally, the club would periodically like to use competition images for various Photographic Society of America (PSA) competitions, the club's newsletter, the club's website, and on the club's Facebook and Instagram pages. In order to be considered for this increased exposure of your work, members must opt-in on the My Member Data page visible after logging into the website.