PORTFOLIO COMPETITION
02nd March 2026
It was to be a late night for everyone when Louise Langley found herself presented with over 100 images to judge over three classes in our Portfolio competition. This is the largest of our season’s competitions, when each member may submit an entry consisting of four images. The idea is to find the person who demonstrates the most skill across a range of genres and so no two images can be from the same genre. This makes for an evening of great variety.
As always, the prints were judged in the first half or the evening, starting with the colour prints. Louise showed herself to be a conscientious judge, giving each image due consideration and comment before moving on to considering them as a group and deciding what they said collectively about their authors.
Things started well, with two of the first three portfolios being held back for the final judging. In fact these were the only two held back, so it was clear that the honours were to be divided between Lee Dalgleish and Andy Stephenson, two names we have become very familiar with in the last couple of seasons and, coincidentally the gentlemen who were putting the prints on and off the stand for Louise.
Lee Dalgliesh
This time Lee emerged the winner, with a score of 20 to Andy’s 19 and Alan Burkwood’s 17. The remaining contestants in this class scored 16 points apiece.
In the monochrome class which followed, Louise admitted that she is a fan of this presentation if done well. As she pointed out that removing the colour also removes many distractions. One shot of a falling cooling tower included a considerable number of people watching, and their clothing could easily have provided many distracting colours which would have detracted from the main subject. Presented in mono, it was clean and clear that the collapsing tower was the key point of interest.
Tom Coulson
Louise is evidently a stickler for detail in an image. We speak frequently of detail, but showing it is synonymous with the image being bitingly sharp, which is one aim at the forefront of the photographer’s mind when deciding on composition and settings.
The first portfolio in the mono class fell foul of something we seldom see – a colour cast. This used to be a fairly common complaint and involves a print having a hint of colour to it overall. Monochrome is usually interpreted as shades of black, grey and white. What it cannot be is shades of those tones tinged with a colour, and in this case a couple of the prints had an unmistakeable blue cast, which would have downgraded them.
In this class, three entries were held back and resulted in Lee Dalgleish coming third with 18 points, Joyce Bell second with 19 and Tom Coulson emerged the winner with 20.
We took a break while the print stand was replaced with the projector and screen and everyone enjoyed some tea and biscuits. When we restarted, the scale of Louise’s task was clear with 14 digital entries, each of 4 prints, making a total of 56 images to be judged, plus a fifth image in each set showing all four together. As with the colour prints, there was quality from the off.
Up against pressure of time, the commentary on each image had to be curtailed, but each person received remarks on each image. Surprisingly there were a couple of comments about lack of sharpness, which is something we have not heard for many years. Fortunately, these were outweighed by praise for the excellent work on show. Alan Burkwood received 18 points for his entry followed by Andy Stephenson with 19.
There was a wider range of scores in this class, but it is entered by more people as it does not require the skill or cost of printing and mounting, so several were newer and less experienced members. We had to wait until almost the end for the winner, which turned out to be by Peter Joyce with a quartet of unusual images. He is one of our newer members who has moved to us from another club, so he has clearly brought considerable experience with him.
Peter Joyce
Next week we will see a return visit from Ashley Franklin with ‘The Wider World of Photography 2’, presumably following on from his earlier visit with Part 1.
Club nights continue until the end of April. We hope to see everyone then and maybe a few new faces as well. Full details of the club and programme are on the club web site: http://www.retford-photographic.co.uk/
Meetings are weekly on Mondays at 7.30pm in St Joseph’s Hall, Babworth Road.
As always, the prints were judged in the first half or the evening, starting with the colour prints. Louise showed herself to be a conscientious judge, giving each image due consideration and comment before moving on to considering them as a group and deciding what they said collectively about their authors.
Things started well, with two of the first three portfolios being held back for the final judging. In fact these were the only two held back, so it was clear that the honours were to be divided between Lee Dalgleish and Andy Stephenson, two names we have become very familiar with in the last couple of seasons and, coincidentally the gentlemen who were putting the prints on and off the stand for Louise.
Lee Dalgliesh
This time Lee emerged the winner, with a score of 20 to Andy’s 19 and Alan Burkwood’s 17. The remaining contestants in this class scored 16 points apiece.
In the monochrome class which followed, Louise admitted that she is a fan of this presentation if done well. As she pointed out that removing the colour also removes many distractions. One shot of a falling cooling tower included a considerable number of people watching, and their clothing could easily have provided many distracting colours which would have detracted from the main subject. Presented in mono, it was clean and clear that the collapsing tower was the key point of interest.
Tom Coulson
Louise is evidently a stickler for detail in an image. We speak frequently of detail, but showing it is synonymous with the image being bitingly sharp, which is one aim at the forefront of the photographer’s mind when deciding on composition and settings.
The first portfolio in the mono class fell foul of something we seldom see – a colour cast. This used to be a fairly common complaint and involves a print having a hint of colour to it overall. Monochrome is usually interpreted as shades of black, grey and white. What it cannot be is shades of those tones tinged with a colour, and in this case a couple of the prints had an unmistakeable blue cast, which would have downgraded them.
In this class, three entries were held back and resulted in Lee Dalgleish coming third with 18 points, Joyce Bell second with 19 and Tom Coulson emerged the winner with 20.
We took a break while the print stand was replaced with the projector and screen and everyone enjoyed some tea and biscuits. When we restarted, the scale of Louise’s task was clear with 14 digital entries, each of 4 prints, making a total of 56 images to be judged, plus a fifth image in each set showing all four together. As with the colour prints, there was quality from the off.
Up against pressure of time, the commentary on each image had to be curtailed, but each person received remarks on each image. Surprisingly there were a couple of comments about lack of sharpness, which is something we have not heard for many years. Fortunately, these were outweighed by praise for the excellent work on show. Alan Burkwood received 18 points for his entry followed by Andy Stephenson with 19.
There was a wider range of scores in this class, but it is entered by more people as it does not require the skill or cost of printing and mounting, so several were newer and less experienced members. We had to wait until almost the end for the winner, which turned out to be by Peter Joyce with a quartet of unusual images. He is one of our newer members who has moved to us from another club, so he has clearly brought considerable experience with him.
Peter Joyce
Next week we will see a return visit from Ashley Franklin with ‘The Wider World of Photography 2’, presumably following on from his earlier visit with Part 1.
Club nights continue until the end of April. We hope to see everyone then and maybe a few new faces as well. Full details of the club and programme are on the club web site: http://www.retford-photographic.co.uk/
Meetings are weekly on Mondays at 7.30pm in St Joseph’s Hall, Babworth Road.