Unfortunately, Sunday was not Swavesey's day, with the club coming out 15th out of 23 clubs. However, there were still some successes on the day...
The first success was Swavesey Camera Club getting the biggest cheer of the day when the club name was announced – mainly because we had seven members attending the event, compared to a typical showing of two or three per club, or in some cases a no-show.
The club also got the biggest laugh of the day at our External Competitions Secretary's expense when Mick Box and Bernie Shaw were announced as being members of Urea Heap rather than Uriah Heap!
A spin doctor would say we came 17th out of the 93 clubs in the EAF – with the other 76 not even entering the Championships... In addition, our 15 images in the 1st round were supplied by 15 different members, whilst the winning clubs' notably came from 5 or 6 members. So, by all means ditch SCC in favour of one of the winning clubs; however, at SCC the odds of your work featuring in an external competition are significantly higher!
The marking by the three judges – Bob Moore MPAGB Hon PAGB Hon FRPS, Sue Moore MPAGB FRPS and Erica Oram CPAGB EFIAP BPE3, did sometimes lead to some head scratching, with club competition winning photos being marked anything between 8 and 12 out of a possible 15, but the EAF Championship is a very different competition to the usual format, with judges giving their scores within seconds of seeing the image, and with no accompanying comments.
The structure of the competition gave the judges a difficult task of judging within seconds of seeing each image, and without justifying or explaining their score - just an anonymous press of the button, 1 to 5, with the three judges' scores being added up to give its overall score, a theoretical minimum of three and maximum of 15. Very few received 15, and even 14 was a rare occurrence recognised with applause.
Overall, everyone from the club enjoyed the day and came away with a sense of which genres were trending from which photos were getting the high scores – Nature and Sport stood out (perhaps a nod to the committee as to next year’s set subjects), with Portraiture in the main only being marked 9 out of 15.
SCC's full scores were as follows:
- Paul Saunders, "Did Someone Say Dinner?": 12
- Nicki Henton LRPS, "Maddie": 10
- Barry Hatton, "Icy & Misty Fen": 12
- Roger James, "Eurasian Red - Permission to Land": 11
- Simon Jelley, "Is There Anyone Out There?" 9
- Gordon Fuller, "Morning Glory": 8
- Maggie O'Moore, "Kingfisher Diving - Light Painting": 9
- Patty Watkins, "Where Mountains Meet The Sea": 10
- Ian Johnson LRPS, "Mick Box and Bernie Shaw of Uriah Heap": 11
- Eleni Paliginis, "Dancing Cala lilies": 9
- Nev Tait, "False Widow Spider with Prey": 9
- Penny Reeves LRPS, "Fireflies": 12
- Dona McCullagh, "Portrait of a White Horse": 10
- Jon Watkins, "Rustic fence and Islandic church": 11
- Simon Shore, "Rufous-tailed Hummingbird, Costa Rica": 11
Final results by club:
- PICO* 309
- Beyond* 302
- Colchester* 285
- Cambridge* 281
- North Norfolk* 277
- Ipswich* 277
- Bury St Edmunds* 276
- Chelmsford* 273
- Norwich & District* 271
- Hoddeston* 260
- Ware 177
- Melbourn 157
- Royston 157
- Stevenage 156
- Swavesey 154
- Welwyn Garden City 154
- Malden 153
- Bottisham & Burwell 153
- St Ives 152
- Biggleswade 148
- Bishop Stortford 147
- Clacton 141
- Dunmow 133
*After 2 rounds
However, the scores did not represent the whole day. Flesh was pressed with old friends, judges and speakers. It was well worth negotiating the snow and pot holes to get there - we thoroughly enjoyed the day.