Competitions and Member Critiques

Competitions

MPC has In-club competitions and also participates in competitions sponsored by the New Jersey Federation of Camera Clubs (NJFCC) and the Photographic Society of America (PSA). See Competition and Member Critiques Schedule. You must be a paid-up member of the MPC club to enter competitions.

In-club digital competitions are held once a month. On competition nights we usually hold two contests: an assigned subject and an open pictorial competition. Members compete according to their experience in one of three classes: Entry, Advanced and Salon. New members start in the Entry class and advance based on performance in competitions. Images are critiqued by an outside judge to help the photographers improve their technique behind the camera and in post-production. Members can enter 2 photos in each contest – typically 2 for the assigned subject and 2 for open.  A photo that does not receive an award, may be entered again at a later date, often with enhancements/corrections suggested by the judge.

To advance from the Entry class to the Advanced class requires getting an accumulation of 25 points in club competitions and to go from Advanced to Salon 100 points.  Points are awarded in the following way: Merit Award (judge’s score of 9) gets 3 points, Honorable Mention (score of 8) gets 1 point and Salon Best in Show gets 4 points.

Assigned subjects are suggested and chosen by the members at the end of May. See the 2022-23 season subjects here.  They are intended to broaden the experience of club members and encourage them to think out of the box. For example, some assigned subjects in the past have been: “Night Photography”, “Black and White”, “Patterns” and “Street Photography”. In addition, there are standard assigned subjects, which are “Nature”, “Travel” and “Creative”.

This year’s Annual Salon Competition is more an exhibition of the what MPC members consider their best photos from this season’s competitions.  Members may also exhibit recent photos that they consider to be among their best work and that have not been entered in this year’s competitions.  There will be no formal judging. Members can enter up to 6 photos each using the normal entry process using phototcontestpro.com. There are no entry classes for this competition.  It will be a fun event!

Member Critiques

The purpose of Member Critiques is to help members improve their photographic skills based on advice and criticism from other members.  There is no scoring or awards. One photo maximum for each paid-up member.