To enter images into our monthly competitions please head over to our MyPhotoClub site here.
Links to members resources as follows:
Aggregate Competition
Our club runs several image competitions each year. The Aggregate Competition is held monthly on the second Tuesday of each month at our Club Meeting. Here submitted prints and projected digital images from our members are commented on and scored by a judge. Images are awarded:
| Awards | Aggregate Points |
| Honour | 6 |
| Merit | 4 |
| Highly Commended | 3 |
| Commended | 2 |
| Out of Category | 0 |
| Alice Black or Graham Burstow award Additional to above score | 2 |
As part of the Society’s Aggregate Competition, members are divided into B Grade, A Grade and Salon Grade:
- B Grade is for those members who wish their entries to be judged and scored. Points are accumulated towards an Aggregate score.
- A Grade is for those members who have achieved a higher standard of photography. Their images are also judged and scored, with points accumulated towards an Aggregate score. To be eligible for consideration for re-grading to “A” grade, a “B” grade member must receive a certain percentage of competition points in one competition year. Currently this is 55%
Members eligible for re-grading are advised prior to December, the start of the new competition year. The management committee makes the final decision on re-grading.
- Salon Grade is for those members who have attained the highest possible standard of photography within our club – an A Grade member must attain 60% of competition points in a competition year to move to Salon Grade.
At the end of the Competition year (December), awards are made to those members with the most points in the various categories for each Salon, A and B Grade. Members may enter images in the ‘Set’, ‘Open”, ‘Creative” and/or ‘Field Day’ subject categories in any or all of the following formats:
- Prints (all grades – colour or monochrome)
- Projected images (all grades – colour or monochrome
The definitions for each section category are:
- Open subject: photograph can be an image of anything
- Set subject: the topic and definition is specified in the TPS Calendar on our website.
- Creative subject:
Creative Photography
Definition: Creative photography is the altering of reality
Explanation and Guidelines:
It is an extension of conventional photography into creative art, and its purpose is to take the image beyond the literal through the use of imaginative skill or originality of thought.
There should be a significant photographic content, and inclusion of mixed media of any kind (paint, transfer, digital etc) is welcome. It can be a collage or a montage. The final result must be all the photographer’s own work. This includes any tools used to alter the image that are not native to the software used, such as
- Extra brushes that add photographic elements such as snowflakes, raindrops, leaves etc
- Replacement pre-sets such as skies, sunsets, scenery
- Expansion packs
If you use image manipulation software you can
- Combine two images then experiment with different blending modes and opacity
- Experiment with the inbuilt tools such as colour replacement, invert, free transform, perspective warp, puppet warp, liquefy
- Create your own backgrounds by photographing interesting textures, skies, sunsets and scenery
If you are not using image manipulation software there are many other ways of being creative, such as
- Using in camera effects such as zoom pull, multiple exposures, intentional camera movement
- Cutting and pasting of printed images to make collages and montages
- Painting on prints or hand colouring
Only TWO entries can be entered in any monthly competition. The images can be shared amongst any of the categories / formats or they may all be entered in one category / format. Any one image may only be ever entered FOUR times in one year by choosing 4 of the 5 possibilities – either in ‘Open’ subject, in ‘Set’ subject, in ‘Creative’ or in the End of Year competition.
Note: Where images have content that may be regarded as disturbing or offensive to the majority of our membership or the public in general, TPS may exercise its right to not display such images.
Alice Black & Graham Burstow Awards
At each month’s Aggregate Competition the judge will select an image from the awards of those entered as the monthly Alice Black Image (colour) or Graham Burstow Award (mono) they will use their own criteria to select the image.
All images submitted in the Aggregate Competition have the potential to become a possible winner of the Trophy as there is no restriction on the grade of the entrant or the medium in which the image is presented. The Alice Black image chosen each month receives an additional 2 points to the points already awarded.
As part of the “End of the Year” competition, the judge will choose the winning image from the eleven images chosen by the monthly judges. There are no points awarded for the overall winner, in common with other EOY awards.
David Hack Memorial Trophy
In honour of our late member David Hack, the club has introduced the “David Hack Memorial Trophy”. David was a keen, successful motor sport photographer who lost his battle for life due to Leukemia. Each year our members are invited to attend the “David Hack Classic Car Meet” arranged by the Toowoomba North Rotary Club and enter images taken on the day into a special competition. The best image is awarded the “David Hack Memorial Trophy”.
There are no restrictions placed on members as to subject matter, grade or medium of the images presented for consideration. The Management Committee of the Toowoomba Photographic Society Inc. will choose a judge each year and the Trophy will be presented at the End of Year Presentation Dinner.
Note that the maximum file size of each image is 5000 kilobytes (or 5 megabytes).
Please do not hesitate to contact the committee if in any doubt.
External Competitions
There are a number of external photographic competitions that photographers can enter. In particular we encourage our members to enter images into the annual Heritage Bank Photographic Awards. Details of these awards and past successful images can be viewed by clicking on the following link – Heritage Bank Photographic Awards .
Additionally, photographers can enter a range of National and International Photographic Competitions to obtain Photographic Honours – details about this can be found at the Australian Photographic Society website by clicking on the link APS Honours and FIAP Distinctions.
Details of upcoming competitions can be found at a number of websites: