 Kai Eiselein |
The Losers' List Maybe by discussing and giving critiques we can move into that world of "Finalists" or "Winners" I've been a member since 2003 and have yet to have a photo move into the finals, so I must be doing something seriously wrong. So, lets get going and see what we can do about getting out of the losers' bracket!
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Debby A. Tabb |
Kai, I must say you have a beautiful gallery, of what looks like a wonderful life as well. So, you are a WINNER! Just enjoy your work.
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Samuel Smith |
kai,so we argue.i'm an idiot. I should not even be allowed to post.but what is this.unless your really good at a photo program,guess what... nice gallery. a cats face wins grand prize. a judgemental call where now you want to compare your work to others and allow judges decisions to pass judgement that your photos don't pass the test. debby,previous post,was labeled a cookie cutter,how's my spelling. please don't lose heart.nemesis and great disagreements aside,just please say no. a photo contest is not a grading scale as far as your photography.ok.
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- Gregory LaGrange Contact Gregory LaGrange Gregory LaGrange's Gallery |
"unless your really good at a photo program,guess what..." What?
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Mike Rubin |
I agree with Debbie about your gallery. I have had only one finalist since I have been a member. However I go months without entering and the most I entered in any given month was about 7. It seems that the people who consistently enter a photo a day have a greater number of Finalists or Winners, it only makes sense. There is much more here at BP than the contest. It's worth repeating that you do have many great images in your gallery. Many times there is a winner that makes people ask "How could that possibly win?" The judges work in strange and mysterious ways. Maybe they are related to the Wizard of OZ. Just enjoy the hobby.
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Deborah Liperote |
I'm in the same boat as you... no wins! However... since they put the editors first picks page in and at the beginning of this month I was entering a photo a day I got 3 pics in the editors first pick section soooooo I'm gonna bask in that glory for a little while and consider it an advancement in talent.
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Suzanne Colson |
I want to chime in. I did get a finalist this month and last month for the first time, but to be brutally honest I don't know how when I look at some of your galleries. I can say I did enter a photo every day in March, but I also entered a lot of photos since October of last year. The only thing I can say I did different starting in February was changing the size of the images to 480 on the short size and then doing some last minute unsharp mask based on a post I read here. Did that make the difference? Who knows. I stopped entering so many in April because it was consuming me. I decided to concentrate more on the great posts with a wealth of information and just try to really enjoy. Good luck everyone.
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Kai Eiselein |
Although I do appreciate the compliments, that's not why I started this thread. I know I can't be the only one having a hard time getting a pic into the finalists. I think what we need are some honest comments to help improve our shots for competition. Now, I also know that getting a "medal" isn't the end all - be all of posting here, I like looking at other people's shots and like people looking at mine. But, (there's always that "but", huh?) I am competitive by nature, I work in a highly competitive field and I enjoy it. I enter articles and photos into competition each year as part of my job, sometimes I win, sometimes I don't. So BP is nothing new to me, but it has proven to be the toughest.
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Deborah Liperote |
Okay then... let me start by saying that I feel very uncomfortable critiquing others work when mine has won anything. So here is how I'm gonna aprroach this thread and if you are in dissagreement with this let me know and I will really try to warm up to being a judge. I am going to critique mine and ask questions about mine and go from there. I think we need to ask specific questions about our work and then I think that will help start the dialogue. First of all... I never resize my images before upload. can that really make that much of a difference? Secondly, I think my photos are boring. I am concerned that this my be why I don't win. Same old same old shots. I got some recognition for dreaming in watercolor. so i'm hoping I take something home for mays results. I need to branch out and photograph other things but i'm just not a fan of doing still life even though I do enjoy looking a peoples pictures. So there. anyone is welcome to agre with me or comeent in anyway. and then please add something in reference to your work so that I can give some comments. I think this is actually a really good Idea so I am trying to support it
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Debby A. Tabb |
Kia, if that is what you'd like may I suggest that you post the pic. you entered. that can start a thread that everyone can do the same. Also, as I have said here MANY times,
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Suzanne Colson |
Kai, I understand your frustration and I guess easy for me to say just enjoy because I finally got a finalist. Technically I guess I shouldn't be posting to this thread, but I hope you don't mind. I first saw your shot from overhead of the basketball game on the Cocktails thread and I honestly thought it was a sure winner. Great viewpoint. I think the colors, sharpness and comp are great. So what else? I thought I would poke around the forums and condense some of the posts about sharpening, resizing images, etc. I don't have a really good eye for detail. I know when I see some photos here they just pop out at you. Each of us seems to have good equipment. I have seen lots of photos win that use the Canon L series lenses, but I have also seen many win that use the next step down. I thought over the weekend I would pick a photo and do some of the things below and post both and see if anyone here can see a difference
• If you are resizing web images, 500x750 and 72dpi is a good size. BUT you would not want to print that image. It will not print clearly at any reasonable size. This is a good thing, because you don't have to worry about anyone else printing out your images without your permission. • Ignore the 500. Make the short side exactly 480 and you'll be sharp as a razor. • your monitor can ONLY DISPLAY 72 ppi. There is ABSOLUTELY NO NEED to save any larger for web use. • One of the things I learned in a course on BP last year was that when you edit your photos you should convert them to TIFF first, as that format retains more information • When you do any editing in photoshop, you will be adding noise and artifacts regardless of what other people preach, I find using the noise filter last helps smooth out these artifacts and noise. I also resharpen my original pix first then resharpen again after resizing, try it this way and see if it suits your needs. • Amount 500%, Radius 0.4 pixels, and Threshold 0%. Now go to edit and fade unsharp mask to 60-70%. After resizing to BP size, repeat these steps. • Immediately save any non-TIFF format files in TIFF format before any editing. This will preserve the maximum amount of detail that your camera generated. Only save to JPEG if necessary, i.e., for submission to BetterPhoto. Hope this helps!!!
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Kai Eiselein |
Suzanne, outstanding idea of putting all the prepping tips together! I starting resizing to 480, converting ti TIFF a long time ago, and it made a HUGE difference. (I also use a 10 MP DSLR) Debby T, here's one that I thought would have a good shot at a finalist.
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