External Competitions

Tring Camera club participates in a range of competitions with other camera clubs in the Chiltern Association of Camera Clubs (CACC). All members are encouraged to contribute entries for these and a selection team pick those that they think will score best – so very much a team effort, co-ordinated by our President, Peter Cox. In addition there are many opportunities for individuals to enter regional or national competitions.

Club Competitions

Three Counties Panels

Outline: TDCC competes against two other clubs for whom can get the highest judges score across 15 panels. There is no subject specified for the panels, thus it is ‘Open’ to any subject.

This is a Digital Competition – we submit only the final panel and not the images included.

Brief: Individually or Collaboratively members are to create panels of images (3-6 images per panel). Each image must be excellent but the aim is for the panel (group) to fit together well.

Rules:

  1. Each club may enter up to 15 panels to the competition.

  2. A panel will consist of between 3 and 6 images presented on one digital screen.

  3. Club members may work individually and/or in groups to prepare panels – if working in a group, the images used must be from at least two authors; any author should not submit more than three panels where they are the sole author or in collaboration with others.

  4. A panel must not include the same image changed to alternative crops or aspect or axis.

  5. There is no age limit on individual images used in the panels; any new images may be used in future club competitions subject to any specific club rules. Panels prepared for club competitions in the current year/season may be entered into this competition.

  6. A.I. may have been used within post processing software but each individual image must have been created in its entirety by the members.

This competition runs for the last time in November 2025

Intimate Landscapes

Outline: TDCC Organises this competition where 14 clubs compete for whom can get the highest judges score across 5 images that fall within the brief of an “Intimate Landscape”

This is a digital competition. The judges decide a score before the competition evening and then give feedback over zoom on each image.

Brief: An intimate scape is one in which you’re selecting and isolating a small scene that captures your interest and presents an ‘intimate feel’. It might be a smaller part of a wider scape, it might also be a smaller or close up composition that focuses on shapes, lines, colours, textures or patterns. It is a view of a scene in which any object of focus, is surrounded by its context. 
The scape can be land, sea, water or urban, but, whatever the content, it must be an ‘intimate’ scene.

There is a dedicated website for this competition: www.intimate-landscape.com

Rules:

  • Each Club submits 5 images

  • Two judges review the 60 images and agree a score

  • Club with highest mark across 5 wins.

This competition runs for the last time in February 2026. We hope to replace it with a new Landscape Competition.

Nature (Les Spitz Trophy)

Outline: Pinner club runs this annual competition where TDCC competes against around 12 other clubs for whom can get the highest judges score across 6 submitted images. There is also a prize for the best individual image.

This is a Digital Competition. The Images are displayed and judged on a large screen at Pinner Club and all are invited to attend.

Brief: A great shot of anything that is considered ‘Nature’ – so animals, trees, plants, fungi, birds, amphibians, reptiles, fish etc. If some kind of creature then it must be self supporting (Not a Zoo). However wildlife in major Nature reserves are fine as the animals may be protected but are still self supporting.

Rules

In addition to the requirement that a creature is self supporting, In nature competitions there should be a minimum of post processing. In particular, the image should reflect the Competition’s principles of authenticity – a true representation of nature - so that they do not deceive the viewer or misrepresent the reality of nature, or what was originally captured by the camera.

The following digital adjustments – but not limited to these – are not allowed: adding, moving or removing objects, animals or parts of animals, plants, people etc; the removal of dirt, highlights, backscatter, bubbles, debris and similar; composites, painting the foreground / painting out the background.

Chiltern Challenge

Outline: 5 clubs in the Chiltern region compete with each other for whom can get the highest judged points over 10 images.

This is a digital competition and is held on Zoom so all can attend.

Brief: This is an ‘Open’ competition, so any genre of image is acceptable.

Rules: None of any consequence

Process for Selection of Entries to Club Competitions:

For each of these competitions we ask for submissions from all members.

A group of members are then brought together to select which they think will score the highest scores. We often come back to the authors to suggest minor alterations that we think will increase the score. Feedback is provided after the competition is completed.

Individual Competitions

Entering competitions is a great way to get feedback on your images and compare with other entries. It is always great to do well, but due to the variability of judging methods and capabilities, think yourself lucky if you do well and don’t be dismayed if you don’t do so well – there’s always another competition to enter!

Competitions aimed at everyone:

See this link: https://amateurphotographer.com/latest/articles/best-photography-competitions-to-enter/ for information on a wide range of competitions open to all.

Photocrowd https://www.photocrowd.com/ This is a global web based competition where at any time there are more than a dozen different competitions running. There is a free or paid version.

It is great fun because the images are scored by everyone else in the competition – and often there may be thousands of entries from all over the World. So getting into the top 100 can be quite an achievement.

The images are usually marked very quickly by people on mobile phones with no judging ability! So your entries need to be very simple and effective and have good Wow factor.

Landscape Photographer of the Year (LPOTY) https://www.lpoty.co.uk/

A major competition accepting UK landscapes only – thousands of entries and well judged so top images needed.

Travel Photographer of the year. tpoty.com

A fun competition with high standard expected – but great to see the best of travel photography.

Wildlife Photographer of the Year: https://www.nhm.ac.uk/wpy/competition/enter-the-competition

One of the biggest competitions in the World – The images are beyond amazing – great to visit / be involved with this as it is very inspiring.

Close Up Photographer of the Year: https://www.cupoty.com/

If you like using a Macro Lens this one is for you. Fantastically well organised competitions with many sub categories for you to enter.

Garden Photographer of the Year. https://igpoty.com/

Another good one for Macro shots, but also any shots of gardens, flowers, structires etc are good for this.

Competitions aimed at more experienced photographers:

Chiltern Hundreds:

This competition is organised by the Chiltern Association of Camera clubs and runs annually. It is an ‘Open’ competition and Images are marked by three judges whom can each give up to 5 points – so any score above 11 is good, 13 or more is really good.

Entries are managed by the club – so contact Peter Cox to discuss.

British Photo Exhibitions: (BPE) http://www.britishphotographicexhibitions.org.uk/index.php/list-of-exhibitions

Associated with the Photographic Alliance of Great Britain (PAGB) these competitions are also called “Salons’ where top photographers enter in various categories. The entry is digital and competitions run most months. Again there are three judges whom award up to 5 points for each image. A score of 12 or above is considered “ACCEPTED” - which is very good, but only around 1000 of the 6,000 entered will get this core. Any score above 12 is well worth a celebration.

If you get 25 acceptances over any number of competitions you get to put “BPE” after you name.

If you require help with any of these competitions please contact Peter Cox Club.president.tdcc@gmail.com