Royal Photographic Society

Hi Guys,

Been a bit quiet on the 'New Images' front lately, due to concentrating on my application to the Royal Photographic Society for the Licentiateship distinction, LRPS for short.

In case you don’t know (and most people probably wouldn’t), the Royal Photographic Society is probably the worlds oldest photographic society with (originally) Royal connections. LRPS is a standard to achieve, criteria set and judged by the society officials.

It was an enjoyable and frustrating experience. Its difficult to be objective about your own images, and knowing what to select for submission was the hardest part. Thankfully I had some very helpful opinions from various people. People who knew about photography from a technical point of view and people who just knew what they liked or disliked.

Attending the judging day was well worth the effort of travelling to Bath, UK.
Quite a few people were nervous wrecks, weirdly I wasn’t. I figured all the hard work was done already, tough decisions made. All I had to do now was...wait... and BE JUDGED, arrhhhh.

Its a strange experience having your personal, lovingly hand crafted, meticulously printed and mounted, photographic creations, critiqued. Everyone reacts differently.
As we all sat in the audience, I saw some entrants shaking their heads, whispering in their friends ears, even some walked out!! (actually, that was probably just for a comfort break, I hope).

The judging started ominously with the first four submissions failing to be accepted. You could see people thinking, we are in for a tough day! The judges were excellent and explained their every reason and always managing to find some positive comments in every failure.
Then some submissions finally started to pass the grade. You could sense the relief in the air, the judges DID have a heart after all.

http://www.rps.org/distinctions

My ten images came out from the 'mysterious' side door, carried by men in white gloves, late in the afternoon. They carefully arranged them, as I'd requested, in three rows. The layout and how each image positionally related to the other, was just as important as every other criteria needed to please the judges.

By this time I was used to the judges movements, the pointing and glances to each other, but you still had no clue of the outcome. Not until the their papers were collected and examined, did the Chairperson announce the outcome. He asked if I was in the audience today (some people couldn’t be as they had applied from far overseas), and with his beaming smile, congratulated me for some great images and successfully passing the Royal Photographic Society’s Licentiateship distinction.

Simon Bratt LRPS