The big day!

Today was my assessment of my panel of images to obtain the ARPS qualification (Associate of the Royal Photographic Society). It started at 10am this morning on zoom and finished at 4pm. The A panels were completed by lunchtime and then this afternoon it was the F panels. Thankfully I passed!

As it was a print submission, the prints were sent to the RPS office in Bristol where a print judge assessed them to ensure they met the necessary standards for print quality without any artefacts or technical faults. However because of Covid the judges did not all meet up in person but were judging a digital version of the images from their various locations, and referring back to the print judge. The candidates were in the zoom meeting but we had our speakers off so there was no interaction between the candidates and the judges. I was pleased to see my advisor who gave me one-to-one feedback before my submission, was also present to hear how I did.

There were only eight candidates - this is done twice a year so that is not many people applying for this qualification. One person was re-submitting his work on a second attempt. Of the eight of us, seven passed. 

My panel was the last to be assessed and by the time they started on mine I was feeling quite stressed with my heart thumping in my chest! The panel of judges was chaired by Joe Cornish, one of the world's best landscape photographers, and the judges were all highly qualified. Joe seems like such a nice man and said some very complimentary things - I also liked Tony Worobiec who was one of the judges - some of the judges were quite harsh but having six judges means you get a balanced assessment.  

I am very relieved it is all over! This was a photo taken of my computer screen when the layout went up - they also show each individual image twice so you can get a good look at them. There were some wonderful panels from other candidates today, looking at some of them I had doubts about my own work. If you want to look at my individual images you can see them here.

Tonight I have book club. It was meant to be hosted by another book club member but late yesterday we found out she can no longer host it, so I offered and it has therefore been a last minute scramble after my assessment to go get some food and nibbles for tonight. I must now get ready for that.