A couple of months ago, I reported on the chuckling heard amongst social photographers about the fuss surrounding the final of the Kodak Wedding and Portrait Awards 2009, which is a print competition that some people try to win so that, if nothing else, they might impress potential clients who are impressed by such things.
Well, it’ll be interesting to see what happens when next year’s final comes round, because the rules have now been published for the 2010 awards – and there’s still nothing about pictures submitted for the wedding category having to be pictures that were taken at a wedding.
The requirement that entry forms bear the name, address and signature of the customer is unchanged, but perhaps next year the intention is for somebody to actually look at what’s written on those forms. Maybe even check their veracity before the finalists are announced? Who knows.
What’s certain is that in an effort to avoid a repeat of last year’s embarrassment, the rules now specifically state that “images produced on workshops and/or training seminars (as a delegate) are not permitted”. So you can’t now go to a workshop run by one of the great and the good, take a snap over his shoulder of one of the models as posed by him, Photoshop it to death and be in with a chance of winning the title Kodak Wedding Photographer Of The Year. That’s got to be good, but what’s with the afterthought in brackets – the “(as a delegate)” ? Is the idea to leave it open for he who’s running the workshop or seminar to enter a shot taken at it?
Whatever, it makes no sense at all to me that it’s apparently still possible to become “Kodak Wedding Photographer Of The Year” on the strength of a photograph of a professional model in a wedding dress taken at leisure, under conditions far removed from the reality of any wedding day. Just how valid is that?
by Dan
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