Photo Competitions

This is an adaptation of my weekly newsletter, Adventures Big & Small. If you want to receive emails like these, click here to subscribe.

I grapple with the concept of photo competitions.

If what I create is more about you than me (and it is), then what’s to be gained by trying to convince a panel of judges—people who don’t know the first thing about your family or the time we spent together—that the picture we made is “great”? Only you can make that judgment.

Still, I keep coming back to them. Is it a desire to win? To be seen? To be taken seriously?

Probably a little of each. But I think there’s more to it. For me, it’s an avenue for growth.

The process starts in my archives. I spend hours narrowing down images, looking through the specific lens of that competition’s judging criteria. At no other time do I review my work so critically.

Then there’s the experience of seeing—and often being surprised by—what wins and what doesn’t. That’s a whole other education. Composition, light, color grading. What are other professional photographers seeing when they look at my images? These are objective elements that shape the story a photo tells, even when the story itself is subjective.

Anyway, that’s it for today. Below are a few photos I submitted to a recent competition. Enjoy them.