Previous competitions with a theme of monochrome have tended to scare members off a little, but not this time. We had a record demolishing 62 digital entries submitted, plus a further 27 Small Prints (the highest number for some time) and 26 Large Prints. It was also the first competition for three of our new members – Aldo, Claire and Jim.

This bumper harvest of images meant that our guest judge Jeff Akers certainly had to earn his appearance fee, which he did very well, without letting the night get too long. Jeff mentioned afterwards that he was particularly impressed by the overall quality of the images presented. After due consideration and provision of helpful feedback, Jeff awarded 21 Merits, 27 Credits and 22 Acceptances across the three categories. The long list of those who earned Merits were Ben (x3), Denis (x2), Vince (x2), Aldo (x2), Dallas (x2), Peter (x2), Jim (x2), Rob, Bernard, Jenna, Michael, Kevin and Claire. Well done everyone – and nice to see all our new members doing well.

With the number of images on display, the members' task of selecting Members Choice matched the difficulty Jeff had assigning awards. Once the counts were tallied the three lucky winners were:

Small Prints – Claire for Leaves
Large Prints – Peter for Mouse Judge
Digital – Ashley for Chess

Congratulations to all club members for the significant increase in participation and the number and quality of images presented. It was particularly pleasing to see the return of some club stalwarts, together with a strong first outing from our new members.