Tardebigge and Bentley churches annual photo competition
Each year, we hold a photographic competition based around the life, seasons and scenery of our two parishes – Tardebigge and Lower Bentley.
The competition is open to everyone, of any age. You don’t have to be a church member, or live or work locally or visit the area regularly. As long as your photos meet the criteria listed below, you can enter.
We start taking entries on the first day of September, and the deadline for the photo competition is 31 July the following year.
There’s a cash prize too, for the two overall winners from all the categories.
The cash prize is kindly donated by Spring View Care, who run Grosvenor House in Alvechurch and Tutnall Hall, Bromsgrove.
Competition categories
The four categories are:
- Our parish in winter – images that capture the essence of winter, even when there’s no snow!
- In and around the parish – any photo taken within the Tardebigge and Bentley areas
- Parish wildlife – the flora and fauna of the parish
- Children’s – any parish-related photo taken by a child under 16.
The competition entries will be judged by an independent panel, who will select the best three pictures from each category – as ‘Winner’, ‘Runner-up’ and ‘Highly Commended’.
Parish calendar
The 12 photos selected will be used in the following year’s church calendar.
From these 12 photos, the residents of Spring View Care homes will choose the two overall (cash prize) winners.
The prize-winning photos will used on the front and inside back pages of the calendar.
How to enter
The competition is open to everyone, whether or not they live locally or are members of Tardebigge or Bentley churches.
You can email your entries to us at contact@tardebiggechurch.org.uk, or give them to church wardens Chris Milton or Dean Hall, or parish clerk Jane Hall, on a CD or memory stick.
We do also have a Dropbox account: please contact us if you would prefer to use this instead.
You need to send us your entries between these dates: 1 September and 31 July the following year.
Judging takes place during August. We can’t accept any photos sent after the deadline of 31 July for that year’s competition.
Taking a good photo
Unfortunately, some potentially good photos aren’t chosen because of simple mistakes. At the very least, make sure your photo:
- meets the criteria (for example, for age or category)
- is in focus
- doesn’t have anything that gets in the way of what you’re photographing – no fingers covering lenses, or window frames and (for example) clearly visible in the shot!
Edit your photos if you need to, to crop out what you don’t want in the picture. Or take care to compose the image first, before you take the photo.
You should also make sure your photo is not blurred when printed or viewed at:
- A5 size (about 15cm wide x 21cm high), which is the minimum size we recommend for portrait (taller-than-wide) images
- A4 size (about 30cm wide x 21cm high) which is the minimum we recommend for landscape (wider-than-tall) images.
More information
For full details of the competition, you can download a copy of the leaflet here:
or you can pick up a copy from the table at the back of the church. If you need more information, please email us by using the Contact form: click here for the Contact form.
Photo consent
Please make sure you get permission from anyone who could be identified or recognised in your photos, before you take their picture.
(If in doubt, it’s best to avoid photos with people in them, and to delete images that include people who haven’t given their consent to be photographed. Click here for more info about photo consent.)