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UK Aquascaping competition.. or lack of it...

Piece-of-fish

Piece-of-fish

Member
Joined
2 Jun 2009
Messages
1,383
Location
East London
Just been thinking really, why there is no annual UK aquascaping competition. Small countries have it. This could greatly help to up the standards of aquascaping here. With such a large community i believe thing like this is a must. There are loads of sponsors who might want to contribute to it. The industry is so huge here!
What you people think? :rolleyes:
 
We're not as big a community as we appear to be, we have loads of members but extremely few posting members. :(

I reckon that if all the active members posted a tank we'd probably have a max of 30 scapes and we all know that one of our "big name stars" or founders would take every prize going.
I'm growing more and more cynical of competitions lately, with the mis-judging and cheating in ADA to the hording of scapes soley for competitions, I just don't think it's healthy or condusive for a good forum, especially as you tend to learn very little from the top scapes unless you understand how it was formed from begining to end and the problems encountered. If we were to have a competition at all for me it would have to be judged on the thread documenting its raise and issues rather than on some trite final photograph that gives little/nothing back to the hobby.

Soap box dismounted.
 
I agree with what Garuf says, I prefer to read a journal from start to end and learn along the way, a final photo of a good scape, although being a great achievement does not teach anything useful. And because of the competition members would be avoiding creating a journal which for me would be worse for the forum in general and the hobby.

I would rather see a few meets a year where members took their tanks for display to others, similar to what the Aqueous Art Movement did but not in that context, just a place booked for a day or two where members could display their work to others, and invite people in to talk about the hobby in general and the tanks in display.

These places could be paid by UKAPS if there were funds available for this, or even by the sponsors where they could also have a stand to display/sell their products and also an opportunity to display some demo tanks.

Include a workshop in the middle of the two days and you are on to a winner!
 
Yeah, I do miss seeing the better tanks' journals. Now all we get is a final shot that no-one learns anything from at all. It was by reading journals on UKAquarist, then onto plantedtank, APC and here that I learned what I know now, but everything has gone quiet on that front now as everyone is so secretive.

I can see the point of keeping scapes under wraps for the competition's sake, but IMO it's killing a lot of what I liked about the hobby a few years ago.

Tom
 
LondonDragon said:
I agree with what Garuf says, I prefer to read a journal from start to end and learn along the way, a final photo of a good scape, although being a great achievement does not teach anything useful. And because of the competition members would be avoiding creating a journal which for me would be worse for the forum in general and the hobby.

I would rather see a few meets a year where members took their tanks for display to others, similar to what the Aqueous Art Movement did but not in that context, just a place booked for a day or two where members could display their work to others, and invite people in to talk about the hobby in general and the tanks in display.

These places could be paid by UKAPS if there were funds available for this, or even by the sponsors where they could also have a stand to display/sell their products and also an opportunity to display some demo tanks.

Include a workshop in the middle of the two days and you are on to a winner!
Click to expand...

I like that idea a lot, I'd love to hold such an event at my house. I tried to get a get together in the north earlier in the year but I think I must be the only one who scapes in this part of the world.


It's good to hear that people agree, I've been derided before for suggesting that competitions are actually bad for the hobby.
 
people will only post a journal, or carry on with a journal if there's interest in it.

I've found recently that i'm making an effort to take pics, post them with very little response. you can only take so much of that.

There are threads on the site, non aquatic related which have more comments than many journals.
 
I've found recently that i'm making an effort to take pics, post them with very little response. you can only take so much of that.
Click to expand...

No-one's commented on mine from earlier today, after some people asked for an update :p :silent: Probably a bit dull though to be fair! :lol:

Just thinking about it - one analogy could be if the Premier League were to withhold all games and results from the public and just release the final table standings at the end of the season. Winners would be announced, and their performance from that year analysed briefly. People would soon go off football. I think it's a similar but slightly less severe situation here :rolleyes:
 
Mark you also need to consider that you are a very experienced scaper and most of us including myself are only limited to saying "brilliant" "great" "awesome" etc... and actually give you very little constructive feedback as what we see is already in our views all the way up there.

The less experienced scaper will be afraid from posting because of the higher levels of scapes on the forum and feel somewhat ashamed to post their work.

This is what needs to be addressed really, encourage the not so experienced scapers to post their work, by then the higher more experienced scapers giving these newcomers some constructive feedback, with ideas and suggestions to improve their work.

I think that would encourage more users to start posting their work.
 
I think the hobby is floundering, a lot of places you read that people are bored of such and such a style or plant and so on. It's two fold really, plants and the hobby as a whole are outside the means of a lot of people and the economy in the state it's in only exaserbates that. It's not that the tank is poor or the photography or anything, it's just a reflection of our deminishing base.
The fact that it's all the same people that are always in the spotlight puts people off too I think, people see it as something they can't get into because it's so insular and secretive, there's very little commerardery left it seems and the publicity can only be taken so far without some massive roll out, we'll never be Germany with their economic might and interest and progress base, but I think if we team together we can be noticed if we stop operating as loan agents, the us and asia has always been way ahead of us in terms of meet ups, hang outs, scape parties, what ever you want to call them, if we had a more inclusive thing and did something to reward the members we have I think new members will come into it, while at the same time we have realtime improvements and an active hub for progression. Where would the art world be if the artists of New York or St. Ives never met each other or saw each others works, I think we're already in that rut!
 
LondonDragon said:
Mark you also need to consider that you are a very experienced scaper and most of us including myself are only limited to saying "brilliant" "great" "awesome" etc... and actually give you very little constructive feedback as what we see is already in our views all the way up there.

The less experienced scaper will be afraid from posting because of the higher levels of scapes on the forum and feel somewhat ashamed to post their work.

This is what needs to be addressed really, encourage the not so experienced scapers to post their work, by then the higher more experienced scapers giving these newcomers some constructive feedback, with ideas and suggestions to improve their work.

I think that would encourage more users to start posting their work.
Click to expand...

This might be true, but i dont see myself as a more 'experienced scaper. I've been doing it for a lesser time than most on here.

Many know now, that i dont look for 'praise' I simply cant take compliments all that well, even in real life.

George is the classic example of a great poster. He mangaes to ask all the right questions. everyone is capable of doing so i think. If something looks good, ask the scaper why it looks good. what did they do?

I've been asked recently to do an interview for scape fu. I get mails from other forums internationaly, how to take pics...i've not had one question from the UK! maybe 1
 
Wow, a hot discussion.
So i dont think that you have to hide your journal for something as UK competition. Furthermore the rules actually could include a journal as a must or every month progress pictures or something like that. A video as a contribution to the photo?
There are many ways. This could be converted to a huge studing material. Who says we have to follow the contest rules? The problem at the moment is ADA with their privacy rules but hopefully they will get it at the end.
There always will be people hiding their scapes to the end. There could be several reasons for that and not only a contest.
As well as the negative effect because of hiding a scape there are lots of positive things. A lot of newcomers would try to get better imho. Improve different aspects of a scape, photography etc.
 
Mark you picked it up very quickly, different people have different capabilities both in terms of scaping, learning and financially, this hobby is not cheap as you well know.

There was an announcement asking members to submit tutorials/articles, why not create one regarding aquarium photography showing all the aspects of it from lighting to the actual camera settings, don't always wait to be asked be pro-active also, this would be very helpful. Btw this is not a personal pop at you in case you take it that way, everyone with the knowledge is capable of producing some materials that would benefit the community in general.

I know you explain a lot of stuff in your various journals and photography threads, but would be nice to correlate all this information into an article that could be easily accessible.

Photography article would make a nice feature on the new upcoming website.
 
Mark has already volunteered to do a tutorial for UKAPS. I believe he's in the process of doing it.

It should be a great help to everyone :D
 
LondonDragon said:
Btw this is not a personal pop at you in case you take it that way, everyone with the knowledge is capable of producing some materials that would benefit the community in general.
Click to expand...

i know it's not Paulo. Actually i've just been singing your praises for what your doing for the site ;)
 
New site. New tutorials. Great stuff :)

Piece-of-fish said:
Wow, a hot discussion.
So i dont think that you have to hide your journal for something as UK competition. Furthermore the rules actually could include a journal as a must or every month progress pictures or something like that. A video as a contribution to the photo?
There are many ways. This could be converted to a huge studing material. Who says we have to follow the contest rules? The problem at the moment is ADA with their privacy rules but hopefully they will get it at the end.
There always will be people hiding their scapes to the end. There could be several reasons for that and not only a contest.
As well as the negative effect because of hiding a scape there are lots of positive things. A lot of newcomers would try to get better imho. Improve different aspects of a scape, photography etc.
Click to expand...

This line of thought resonates with me. As Edward says, there are many different approaches that can be taken. I think there is a lot to explore here.
 
Well, if you do not mind i could share my experience with our local contest.

I hear some negative voices here because of the IAPLC publicity issues, but usually the local contest are not that hard. People still do journals and they post pictures there on their progress. Maybe they stop publishing 1-2 month before the contest just to have a better result, but you have an idea how they are doing.

Contests not equal with hiding works. That's important.

Other might learn a lot form the journals which is really helpful by the way, but the person itself learn the same to prepping to these events. When you have goals and targets you need to do much better.
Quick example last year from our small contest more than half of the aquariums had algae issues. This year probably only the last few tanks. Plants are much healthier, people think more about planting, and harmony. There are also crazy ideas sometime from individuals. Which is good in overall.

Contests are good. Really helps to move forward, do better. And at the end we all have the best moment from that tank which is amazing to see anytime in the future.

These tanks gives great inspiration to newcomers, shows them this is all possible to do. Will have more active members at the end.

Hungary is a poor country compare to UK. And the economy is in a bad position. So money should not be an issue here.
UK planted scene is more experienced and the scene itself is older much larger, but i feels that the hobby is a bit burnt. This happens with many creative tasks after a time. We're much younger, but we do many stuff to keep the fire burning. This is not an easy task anyway. Back to the original post local competitions keep this fire burning.

With target, goals a bit of a race, seeing these journals in progress makes the whole thing more exciting. Many of us do not have real chances on the largest contests because of the big guns. But local contest is different. This was the reason to keep our contest allowed for local guys only. Just like Poland contest.

We also select the winner to our judge panel next year. So the winner will be different for sure every year. ;)

I do not know what will happen 5 years later, how we can keep up the interest in long term, but sometime need a boost, an inspiration to put things back on track. UKAPS need a bit of that around this time. You have great talents, amazing scapers, brilliant works and past achievments. Some people would be more active in the journals if you would have a contest i guess. People who probably burnt might would turn back to the hobby again.

I would be the first person to vote for a UK contest for sure. Seeing your works in their best form would be inspiration to many of us. There are not just 4-5 talented guys here. Keep the fire burning guys. :thumbup:

ps: sorry for beeing long ;)
 
Thanks Victor. Seeing Hungarian contest results actually inspired me to start this post. I fully agree with many of your points. Especially about making the best effort at the end for that final photo. You will have only it to remind you about your work. I want to double the point that with only big contests a lot of people just won't enter because they don't feel like ranking high. To have a close contest is good idea. As I said before we could think about special rules like progress photos or even videos before that final photo.

So Yes to UK contest. :thumbup:
 
I'm thinking about the Pico contest from last year and how much fun that was. I'm going to have a think about this guys, and see if any of my experiences from running that little contest would translate to something bigger ;)
 
I do think, there should be a competion, which to take place on a regular basis. The competion as in the bussines makes the competitors stronger, so it will improve the knowledge of the aquascapers throughout the country.

Also this way will attract attention to the hobby and hopefully will drag people, previously not interested to join. The other thing is that a well presented competition to the public will encrease the attention.

A major mistake or disadvantage is that the local competitons and events, do not get enough media coverage. I fully understand that this is not entirely up to the Organisers, but if we all put some effort together I think it could be acchieved.

Then the big sicret .... when there is a media coverage, the sponsors will be craving to join.

The idea for work shops and show days is a great thing too, but I do not think that the both things are interchangable.

Regards
 
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