AWGB Woodturning Forum

General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: burywoodturners on July 09, 2015, 07:57:24 PM

Title: Club Competitions
Post by: burywoodturners on July 09, 2015, 07:57:24 PM
Does your club hold regular competitions and if so how many members take part?
When we first started we had around twelve members and we had eleven entries in our first competition. for our latest competition we had forty members and we had ten entries from seven members, only one entry was from a non committee member.
What do you do?
Ron
Title: Re: Club Competitions
Post by: Les Symonds on July 09, 2015, 09:05:10 PM
We don't have regular competitions at our club (Mid Wales), but we do have an active group of contributors and our members' work table often draws favourable comments from demonstrators, but as with your club, it tends to be mainly committee members who contribute. In our case, I'm guessing that as much as 60% to 70% of the work is regularly that of the committee. However, that's n ot really surprising, after all, if you are committed to turning and to the club that you join, then it follows that there's a strong possibility that you'll also be a contributor to displays of work and to serving on the committee.

Les
Title: Re: Club Competitions
Post by: John D Smith on July 09, 2015, 09:38:20 PM
 Hi Ron,
           At our Club meeting July we had our first Club Competition for Beginners and Intermediate Turners there were prizes donated by one of our most generous members.Because so many members brought a lot of pieces we had to limit it to 2 per person we had an attendance of 40 Members each piece was numbered and voted on by the Members it was a wonderful display of work and  some members discussed their pieces with the members every one enjoyed the evening it will be interesting the support we get at the next one I think it is best not to do these to often although I know some clubs hold these on a regular basis.
                                                                    Regards John   
Title: Re: Club Competitions
Post by: bodrighywood on July 10, 2015, 12:51:23 AM
I used to belong to a club that graded the levels in the competition. Novice, intermediate and expert. It was prety well supprted. the level you belonged to was assessed by the committee. it allowed those with less confidence the chance to put things in. At the endd of the meeting a chosen member would give a constructive critique of each piece which went down well as it gave praise that was due appropriately but also where improvemnet could be made. One potential problem with these competitons, I suspect,  is that a lot of members feel that their work is not good enough and so don't bother.

pete
Title: Re: Club Competitions
Post by: fuzzyturns on July 10, 2015, 09:09:34 AM
One of my clubs does a monthly chairman's challenge in 3 categories (novice, intermediate, advanced). We usually get about half a dozen entries in the novice and advanced categories and anywhere between 2 and 5 in the intermediate. It's generally the same circle of people every time, which is a little disappointing, but unsurprising. I share Pete's suspicion, and I also think that levels of desire to improve vary vastly between club members.
Title: Re: Club Competitions
Post by: Dave Atkinson on July 10, 2015, 11:24:26 AM
I'm coming to the conclusion that a lot of members don't do much turning.  Many seem to come for the social aspect.  As for me I don't have time to turn very often, due to work commitments and running the AWGB Accounts.  And when I do I'd rather turn something I want to do than a competition piece that I am not that interested in turning.

Cheers Dave
Title: Re: Club Competitions
Post by: burywoodturners on July 10, 2015, 07:43:34 PM
Your replies all seem to agree with our thinking , we will try graded competitions to encourage the relatively inexperienced members to have a go. We do have some really good turners in the club and a newcomer may well be daunted by that.
Dave has a point, some just come for the entertainment, to watch the demo's and have a chat, after all where else would you get a night out for £4 with tea or coffee included?

I am thinking of a questionnaire even though these are of dubious value, they may point us in the right direction

Thanks to every one who replied, some good points made
Ron
Title: Re: Club Competitions
Post by: steve w on July 11, 2015, 08:17:39 PM
from a novice point of view - i think if i were new to a club, i would feel awkward entering one of my efforts into a comp with experienced turners  or even embarased in time if the committee judged me to see what level i should be in, and kept me down if they held different levels of entry. its a tricky one but once i had been in the club for a while i think this would change.
Title: Re: Club Competitions
Post by: fuzzyturns on July 11, 2015, 11:11:15 PM
Steve, I think this is really down to personality more than anything else. I joined two clubs less than a year ago, and I never had any hesitation to show my work, or enter a competition. I joined these clubs for multiple reasons, but one of them was to get exposure to experienced turners, and learn from their critique (the same reason I am posting pictures of my work here). If I were to find myself in a position where my aesthetics are at odds with the judges, I would probably stop entering pieces, and possibly look for a different club. Having said that, there's a big difference between judging aesthetics and judging workmanship.

In our club competitions, pieces are judged in 5 disciplines:


So far I had very little reason to disagree with the judges, but then that's just this one club. I obviously cannot speak for any others.