Starting On My Royal Photographic Society ARPS Distinction

Developing a set of photographs for my next Royal Photographic Society distinction

With some time on my hands, it is time to start considering my Royal Photographic Society ARPS distinction submission. This is quite a challenge, not least because the submitted photographs will undergo heavy scrutiny by some of the UK’s most established photographers. I thought I would document my progress on this journey.

What is the Royal Photographic Society ARPS?

The Royal Photographic Society has a range of ‘distinctions’ available for its members. Put simply, they are examinations in which the photographer submits a series of photographs. Here is a summary taken from the RPS website, as follows:

In the case of the ARPS distinction, 15 images are to be submitted. These have to work as a cohesive set so the photographer must also submit a hanging plan. Normally, the 15 images are printed (A4 is the recommended size), framed and designed to be hung as a set in a certain order to satisfy the submitted statement of intent. This intent defines the theme of the project.

While the LRPS is more general, the ARPS is split into distinct categories like documentary, landscape, and travel. I had planned to submit a documentary project, but I’ve decided to put that on the back burner for a potential FRPS project. Instead, I am aiming for the travel category. Travel, after all, makes up the bulk of my work.

Delving further into the ARPS distinction, the RPS states the following as the criteria:

• A Statement of Intent that defines the purpose of the work, identifying its aims and objectives.
• A cohesive body of work that depicts and communicates the aims and objectives set out in the Statement of Intent.
• A body of work that communicates an individual’s vision and understanding.
• A high level of technical ability using techniques and photographic practices appropriate to the subject.
• An appropriate and high level of understanding of craft and artistic presentation.

How I starting planning an ARPS Submission

I should start by saying this is not a recognised workflow, rather, my own approach to what can be a daunting task.

What’s The Theme?

The first thing to consider is the theme, that ‘cohesive set’ that is going to hang together. Will it be 15 images from an African safari? Beach vistas from the Med? Low-light silhouettes? Although I haven’t honed my theme to something really specific, I’m pretty sure it’s going to be Indonesia, and most likely ‘people of the Indonesian islands’. That’s as far as I’ve got but it’s narrow enough to give me some focus on the images I select as possible candidates.

Create a folder

Next, I created a folder, backed up to the cloud. In it, I dumped digital copies of the final, full-res jpeg versions of potential candidates, making sure to retain the original file name for future reference. In my case, this folder contained 135 images.

Get Them Printed

The next step was to get them all printed. The quality is not so important at this stage, provided you have already checked for imperfections in the digital version (things like blown-out highlights and aberrations). While back in the UK I found Asda came in pretty cheap, charging me around £12 for 135 prints and delivery within a few days.

Bin the failures

Depending upon your emotional attachment to your images, this will either be the easiest part of the process or the hardest! I found that having the prints in my hand allowed me to quickly put aside images that weren’t going to work. If you find this stage difficult, it is worth learning how to kill your darlings.

Kill Your Darlings

This is one of my favourite expressions in critiquing your own work. I learned it from Liz when she was running her travel writing courses, and it’s a popular phrase used to help writers sort the wheat from the chaff. According to Masterclass:

“Kill your darlings” is a common piece of advice given by experienced writers. You kill your darlings when you decide to get rid of an unnecessary storyline, character, or sentences in a piece of creative writing—elements you may have worked hard to create but that must be removed for the sake of your overall story.

This is as applicable to photography as it is to writing. Cast aside emotional attachment to your images. Step back and look at them critically and ask yourself if they satisfy your statement of intent. Keep checking those bullet-points listed above.

Sort the photos into sets

The next thing I did was sort the remaining photographs into ‘sets’.

Clearing aside a large floor-space, I quickly sorted the images into rough groups. You can see what I was trying to achieve by these images.

There is nothing particularly scientific about this process. All I am doing is getting an idea of how potential photographs could work together. Will my low-light shots work with some strobe shots? Can my street portraits sit next to landscape shots?

All the while I am thinking ‘am I communicating a sense of place?’, the definition of a travel photograph according to the RPS. At this early stage, I will reinstate the ‘kill your darlings‘ mentality and look to bin a whole load more photographs before I continue.

Taking my time

Honestly, I should have achieved my ARPS years ago, but life in general and travel in particular got in the way. I’ve already binned one project, an underwater set that didn’t quite work due to the quality of images produced by the Olympus TG-6 falling apart when blown up and printed out.

I’ve got around two months while back in the UK to spend some quality time on my potential submission. I will continue to document my progress here.