P3D Re: PSA judging

[michaelk@xxxxxxxxxxx (Michael Kersenbrock)]

> I believe a
> judge cannot leave personal preferences at the door, and still be able to
> judge artistic content.

I agree.  When I'm a judge at CSC, I'm probably one of those bad judges.
I'll rate an image that impresses me and I like higher than another that
I think dull and uninteresting even though they both are technically
equivalent.  I willfully attempt to reduce my biases, but even if I were
to think I'm being completely unbiased, I'd know full well that I'd be
a liar. Biases will always affect the outcome, it's inherent to the animal 
unless there is NO artistic content being judged at all, and that in 
itself seems of some, but limited value. 

If "artistic merit" is being judged, and all judges "must" give equivalent
scores consistently, is it that the judges are all fully trained in their
judging or is it that they are picked to be equivalent in their biases?

When I say that their biases are "picked" I don't mean that in the
nasty way it might sound.  What I mean is that if a set of judges
judge a zillion images together, their image-experiences would 
tend to become a common one, and that history would be a basis
of each's bias.  They would therefore react similarly to "new" 
images, not necessarily in an un-biased fashion, but in "matched" 
bias fashion. Different groups would then perhaps have different
"standard biases" developed.

Does any of this make sense? 

Mike K.

P.S. - I ask these questions only for the purpose of thought
       provocation, not to critisize any group or their judges.
       Judging is a difficult job and often a thankless one.


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