As Gaz says, there is potentially some distance between what may win in a popular vote and what looks really great on your wall for a month. I don't want to decry the results from such choices. At times they're a great way as we see each POTM. There is however a considerable investment in producing a calendar. It's worth the additional effort to make it great as a whole package. It needs to have a story and control of the type of images to give a balanced group of images.
I will be drawing up a shortlist of images that really do justify being in that list based on composition, impact, technical quality etc and then ensuring we have some balance of complementary and diverse images. Just being a nice picture simply isn't enough for a high impact calendar. I'll be letting Gaz along with some others decide which make the final list so there is a double and triple check against my opinions. It won't simply be my choice. For transparency, I'll also be making no decisions on which of my photos even make the final shortlist.
That whole process took six weeks of deliberation and checking last year. I did dozens of scans through the entries slowly whittling them down to those that I thought really were the best images. It is a slow and methodical process. I will look for things that you won't see and by doing so improve any image. Those little things actually do matter when your enlarging something from your iPad or even phone to something A3 sized. I think the success of the calendar showed it was worth the effort.
Even some of those well received photos I've posted recently I am not happy with and wouldn't consider using.
Across the members we really do have the opportunity to have an even better and stunning calendar. I'm just using my critical photographic skills acquired over many years to get you there. I will also be seeking opinions of some of my experienced and competition winning photographic buddies.
You will all have something as a group and individuals to be really proud of (I hope!).