The two things go hand in hand. There is a demand for somewhere to gossip and that leads to a need for content apart from words. So photos, short movie clips all add to the party feel.

If I want to talk photography i come here, if I want to tell the world I've just made lunch I go to Facebook. Having said that though, it's an easy place to share whole albums of pictures with friends, so there is a more sober side to it.

Virtually untouched by human hand, complete with all original accessories plus box. The box has been a bit battered in storage but the lens, hood, cap, back cap, pouch, etc are all in exemplary condition.

Price £225.00 including insured shipping to anywhere in the world.

Just to be clear, and I will change the wording later, the intention was that if someone in the forum (original) version of the competition put in an image say 1000 pixels wide it would be deleted, but they would be welcome to correct the size and submit it again.

There was never any intention that entrants would post different images as the competition went on.

I can assure you Stefan that would lead to chaos and isn't allowed under the general competition rules. People have to know where they stand. Otherwise, if I set a competition, who's to say I couldn't drop you a PM and suggest there was a better photo for the competition that you'd posted last week elsewhere, why don't you change it for that one?

You wouldn't get very far sending a picture to a magazine competition and then sending another one asking for it to be subsitituted. "No communication can be entered into" is the answer you would get, if you got one at all.

You'll get promoted Paul after a relatively small number of posts, and the ranks increase as the post count increases. Just a bit of fun.

There are no plans to change the competitions Glyn. They seem to work very well and perform a useful learning function also.

Apart from being enjoyable to enter and to judge of course!

Austin Thomas is a member of one of the photographic societies local to us. He produces some incredible images.

Many of these things predate the general use of photography, so I'm not sure about that. Colour photography has been available, but difficult, since the late 1800s, and these exhibit a different look to the pure colours we see today. Autochromes are an early example and they can look fantastic.

I tend to use black and white in situations where I feel the design and texture is diminished by the presence of colour. Or indeed as you suggest to evoke a feeling of yesteryear. But equally well I have used Photoshop to recreate the Autochrome look, so looking back is not entirely restricted to black and white.

There is plenty of black and white art, from sketches, detailed drawings such as Escher's to all sorts of engravings.

I see this sort of thing on the walls of some stately homes, usually tucked away down dark corridors with only me there stopping to enjoy them.

I'm absolutely certain that re-submitting is unfair to the other entrants. The motive for replacing an entry doesn't matter - once the die is cast that should be it. You read the brief for the competition, you give it your best shot and that's it. The judge only gets involved after the deadline.

This has worked well for the past 150+ competitions and worked well without having to change this basic premise. It's obvious from the feedback that deviating from that causes problems, so let's just keep it fair and square for all.

Not bother perhaps, but this is a Classified Ad, discussions should be elsewhere.