Amateur Photographers: Photograph Your Way to Forum Fame

The SANParks forums host hundreds of images that forum members have taken in our parks, and then chosen to share in the online environment. As the quality and the quantity of images submitted has grown, so too has our forum community, which now boasts several keen amateur photographers among its ranks.

To recognise, encourage and celebrate the visual feast the forum community creates through their photographs, the SANParks volunteer moderators, with the support of SANParks, are launching what we hope will become an annual forum amateur photography competition!

All forum members are welcome to participate! If you want to participate and are not a forum member, you can find out how to join the forum here.

The Sanparks photographic competition 2009 is open for submission from 20 January 2009 till 31 March 2009! And like last year, you will be able to enter in 6 categories, so you will need 6 folders for submitting your entries!

How to enter

You must e-mail the moderators your entry before March 31 2009. Only e-mailed submissions will be accepted.

Along with your entry, which should have the subject line read - Forum Amateur Photo Competition 2009, please remember to:

• Specify which category you are entering. You may enter the competition for Digital Compact cameras or the competition for Digital Single Lens Reflex cameras (DSLR). If you are not sure of the difference, pm a mod and we will help you out.
• Your full name and forum name
• Your e-mail address
• A contact phone number
• A postal address
• Information on where and when your entry/entries was/were taken

The 6 categories in both the Digital Compact cameras and the competition for Digital Single Lens Reflex are as follows:

• Portraits: All animals and insects-including reptiles and birds
• Landscapes
• Animals and insects: All animals and insects
• Human activity in any South African National Park: This must be legal activity and it must be artistically interpreted. It can include things like being stuck at ellie roadblocks, traffic jams with lions, doors, windows, palm trees, lonely benches with the river in the background etc.
• Plants: flowers and trees
• Black & white: all subjects.

Competition Rules

As always there are rules involved.

• Entries must be digital images, taken between 1 January 2008 and 31 December 2008. Scans or prints are not permitted. No picture may be entered in more than one category. Series shots are not allowed, please submit one image from any series. You can crop images before submission, but please ensure the image quality is maintained.
• SANParks employees and moderators are not allowed to enter the competition.
• The number of entries per member is limited to two (2) pictures in each section, per entrant.
• Digital guidelines:
  • Format: The original capture as it was recorded by the camera with no manipulation applied (eg *.DNG, *.JPG, *.NEF, *.CR2, *.CRW) may be requested if your image reaches the final stages of the competition and if requested must be supplied to us.
  • File size requirements: The photos must be sent in jpeg format, resized to a maximum of 800 pixels on the longest side.
  • Calibration and colour: For the best result please submitted Images colour profiled/corrected using a correctly calibrated monitor and utilising Adobe RGB 98 colour space before submission. Entries will not be dismissed if the colour management is not according to our request. But we can not be held liable for not accepting images of poor colour. Allowances will not be made for poorly colour managed/corrected images, in particular please ensure your images are not over saturated and faithfully represent the subject.
  • Labelling: The file should carry your name, the category number or title and the key subject (eg JohnDoe.Cat2eagle.jpg or JohnDoe.portrait.eagle.jpg). Please label all images using the same format.
  • Other information required: Hardware details (ie name of camera) should be mentioned in the mail, and if possible in the EXIF-information of the jpeg.
• Copyright: You must be the sole author and owner of the copyright for all images entered. By entering your images into the competition, you grant South African National Parks a non-exclusive licence to publish the images for any purpose in connection with the competition including, but not limited to, the following purposes:
  • Judging the competition,
  • Display in the galleries,
  • Inclusion within promotion of the competition and exhibition organised by SANParks.
• Subjects: The photos should be taken in one of the National parks in South Africa.
  Domestic animals (cats, dogs, farm animals, etc) and cultivated plants (species or hybrids grown in a cultivated setting) do not count as wildlife and are not eligible subjects. You must declare at the time of submitting if a picture has been taken in captivity or conditions that are unnatural (eg if live bait has been used). Details of the subject and location must be provided in the file info.
• Other competitions/publications
  A picture that has already won a prize in a major competition (one receiving more than 500 images) is not eligible for entry. Please avoid entering images that have been widely published in the past 12 months or entered into other nature photography competitions.
• SANParks and the moderators have the right to refuse any entries which they deem unfit for display as part of the competition.
• Manipulation
  The faithful representation of what you saw at the time of taking the shot must be maintained. Sandwich shots, double exposures, photographs which consist in any way of more than one separate image and images that have been digitally manipulated outside of rule 4 are not eligible.
• Judges
  The moderators and the SANParks photographer will make a preselection of 5 photos per category. The forum members will choose the winner via a blind poll. There will be no discussion about the preselection.
  Should the quantity of entries in a particular category fall below a set amount, SANParks reserve the right not to award prizes.
• Notification
  Winners and commended photographers will be notified in June 2009. All the entries will be published on the competition gallery.
• Closing date
  Closing date for entry is 31 March 2009.
  

Selecting the winners:

The forum moderators, in consultation, will select 10 pictures from each category and present them to SANParks. SANParks will then select 5 from each category and these images will be displayed on the forum in May 2009 for the forum members to vote for the winning pictures in each category. The winners will be announced in June 2009. The pictures with the most votes win.

The winners will be announced on the forum and each winner will receive a prize from SANParks. The judges decision is final, both in the preliminary and final selection stages.

By entering the competition, you are giving SANParks the right to display the winning images on our website or use it for publicity purposes. Copyright of the image however stays with the photographer.

Related Links

• Winners DSLR competition 2008
• Winners of the Compact Section of Photography Competition