First monthly Anandtech Photography contest! June 2007

[blurredvision]

Final Voting Results

submission_1.jpg - Brainonska511 - WINNER!!
submission_2.jpg - blurredvision
submission_3.jpg - dartworth
submission_4.jpg - ZOXXO

June 2007 Submission Gallery

Password: atcontest

Congratulations to member Brainonska511 on winning the first Anandtech photography contest! It definitely came down to the wire, as ZOXXO gained a ton of votes in the last few hours of voting, and almost pulled it off. Thanks to all who participated, and thanks to all who voted.

Look for next month's contest in the next day or two!

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It seems as if this has been fleshed out a bit in Off Topic in the past and more-so recently, but it keeps fading away without any progress. So, I'm going to take it upon myself to get this thing started. I'm logged into these forums way more than I should be, so I have the time to keep this thing organized and going.

June Contest Dates:

• Photo must be taken between June 6 - 23, 2007.
• Photo must be submitted by end of day, June 23, 2007.
• Voting begins June 24th/25th, 2007, and will run through the 28th.
• Winner to be announced at the end of June.

June 2007 Contest Theme:

• Summertime Fun!
• Our first theme encompasses whatever it is that you like about the summertime. We'll keep this wide open to get everyone acclimated to the rules of the contest. Pictures can range from fun activities to pictures of your favorite summertime hangouts. Good luck!

The General Rules:

• Submitted photos must easily pertain to the contest subject matter.
• Contest eligible pictures MUST be taken within the dates stated for this month's contest.
• Only one submitted photo per entrant.
• Full EXIF info MUST be retained with any submitted picture.
• Submitted photos must abide by forum rules (which basically means no nudity)

Post-Processing Rules:

• We are now going to dispense with any PP rules. Anything is allowed, but I still want to discourage the following:
  • Try to refrain from turning your photo into "graphic art".
  • I would like to discourage major cloning and photo transplants.

Submission Rules:

• Each person is given one full day after the contest ends to make their final submission. This gives time to make any last-minute PP adjustments.
• Smallest picture size available to submit will be limited to 1200 pixels on the smallest side. This gives everyone with atleast a 2MP camera a chance to enter. (Any arguements on this one?) - UPDATE: If anyone has any problems with this, we can dispense with this rule. Now that I think about it, any full-size originals you submit to me will be available for anyone here to grab.
• Please submit JPG's only! (Highest quality setting for JPG is suggested to reduce compression artifacts.)
• Your final entry can be made at any time between the start of the contest itself until the submission deadline stated above.
• Each member will have only ONE chance to submit a final entry for the contest. Once you submit, that is it.

Submitting Your Entry:

• There will be two ways to get your photo to me:
  • Email your photo to blurredvision at gmail dot com.
  • PM me with a link to your full-size photo on the web.

Voting:

• Voting will begin at the date stated at the start of this thread.
• The gallery will be available to view at all times as pictures are added throughout the contest, however all final entries will be posted in this thread with links, along with a poll at the top of the thread.
• Voting will stay open until the deadline.

Prizes:

• Due to the nature of the contest being ran by regular members, there are no prizes to be offered. You will only gain the satisfaction of being chosen by the members of Anandtech as the best in this month's theme.
• If any prizes are able to be given away in any future contests, I will be sure to outline the details. If you do not see mention of a prize, then assume there isn't one.

 

[Brainonska511]

Sweet. I have my new XT to play with and a few pictures that can already be submitted and time next week to go take more (since my last finals are on Tuesday and I don't leave for home (NY) until Saturday - it will leave me time to wander about Chicago).

How about categories like:
Animals
Plants
Summer stuff
Macro photography

 

[blurredvision]

Originally posted by: Brainonska511
Sweet. I have my new XT to play with and a few pictures that can already be submitted

Well, hate to burst your bubble, but one of the rules will definitely be that the picture needs to be taken within the dates assigned. We'll probably be looking at contest periods around 2 weeks in length. I'd like to get a new contest going each month, so everyone can continue to use their shiny, expensive digital cameras. I know it will definitely help keep me on the ball.

 

[Newfie]

Ohh, I want to post some =)

Categories:

Wildlife (plants n' Animals)
Landscape (pretty obvious)
Personal Shots (groups, other people, yourself, etc)
Macro shots
Still-life Photography

Thats all I can think of now.

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: blurredvision

Originally posted by: Brainonska511
Sweet. I have my new XT to play with and a few pictures that can already be submitted

Well, hate to burst your bubble, but one of the rules will definitely be that the picture needs to be taken within the dates assigned. We'll probably be looking at contest periods around 2 weeks in length. I'd like to get a new contest going each month, so everyone can continue to use their shiny, expensive digital cameras. I know it will definitely help keep me on the ball.

That's fine. I'll consider the earlier stuff practice and go out and hunt for better stuff .

 

[blurredvision]

Originally posted by: Brainonska511

Originally posted by: blurredvision

Originally posted by: Brainonska511
Sweet. I have my new XT to play with and a few pictures that can already be submitted

Well, hate to burst your bubble, but one of the rules will definitely be that the picture needs to be taken within the dates assigned. We'll probably be looking at contest periods around 2 weeks in length. I'd like to get a new contest going each month, so everyone can continue to use their shiny, expensive digital cameras. I know it will definitely help keep me on the ball.

That's fine. I'll consider the earlier stuff practice and go out and hunt for better stuff .

Precisely the reason for the "contest".

 

[fierydemise]

I want an urban category

 

[ProviaFan]

This is a good idea... I'll look forward to participating. :thumbsup:

 

[zylander]

Urban (not people, more like buildings, bridges, structures ect.)
Macro
Wildlife (plants and/or animals)
Landscapes

I like taking pictures of bridges, plus boats/ships. Dont know if that would fit into landscape or what ever, but a category for that too.

 

[virtuamike]

Woohoo! I vote for a people category, because people are cool

 

[drifter106]

hey...this sounds great!!

 

[umbrella39]

Great idea indeed! New photos taken after a contest starts I hope. In other words, no photos taken XX years ago.

 

[zylander]

Originally posted by: umbrella39
Great idea indeed! New photos taken after a contest starts I hope. In other words, no photos taken XX years ago.

Damn, that means I cant use pictures I already have that I really like. I shouldnt have posted them in that other thread.

 

[virtuamike]

Originally posted by: zylander

Originally posted by: umbrella39
Great idea indeed! New photos taken after a contest starts I hope. In other words, no photos taken XX years ago.

Damn, that means I cant use pictures I already have that I really like. I shouldnt have posted them in that other thread.

The whole point is to get people to go out and shoot

 

[Patt]

Cool ... I sometimes need prompting to take more pics, and since I'll be getting a new camera soon I'll participate.

 

[Jawo]

I loved this idea when it was proposed in late march. But it never got off the ground. I just got a new XTi as well and going to have some fun playing around with it!

 

[drifter106]

How will it be done? Will the server hold all the pics or will we have to provide a link...a few places i know of have a limit on file size.

 

[blurredvision]

Originally posted by: drifter106
How will it be done? Will the server hold all the pics or will we have to provide a link...a few places i know of have a limit on file size.

I am working on a couple of solutions for that which should work. I'll post details soon....

 

[blurredvision]

From the updated OP:

As far as a website to view submitted entries, as well as judging, I'm looking at these options. For submissions, I am willing to set up a passworded gallery on my Smugmug account for all entries. The password will be posted in this main thread for all to have access. This will ensure the photos are not mistaken by anyone as my own. Another option is for the dedicated web programming of random individuals here who would like to donate their time and skill towards coding a website to automate submissions and help with judging.

As for judging, I would not mind seeing a self-judged contest. I am thinking of something along the lines of allowing everyone one vote, which could be emailed/PM'd to a panel of 3 judges. Each person can vote once, and cannot vote for their own submission. The judges would make sure that all rules were followed, and each judge will communicate with each other to verify the tallies line up. The top 3 vote-getters will then be announced. The 3 judges will be decided upon within the next two weeks.

Also, should we allow anyone on the forum to vote, or only entrants to the contest? If we allowed anyone and everyone, we could definitely set a minimum post count or minimum forum membership length to discourage cheating by signing up for new accounts (although I sincerely hope this would not become an issue).

Comments, suggestions so far?

 

[zylander]

Originally posted by: virtuamike

Originally posted by: zylander

Originally posted by: umbrella39
Great idea indeed! New photos taken after a contest starts I hope. In other words, no photos taken XX years ago.

Damn, that means I cant use pictures I already have that I really like. I shouldnt have posted them in that other thread.

The whole point is to get people to go out and shoot

Hehe, oh I know, I just have one or two that I really like and was just going to throw it in along with the stuff that I went out and got.

 

[drifter106]

Food for thought...

Contestants submission is viewed with no name attached thus making any judgement totally objective in nature...

 

[ProviaFan]

A question... if you "strongly" encourage no post processing, do you really mean that it's strongly encouraged to let one's camera make all post processing decisions on a JPEG, essentially leaving these decisions to random chance? With that said, since I shoot RAW exclusively and will thus be "forced" to go against this directive, can I assume that all of the controls in Adobe Camera Raw are permitted? (except for the cloning tool when used to modify subject content, of course)

 

[deanx0r]

Originally posted by: fierydemise
I want an urban category

Seconded.

 

[ThePresence]

Originally posted by: deanx0r

Originally posted by: fierydemise
I want an urban category

Seconded.

Thirded.

 

[blurredvision]

Originally posted by: ProviaFan
A question... if you "strongly" encourage no post processing, do you really mean that it's strongly encouraged to let one's camera make all post processing decisions on a JPEG, essentially leaving these decisions to random chance? With that said, since I shoot RAW exclusively and will thus be "forced" to go against this directive, can I assume that all of the controls in Adobe Camera Raw are permitted? (except for the cloning tool when used to modify subject content, of course)

I guess that's kind of what I meant by it, but to be honest, I'll most likely never post a picture that hasn't been post-processed by some amount myself. I also shoot RAW exclusively.

As for the controls in ACR, yes, they are all permitted, with the exception you noted. That's part of the allure of digital photography, and I see no reason to disallow adjustments just because photographers couldn't do some of this stuff as easily in the film days.

I'll reword the OP, thanks for the post.