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The Theme:
Places. This summer's Photographer of the Year competition for 2008 is all about capturing the places we visit. Whether it's your favourite spot for a weekend break, an idyllic vista in a faraway land, a building that you find captivating (from inside or out) or just your back garden from a weird angle, this competition covers all the bases. Think 'landscape', 'travel', 'architectural' or even 'macro' photography. The key word though is 'Think'… not surprising given the name of the website.
We ask that you submit a portfolio of up to five images. They can be multiple images of the same place, or a range of photographs designed to show your understanding of more than one genre of photography. Be warned though, yet again this is a topic that at first glance appears easy but is in fact deceptively hard. Practically anyone can take a nice photograph of a field on a warm summer's evening; your task is to make that field your own, by making an image something no one else will ever capture. Perhaps that means getting in position long before sunrise, or using a very low viewpoint and a very wide angle. Or maybe even throwing away the rulebook and photographing a landscape with a Lensbaby. What you choose to photograph and how you photograph it is up to you, just so long as you remember your place. Or Places.
You have until the end of the July, so get thinking and get submitting - you may want to use the caption box when submitting an image to explain your ways of thinking and/or your technical process to achieve results.
The Prize:
There can be only one winner, so there's only one prize. But it's a real honey...
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First place:
The winning picture by members' votes will earn its photographer a brand new Pentax K200D DSLR camera body and 18-55 zoom lens. With its stunning 10.2 megapixel CCD sensor (capable of delivering perfect pictures, thanks also to the Pentax PRIME image processor featured on the top K20D), 2.7” LCD screen and built-in image stabilisation, this is the ultimate DSLR for anyone wanting to learn their craft properly. It's perfect for any photographer, and the whole kit is typically priced at nearly £600 - but you can win one for free! So, get snapping!
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What Do You Mean "Places"?
Exactly what you think it means. Indoors, outdoors, in the city, up a mountain or in the middle of the Great Barrier Reef, this is a true multi-disciplinary test of your photographic skills. What's more, 'places' do not exclude man-made locations and you don't need to be on terra firma to photograph them (although hiring the Space Shuttle might be a bit OTT).
Even people and wildlife are not excluded from these photographs, although they should not be the main subject matter of a photograph about 'places'. Here's what we mean; a photograph of an English village green taken on a summery Sunday afternoon will look completely wrong without a cricket match taking place, but if your images were more about the cricket match than the green itself, it's not really in the spirit of 'places'…
We are not fussy about Photoshop. Your images could be straight out of the camera or heavily manipulated. The choice is yours. Be advised that if you do choose to manipulate an image, try to make it to 'improve on nature', rather than to fix photographic mistakes. Of course, if the image you are fixing was taken on the hoof, while tigers armed with submachine guns were chasing you, we'll cut you some slack.
We will pick the best of the best out for the final vote, but we want to see a range of images showing what you can do. In other words, make your five images count.
Some suggestions:
Go with what you are good at, but then try another genre altogether for one or two submissions. Landscape photographers… try photographing a crowded city scene. Architecture enthusiasts… try climbing a hill, and so on.
Learn from the masters. Hit the library and seek out the photographs, the photographers and the artists that grab you. Then learn how to replicate that style. Remember that many landscape photographers still rely on large format cameras with sophisticated movements and almost all of them get up long before sunrise.
Check out the competition. Experiment. Try to think outside your comfort zone before you submit.
Guidelines for voting:
As usual, when voting on an image, one star is a low vote; five stars is a high vote.
Remember that you don't have to enter the competition to vote - any member can vote. However, if you didn't enter then you have no chance of winning.
Can you imagine why the photographer submitted that particular photograph? If not, then consider just not voting on this one.
This is a very wide-ranging topic; if a specific type of pictures are not for you, skip over that genre rather than mark it down. Just because you don't like travel photography for example, doesn't mean you should make every travel image suffer a one-star vote.
Look through the gallery for the 'wow' images that leap out at you. Give the best of the best of these five stars (you can give five-star awards to as many pictures as you like, but be economical with your stars).
Look at the rest and judge them by your own criteria. Do you demand that shots are perfectly exposed and razor sharp? Do you give more weight to the subject or what the photographer was trying to do? Hand out marks accordingly. Different people rate different attributes but if a large number of people vote, everything will balance out.
If you really think a picture has no merit whatsoever then give it one star. However, be constructive in your criticism - why not take the time to explain why you marked a photo down in the forum? That way, the poor mark can help a photographer improve their work subsequently.
Terms and Conditions:
The ThinkCamera Photographer of the Year 2008 competition is open to UK entrants only.
Submissions to the Photographer of the Year competition are free of charge. Please submit no more than five entries. If you have submitted more than five pictures under your ID after the competition closes, we will be reluctantly forced to disqualify ALL your entries. Don't worry if you submit too many images before the competition closes, as you can always delete the other pictures before the closing date (Any problems then contact the site admin). The use of multiple accounts will be met with automatic disqualification of ALL images from these accounts, so just say 'no'!
Your photograph or photographs must have been taken by you. Images can be derived from any photographic source - film, digital or scanned media - and post-processing is allowed. Please remember, though, scanned images are subject to copyright and you should not use artwork of others. Mixed media images are welcomed, but remember this competition will be judged on your photographic skills, not on your abilities as an illustrator.
After the submission stage of the competition closes, the ThinkCamera team will produce a shortlist of the 20 best photographs from the 20 best photographers. These 20 images will then go to a public vote to select the best five photographer's images. The Editor will then select one of these final five to find the winner of the second round of ThinkCamera's Photographer of the Year. The Editor's decision in the adjudication process is final and no correspondence will be entered into.
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