Photography competition rules inquiry


garbled

Member
Dec 4, 2009
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I wanted to send my entry in a local photography competion and one of their rules is the below.

"Only cropping is allowed. No other form of editing, ie color adjustment is allowed. Entries are tantamount to disqualification upon editing."

My question is...is burning and dodging a photo a form of color adjustment? How about sharpening?

Thanks.
 

I wanted to send my entry in a local photography competion and one of their rules is the below.

"Only cropping is allowed. No other form of editing, ie color adjustment is allowed. Entries are tantamount to disqualification upon editing."

My question is...is burning and dodging a photo a form of color adjustment? How about sharpening?

Thanks.

why don't you CALL them and ask. the phone was invented for a reason. what we say might not be what they think.

so pick up your phone and dial.......and ask them
 

garbled said:
My question is...is burning and dodging a photo a form of color adjustment? How about sharpening?

Thanks.
No it's not a form of colour adjustment because it's just darkening and brightening within the brush size. However it might be against the rules because they only said you can crop. Don't know why but all images must be Post process to look more fantastic.

Be careful, they might want your unprocessed image and use it for themselves later. I'm just sayin.
 

for the common understanding, cropping, adjust WB, apply level, curve, USM are consider basic editing,
burning, dodging, layer mask, cloning are consider beyond that.

to be safe, you need to clarify with them.
 

Thanks for the reply sgdevilz and catchlight, i have the same thoughts of calling them too but I just want to see the veterans handle their images when there's a rule like this. Cheers!
 

"Only cropping is allowed. No other form of editing, ie color adjustment is allowed. Entries are tantamount to disqualification upon editing."

It is very obvious... you can only crop. Any other adjustments is not allowed. That includes curves, contrast, brightness, noise reduction, sharpening, saturation, dodge and burn or even adding a watermark. That is the straight rule. The "color adjustment" thingy is just an example.

You can actually do anything you want, but don't get caught. If caught, you risk disqualification.
 

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Then just shoot JPEG with pre-shot in-camera adjustments. I dun understand why is this rule worded and enforced this way. Isn't processing RAW file part of photography?
 

Then just shoot JPEG with pre-shot in-camera adjustments. I dun understand why is this rule worded and enforced this way. Isn't processing RAW file part of photography?

*shrug*

some competitions will also ask for your RAW file if shortlisted.
 

-_-" Y? I'm guessing its a cheap way to gather lots of images for commercial purposes. Plus the rule that organizer holds the rights to the photos. Well, I'm not saying this is a unfair deal but.... forbidding RAW processing seems limiting potential. Is that an attempt to level the playing field.
 

I wanted to send my entry in a local photography competion and one of their rules is the below.

"Only cropping is allowed. No other form of editing, ie color adjustment is allowed. Entries are tantamount to disqualification upon editing."

My question is...is burning and dodging a photo a form of color adjustment? How about sharpening?

Thanks.

This is not a normal photo competition because normal photo competition don't disallow cropping for sure, so I would take the trouble to enquire with the organisers.

I have never heard of "color adjustment" not being allowed - you can after all, do it in-camera using Kelvin adjustments... To be frank, I think that's a pretty silly rule.
 

*shrug*

some competitions will also ask for your RAW file if shortlisted.

-_-" Y? I'm guessing its a cheap way to gather lots of images for commercial purposes. Plus the rule that organizer holds the rights to the photos. Well, I'm not saying this is a unfair deal but.... forbidding RAW processing seems limiting potential. Is that an attempt to level the playing field.

The RAW file is not always for "commercial purposes", it's more for verification.

If your JPG image is the same as the RAW file, then it would show that you haven't cropped anything.

Whether they are doing it to pay cheaply to get images for commercial purposes, it depends on the company, and of course, the T&C of the competition. Even if they ask for your RAW file, you can ask them what it is for, and if they give you in writing it's only for verification and they won't use it beyond that (assuming that the T&C says that all rights remain with photographer), I won't worry too much about it.
 

the first thing you need to do is read the T&C before you commit yourself into it,
if the organizer says whatever photos submitted will become their property, regardless win or not, it is time for you to walk away.


sometime organizers want to see the raw images, it is also to verify you are the rightful owner of the images you have submitted and you didn't PS too much.


limited editing also ensure can the participants are competent on their photography skills.
 

the first thing you need to do is read the T&C before you commit yourself into it,
if the organizer says whatever photos submitted will become their property, regardless win or not, it is time for you to walk away.


sometime organizers want to see the raw images, it is also to verify you are the rightful owner of the images you have submitted and you didn't PS too much.


limited editing also ensure can the participants are competent on their photography skills.

I wonder what happens if they shoot JPEG only. I used to do that a LONG time ago.
 

I wanted to send my entry in a local photography competion and one of their rules is the below.

"Only cropping is allowed. No other form of editing, ie color adjustment is allowed. Entries are tantamount to disqualification upon editing."

My question is...is burning and dodging a photo a form of color adjustment? How about sharpening?

Thanks.

Sometimes the organizers of the contest are not photographers or imaging people, thus having swallow understanding of digital file formats.

Also it depends on the type of contest and genre.

If the photo is one where you can control lighting, then I would see burning and dodging as serious cheating. If a photo is where the photographer has no control in lighting ratio, then I can accept burning and dodging. Also if something can be done the same with film, then I would also feel that its within honorable limits of photography. BW film masters back then dodge and burn often, nobody can call them cheating.

On sharpening, I would also say its acceptable and without fraud. If you shoot JPEG, files are already sharpened by the camera. If you shoot RAW, raw processors applies a default sharpening upon export. Resizing the file will lose original sharpness also, so its only reasonable to bring it back. But when you sharpen as a form of correction, eg your critical sharpness of the eyes weren't there, or you selectively sharpen a perfectly ok picture to enhance certain parts, eg the eyes, then I would fault you if I am the judge, but I would not disqualify you. Again, in film days, photographers also sharpens with a technique known as Unsharp Mask, which is what the Photoshop filter is named after.

That is why I say it depends on the contest and the genre.
 

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