Photo Contest

Composition tips:

a. Lighting makes a huge difference, especially in landscape shots. Early morning or late evening often give grazing lighting, enhancing the visual depth of your scene and revealing detail. However the flat light of noon can sometimes make subjects that are too contrasty reveal all their detail.

b. Unusual angle or approach can make an otherwise dull subject come to life.

For many more free photo tips on the web, try the Silverlight Tutorial or Geoff Lawrence

Submitting your pictures to the contest coordinators:

a. The pictures should have been taken with the jpeg fine setting in your camera, or converted to that format from RAW if necessary. Most users will find the camera will have done this automatically. With most modern digital cameras, this setting produces images that are between 2 and 5 megapixels in size. (2meg - 5 meg). NOTE: Many cameras and systems also general small copies called "thumbnails" which are only 25 - 50 kilopixels (25k - 50 k). These are useful when filing and sorting your photos but are NOT the originals, just like a paper box label is not what's in the box - it's just a little piece of paper.

b. To send the originals by email, send to photocontest@hardypalm.com by attaching the photo files. Some mail applications use a paperclip symbol to attach the files, others have an "insert" menu which allows you to find the files in your computer. Do NOT just drag the thumbnails onto the email. This method will send us the thumbnails, not the originals. You can tell if you've been successful if the file size in the attachment window is correct (2meg-5meg). If it says 25-50k, you have only attached thumbnails.

c. If you have more than 10 pictures, we recommend you send them as separate emails to avoid overloading the server. Note that any one picture over 10 meg will crash the server, but this huge file size is unlikely.

For example, if you wish to submit 18 pictures, you should do 2 emails of 9 each. Your submissions can be multiple but we'd appreciate them in bulk - a few emails, not 18 emails with one photo each.

d. Information in the submission email: For each entry, tell us which category (specimen, grouping, or landscape) you want for the picture. Also give the location and date (if different than the file date on the photo) and any other details you might think would be useful to us in a slideshow or calendar, such as species, cultivar etc in the specimen plants. Be sure your actual name appears on the email, not just a cutsey tag name or whatever.

eg: DSCN 2001 - specimen, Ladner, BC, May 2011, Trachycarpus fortunei, 50 metre tall mutant (note this is an example only and not intended to represent reality).

e. The final date for submission of entries has been extended to MIDNIGHT ON TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 13th, 2011.