Exhibition Requirements:
IMAGE AND ENTRY REQUIREMENTS This exhibition is open to anyone; however, an entry may be rejected when the Sponsor or the Exhibition Organizers, in their reasonable discretion, believes the entry does not conform to exhibition rules and these Conditions of Entry. Membership in any photographic organization is not required.
Penalties: Entries will not be accepted from any entrant who has put on the PSA Penalties List for Ethics Violation. Entry fees are not refundable in these circumstances.
PSA Star Ratings
To receive proper Star ratings credit from PSA, entrants must provide their names and country exactly the same way in each exhibition. Aliases are not permitted. Please contact PSA in the event of name changes or relocating to another country. Using one’s name differently in different exhibition exposes the entrant to the risk that many of their acceptances may not be recognized by PSA Star Ratings.
Image Creation
Entries must originate as photographs (image-captures of objects via light sensitivity) made by the entrant on photographic emulsion or acquired digitally.
Certification:
By virtue of submitting an image, the entrant certifies the work as his or her own. Images may not incorporate elements produced by anyone else (for example: clip art, images or art by others downloaded from the Internet). Aliases are not allowed.
Reproduction
The entrant permits the sponsors to reproduce all or part of the entered material free of charge for publication and/or display in media related to the exhibition. This may include low resolution posting on a website. The Photographic Society of America (PSA) may request specific permission from entrants to reproduce entered images in its educational materials. The terms of that permission will be mutually agreed between the entrant and PSA except in the circumstances where the entered image is found to breach the PSA Ethics Policy. In those circumstances the image may be reproduced by PSA, without the entrant’s further permission, for educational purposes to illustrate serious exhibition rule violations. For those reproductions, the entrant’s name will be withheld.
Entries will not be accepted from entrants who indicate that their images may not be reproduced in materials related to the exhibition.” The exhibition assumes no liability of any misuse of copyright.
Alteration and Computer Generation Subject to Divisional restrictions (particularly Nature, Photo Travel, and Photojournalism) images may be altered, either electronically or otherwise, by the entrant; adjustments to enhance images or creatively modify images are allowed providing the underlying photograph is retained in a way that is obvious to the viewer. Images may not be constructed entirely with a computer, and must be the sole work of the entrant.
Re-use of accepted images: Any image that has been accepted in this exhibition, past or present, may not be entered again in the same Division Star Ratings Class in any future instances of this exhibition. It may, of course, be entered in any other PSA recognised exhibitions but must always have the same title. Re-titling in another language is not allowed.
Entry: An Entry consists of, up to and including, four (4) images entered by a single entrant into the same Section. An entrant may only enter a specific Section once. Entrants may not enter identical or similar images into the same section or different sections of the same exhibition.
Titles:
Each image must have a unique title that is a description of the image. That unique title must be used for entry of that image or of an identical Image into any and all PSA-Recognized exhibitions. Titles must be 35 characters or fewer. No titles may be visible to the judges, and nothing in the image may identify the entrant. Titles may not include file extensions such as .jpg or .jpeg (or any other camera capture filenames such as IMG 471). Titles may not consist of personal identifiers possibly augmented by a number; or include words such as “untitled” or “no title”. Titles may not consist solely of numbers unless those numbers are prominently contained within the image, such as a contestant number in a race.
Color and Monochrome:
Color and Monochrome images from the same capture that share substantial pictorial content in common will be considered the same image and must be given the same title.
Digital image requirements:
This exhibition accepts electronic digital images only – no slides or prints. All entries are to be:
- in sRGB .jpg format
- maximum 3MB file size
- maximum 1920 pixels horizontally, 1200 pixels vertically.
Note that portrait orientation images must still meet the 1200 pixel height limit. Images which exceed any of these maximums will be blocked during the on-line entry process.
Smaller images may be submitted – these will not be resized to meet the specified pixel limits and will appear smaller when projected for judging.
You do not need to follow any naming convention for your jpg files when you enter. The entry form software properly renames your files to meet the needs of our exhibition.
Titles
Titles must use letters and numbers from the English alphabet but no other characters. Maximum title length is 35 characters, including spaces. Titles will not be announced at judging.
The Exhibition will be conducted in accordance with the rules of the PSA and the APS.
An entrant’s images will not be presented to the judges consecutively. An entrant’s four images will be distributed throughout four rounds of judging in that section. Distribution of images will be in the same round order as submitted by the entrant. At no stage will a judge be able to view all the entrant’s images together.
Judging method:
Judging will be conducted online where the judges will be required to use color-calibrated monitors that are capable of displaying 100% of the image resolution.
Where the image presented is a lower than the maximum resolution the images will not be enlarged beyond their native resolution.
Each judge will score each image using a range of 1 – 9 where the higher score signifies a higher quality image. The total of these scores will be used to determine an acceptance percentage.
Acceptance target range:
The acceptance target range will be 29% to 35% of total entries within that section.
DATA PROTECTION
By entering this exhibition, you are explicitly consenting to the personal details you have supplied, including physical addresses, email addresses, being held, processed and used by the exhibition organizers for purposes associated with this exhibition. You also explicitly consent to such information being sent to organizations that have accorded official recognition, patronage or accreditation to this exhibition. You acknowledge, agree and accept that by entering this exhibition, your participation status which includes your first and last name, name of the country used during registration at the exhibition, number of sections entered and number of photos entered in those sections will be made public in a published status list and that the results of your entry shall be made public in exhibition gallery, exhibition catalog. You also agree and accept the policy regarding Breaches of Rules of the PSA.
SUBJECT MATTER AND SECTION DEFINITIONS
Statement on Subject Matter – applicable to all sections
The fundamental rule that must be observed at all times and applies to all sections offered in exhibitions with PSA recognition is that the welfare of living creatures is more important than any photograph. This means that practices such as baiting of subjects with a living creature and removal of birds from nests, for the purpose of obtaining a photograph, are highly unethical, and such photographs are not allowed in any exhibition with PSA recognition. Under no circumstances may a living creature be placed in a situation where it will be killed, injured or stressed for the purpose of obtaining a photograph. Images that show live creatures being fed to captive animals, birds or reptiles are not permitted under any circumstances.
There are also concerns about the use of aerial photography, drones, helicopters, low flying aircraft. These should not cause any interference with other individuals or animals which causes a disturbance in their normal activity or disrupt the way any individuals or animals interact with their environment. Entrants in PSA recognized exhibitions should comply with all relevant laws and regulations, associated with aerial photography, in the country in which the image was taken.
Entry into PSA recognized exhibitions is conditional on accepting these policies. The content of images must comply with the General Conditions and with the Division and Section definitions listed in these conditions. Images that – in the sole opinion of the judges or the Exhibition Organizers – do not comply, will be disqualified so the entrant may be aware of the problem when considering entry into other exhibitions with PSA recognition
PSA Monochrome Definition
An image is considered to be Monochrome only if it gives the impression of having no color (i.e. contains only shades of grey which can include pure black and pure white) OR it gives the impression of being a greyscale image that has been toned in one color across the entire image. (For example by Sepia, red, gold, etc.) A greyscale or multi-colored image modified or giving the impression of having been modified by partial toning, multi-toning or by the inclusion of spot coloring does not meet the definition of monochrome and shall be classified as a Color Work.
Greyscale Monochrome images may be entered in Nature but toned images are not permitted for these sections.
Monochrome images may not be entered in the Color Section.
Portrait Section
All entries must adhere to the PSA Monochrome definition and adhere to these rules:
- The central theme of the image is one of a person or group of persons
- The image will be judged on how well it captures the personality of the subject.
Colour Open Section
This section accepts all images which do not meet the definitions of monochrome above.
Editing Guidelines for Nature
This section requires images to be truthful records, so there are limits on the amount of manipulation allowed.
Editing Guidelines
Processing or editing must be limited to making the image look as close to the original scene as possible, except that conversion to grayscale monochrome is allowed.
Allowed editing techniques:
- Cropping, straightening and perspective correction.
- Removal or correction of elements added by the camera or lens, such as dust spots, noise, chromatic aberration and lens distortion.
- Global and selective adjustments such as brightness, hue, saturation and contrast to restore the appearance of the original scene.
- Complete conversion of color images to grayscale monochrome.
- Blending of multiple images of the same subject and combining them in camera or with software (exposure blending or focus stacking);
- Image stitching – combining multiple images with overlapping fields of view that are taken consecutively (panoramas);
Editing techniques that are not allowed:
- Removing, adding to, moving or changing any part of an image, except for cropping and straightening.
- Adding a vignette during processing.
- Blurring parts of the image during processing to hide elements in the original scene.
- Darkening parts of the image during processing to hide elements in the original scene.
- All conversions other than to complete grayscale monochrome.
- Conversion of parts of an image to monochrome, or partial toning, desaturation or over-saturation of color
Any border added to a digital file must be a single border of white or grey, no greater than 3-5 pixels in width.
PSA/FIAP Nature Definition
Content Guidelines
- Nature photography records all branches of natural history except anthropology and archaeology. This includes all aspects of the physical world, both animate and inanimate, that have not been made or modified by humans.
- Nature images must convey the truth of the scene that was photographed. A well-informed person should be able to identify the subject of the image and be satisfied that it has been presented honestly and that no unethical practices have been used to control the subject or capture the image. Images that directly or indirectly show any human activity that threatens the life or welfare of a living organism are not allowed.
- The most important part of a Nature image is the nature story it tells. High technical standards are expected and the image must look natural.
- Objects created by humans, and evidence of human activity, are allowed in Nature images only when they are a necessary part of the Nature story.
- Photographs of human-created hybrid plants, cultivated plants, feral animals, domesticated animals, human-created hybrid animals and mounted or preserved zoological specimens are not allowed.
- Images taken with subjects under controlled conditions, such as zoos, are allowed.
- Controlling live subjects by chilling, anaesthetic or any other method of restricting natural movement for the purpose of a photograph is not allowed.
Attention is drawn to the PSA Statement on Subject Matter which applies to all sections and to the Editing Guidelines for Nature, Photojournalism and Photo Travel.
Breaches of PSA Rules
Entrants are strongly advised to look at the PSA Ethics Policy which can be found at https://psa-photo.org/page/ethical-practices.
If, at any time, it is determined in the reasonable discretion of the exhibition organizer or the judges before, during, or after the judging of an exhibition that an entrant has submitted entries where one or more images may fail to comply with these Conditions of Entry, including the stated definitions, exhibitions, on behalf of the judges, are allowed to request unedited or raw files of the submitted image
In order to ensure that images comply with the Conditions of Entry and definitions, the exhibition organizers may carry out reasonable measures to verify that:
a) the images are the original work of the entrant and
b) the images comply with the rules and definitions as set out in these Conditions of Entry
These steps include, but are not limited to, questioning any entrant, requiring the submission of RAW files or other digital files representing the original capture of the submitted image(s), confronting the entrant with evidence that one or more submitted images fails to comply with the Conditions of Entry (also known as Entry Rules), and offering the entrant a reasonable opportunity to provide counter evidence to refute the exhibition organizer’s evidence by a set deadline. Such entries that are not cleared or are still questionable after the entrant has presented evidence may be considered in breach of these Conditions of Entry, and declined. Such entries may be referred to PSA for further investigation of possible ethics violations.
PSA, on receiving reports from exhibitions of possible breaches, retains the right to investigate in any way all complaints/suspicions of breaches of entry conditions, impose penalties if deemed necessary, void the acceptances of any image found to violate the PSA rules, include the entrant’s name on the list of sanctions provided to Exhibitions, and share such investigations with FIAP. Entrants automatically agree to these terms by the act of entering the Exhibition and agree to cooperate with any investigation.
If another party is submitting images on the entrant’s behalf, the entrant will still be held responsible for adhering to these Conditions of Entry (Entry Rules) and will be subject to penalties for any violations to these Conditions of Entry and PSA’s Statement of Ethics that may result.
If another party is processing images for an entrant or submitting images on the entrant’s behalf, the entrant will still be held responsible for adhering to all Conditions of Entry including the specific conditions in the relevant definitions.
NOTICE: When entrants fills in the Entry Form to submit an entry they will see the following feature to affirm they have read these Conditions of Entry
“I hereby confirm that I have read, understood and agree to the Conditions of Entry of this exhibition. I have read the PSA document to be found at https://psa-photo.org/resource/resmgr/pdf/exhibitions_/exhibition-entrants-agreemen.pdf . I am aware that PSA may apply penalties for breaches of these Conditions of Entry”
Failure to agree will mean that the application will not proceed.
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