Time for the 2009 Dave's Garden photo contest!

Well said by all...
This is a contest for sharing and fun by the members here at DG. I find it quite inspiring to view what everyone has shared from their spot in the world. Thanks to all who have taken time to share!

I for one was happy to have a category for wildflowers...it was difficult to pick out just two. The past two years I have been concentrating on wildflowers here in the PNW for subject matter. Although I didn't pick this photo for the contest it was one that inspired me by what life has to offer.
Mother Nature at it's best...a bouquet of wildflowers done by the best florist I know!!!
:)

Wasn't there a rocks category? If not then which category should I put them in?

Misc.?

Nice GardenGuyKin.

Hack

Almost time to vote - just exactly how do you go about casting your votes?

Hack

There will be information on how to do that on the contest page or thereabouts. It's easy.

Wow!!!! I thought I had at least till the end of today to enter. Where did I go wrong????????

You probably missed the part where Dave specified that he was timing the contest on UTC time, which is several hours ahead of even the eastern US time zones. Midnight UTC came at 4 PM our time.

My personal hints and tips for judging:

If you are having a hard time appreciating an image because of the size it appears on your screen, you can push "Ctrl" on your keyboard, hold and push the + or - button to blow the page up, or shrink it!

If you have high internet speed, you can go to view images as thumbnails, and press "ctrl" , right click and image, and press "T" to open up new tabs in your browser. It makes comparing and browsing through all those images quick and easy!!!

I missed the contest for the same reason...ugh! Last night I thought I'll still have time this morning to enter the pictures. But that's me , always leaving things on the last day... I'm so sad because I spent so much time choosing all pictures. But I'll have lots of fun voting. Lots of great pictures, hard to decide!
Adina

I missed it too! That is just wrong. Are you saying midnight UTC on 11/2 is really 4:00 pm on 11/1 in the United States!!! I've been waiting all year and was going to post my entries this evening. Dave can't you find a way to for the instructions to be clearer????

Looks like we need DGT - Dave's Garden Time
Need a date and clock stuck on the layout =X.

I think they need to have a lot more categories and make one of those daily calendar so their could be over 300 winners. LOL

so many wonderful pictures so few winners.

Done my voting. Some fantastic entries. One thing that struck me though was the number of photos that were clearly in the wrong category which is a shame.

Dave, maybe you can post both times. I too misunderstood it, thinking it was until today, but was lucky to have finished putting in my photos.

Hey Dave! Thanks for answering! How about a countdown clock with days/hours/minutes until the deadline on the homepage starting the week before ;-)

But seriously, don't you think it's a little unreasonable to have to do research on when the deadline is? How about posting the deadline time with a reference to a time zone in the United States? I assume most of your subscribers are from the US, but you could surely have a unix reference for non-US member who speak unix and a US time zone reference for those of us who don't want to have to do homework to enter a contest :) Any time zone at all in the US would get me within 4 hours - I missed it by more a whole day!

I thought that too kniphofia, and a few were duplicated too, too bad as they could have added a second shot.
I thought I had more time too, I think next year a couple of the suggestions here would be good.

This message was edited Nov 2, 2009 9:41 AM

Yes, what was up with all the duplicate entries?!

Maybe you could do what the trains and airlines do, and call it 11:59 pm, or 12:01am.

I looked up UTC time when you posted the contest had begun and the rules. So I understood when the contest was to end. I also understood midnight is the start of a new day.
I just returned to the states on Oct. 31st after traveling 10 time zones and in Europe they did daylight saving on Oct. 25th at 3am. What I'm getting down to is that it's everyone's own responsibility to understand the rules and zone times.

Thanks again Dave for having the contest and the precise instructions.

Thats an excellent idea Claypa!!

Or as you have done in the past Dave
Give the date it closes and close it after your chores are done!
LOL

I wonder if next year the photo's could be numbered when viewing them in the larger format. When going to vote I know there's a 100 within the category, but I don't know where I am if I have to come back later or if it's about to end so I can add a few more to my favorites. I don't know just a thought, it would be easier for me if they were numbered.

Well Dave, at least you still have a sense of humor! Getting a lawyer to write your rules would really by homework!! I think most of us can translate EST time to what ever our time zone is in the US. How about a compromise of two - unix and one
US time zone?

PS, what time do you finish your chores :)

Vegetable, Fruits and Display voting is done - OOFTA !!! The bounty in the photos is making me re-think that garden this spring...... ;)

I also noticed duplicate entries and some major mix-ups on categories. However, I think the quality of the photos is up this year and judging is harder! (Adina, sorry that you didn't get yours in; but you can use them next year.)

" think they need to have a lot more categories and make one of those daily calendar so their could be over 300 winners. LOL

so many wonderful pictures so few winners"

I totally agree with this, Wren! It is awfully hard to choose between 100+ of the best photos that I have ever seen on a subject.

Juneybug, I have to agree that a daily calendar would be a fantastic idea!! The amount of excellent photos have made it a mammoth task trying to find just 3 for any of the categories. I've been drooling (slurp, slurp) over the beautiful photographs and admiring the talent so many of the DGers have with their cameras.

Does anyone else think these pictures would make the nicest ever screensaver? I'd love to turn lots of them into a Powerpoint presentation (once I learn how to make them properly, LOL). I think it would be awesome but also realise I'd need permission to use private photographs in that way (I would never just 'take' anyones photographs without permission anyway).

To everyone who sent in photographs...Congratulations!! You have helped made 2 days of my life very happy, just ogling so much wonderful talent. Thank you!!

Ok, back to the judging :)

Terri

Thanks, Roy! I'll save time next year and will post them from day one when the contest starts!LOL
I just voted for the Trees and Shrubs and it was hard to remove some of my favorites...great pictures!
Congratulations to all !
Adina

All is good. I've started the voting process.

Hack

What a great bunch of photos! I have only "narrowed down" 3 categories so far, and I see that it's going to be an eye-crosser again this year! :)

Dave, I have voted on about half of the categories so far, and am loving seeing so many wonderful photos. I have found it a bit frustrating, however, in some of the categories to choose the best, as there are so many excellent ones. I don't know what your limitations are on categories, but I see that you have expanded them from last year's contest. Hopefully you can do even more expansion in the coming year. I just fiinished voting in the mushrooms, etc., category and SO wanted to select a "favorite" mushroon, and "favorite" seed pod and a "favorite" grass picture, but that eliminated so many really wonderful things that I felt sorry for the many entries that I had to eliminate.
Other categories that I personally thought were a little too broad were tropicals and houseplants, sunsets, etc., the misc. that included humor, and the fall and winter. So hard to choose and so many great photos eliminated.

I finished voting last night. As always, there are so many beautiful photo's that it makes it hard to choose just three for each category. As I was viewing each entry I made a list of my favorite's and my list ended up with enough favorite photo's to have a calendar for each category!

Wow, just like last year, the hardest category to judge for me is Domestic animals. OMGosh!! I have it narrowed down to 15 of my favorites. I am frozen, not being able to delete any. [g] And I am prejudice for my own pet photos there, but still. You all have caught some wonderful moments with your cameras and are so lucky to have such amazing animals in your lives. Some of the compositions and the light and detail. LOVE them! :-)

Maybe we could have a "Fun Random Photo of the Day" with the top 365 vote tally. Let us enjoy more pictures all year.

I finished voting earlier today.
I had so much fun looking through all of the pictures!
I CANT WAIT FOR THE RESULTS!!!! XD
And...
I can't wait for next year's contest already!!!
So many "I"s there.. lol