It's time for the 2007 DG Photo Contest!

Boy, this is hard! Soooo many great photographers out there. Hate to say it but one of my own photos did not make the cut either in one catagory. I have only done 3 so far. It takes a lot of time.

Not everyone votes for their own pet--I didn't. Not only did I not vote for my own dog, but my 3 favorite pics all ended up being of cats! I obviously think my dog is the best, cutest dog in the world, but that doesn't necessarily make my pictures of him the best pics in the contest, I was judging more on photographic merit.

My dog is the cutest, nicest, most well behaved (ok that may be going too far) anyhow, he is really good.

Unfortunately he is absolutely, completely, undeniably, un-photogenic.

So, I was left with voting for my own bug...

I entered pictures of my cats, whom I love, but as much as they are wonderful pets, they aren't particularly striking.

There are some really striking animals in the pet category! A couple of them really blow me away.

I guess I am being indecisive I haven't voted in any catagory yet! Love seeing all the pics.

I've been through all but three categories in the preliminary round. Will return tomorrow or some other time to further narrow down my choice and I anticipate that I might have to work at it several times. I found it interesting how many people used miscellaneous as a dumping ground for additional pics that really belonged in other categories rather than submitting pics that don't belong anywhere else. Most of them I eliminated right away, but there is one that I find so good, I really wish it had been submitted where it belongs. Not sure what I'll do about that.

Don't know about you, but I found on my computer the most efficient means of viewing all the pics the first time was to open the thumbnails about 5 at a time and then look at them. And as I looked at more sections, I got better at eliminating the thumbnails before enlarging them. I have hi-speed lite, faster than dial-up, but not really fast.

Ann

Voting is tough, so many fabulous choices. So far I've done four categories, and out of those twelve "favourites" in one case I voted my own picture, because I thought it actually stood up to the others AS A PHOTO! This is my take on the voting question. There are over 300,000 members here. OK, not a huge percentage will vote (probably) but even if every single person who voted in a category, voted their own photo's #1 and #2 it still wouldn't affect the final result as it would only be one vote out of many in the category.

Actually I think that most of us will do one of two things. We will either choose on ethical grounds NOT to vote for our own work, or we will do as I have done in 7 out of eight cases - look at other peoples photos and go, "Oh well, their photos are better than mine, they get my vote - maybe I'll be a better photographer next year", LOL!

The other question that keeps cropping up is how to make a choice among so many wonderful entires. Here is my 2 cents worth. I did my elimination in several stages. First, I say to myself, "Does this photo fit in this category?" then I look for obvious flaws, bad focus, distracting backgrounds, etc. That knocks out the easy to lose ones. Then I go through again and ask myself if it is a good photo of the subject plant or other items. Does it show the plant off well? Could I look at for a month, if it was hanging on the wall? By the end of this second run through, some photos in the category are starting to grab me, and I have ended up with a pool of ten to twenty in each category to concentrate on.

After that, it just gets exhaustingly difficult so I start going through and losing the one or two I like least, asking myself with each repetition, "Is this picture really special AS A PICTURE?, Does it illuminate, inspire, gladden my heart? Do I just love it for no definable reason?" until I get down to three. Oddly, once I am down to the final three, in each case so far, I have found it very easy to rank them 1 2 and 3, even when I have agonized over eliminating my 4th and 5th places.

I have broadband so it hasn't been too bad for me, but I will certainly have to purchase some extra bandwidth, this month! It must be really hard for anyone trying to do this justice on dial up. I have a suggestion for Dave for next year. If you make the thumbnails a bit bigger - even 1.5 times the size they are now, they will still down load fairly fast but they will be easier to see for the initial runthrough/elimination.

Also it would be nice if there was a check box or something so you could eliminate some of the thumbnails without having to expand them first. It would save a lot of time and bandwidth that way. A three way radio button, perhaps, with the choices being "Keep" "Lose" and "Maybe" - then you could go up and down the thumbnails a few times if you were on dial up, before you go to the slower alternate of the pool of full size pictures. Finally, I'd suggest you expand the votes to include the top 5 rather than the top three, as in each case this seems to be the point where the photos become REALLY hard to choose amongst.

Anyway, these are my thoughts, for what they are worth! I'll be back to vote some more tomorrow, after I clear out my head, LOL!, Kaelkitty.

Dave, did you keep stats on how many individuals voted last year? That would be interesting to know.
Teresa in KY

Chris, I'm with you in the category of MY garden and Professional Gardens. I also voted on unique and hard to capture photos sometimes over perfect clarity. If my pic was better than others I voted for the others. But like most, I voted on my cat because it's very unique and can't believe it was captured. Otherwise the pic is dull and a bit fuzzy.

It's amazing - my yard isn't nearly mature either. Only one year here and I've planted tons of stuff but I want gardens like many of you have - these are stunning photos.

I also wondered if there are any professional photographers who are members and taking some of these pics or if we're all either really good or so-so by trial and error.

These are great pics. I've enjoyed this opportunity to see wonderful ideas.
K

Well, I've made it through all categories in the preliminary round. Now comes the REALLY hard part. I have to admit, it was really tough in some cases to eliminate a really good photo because I was convinced it didn't belong in the category in which it was entered, but it happened a few times.

Kaelkitty, you've made some excellent points on how to eliminate some and also some excellent suggestions to Dave for next year - especially larger thumbnails and a check box for yes, no, maybe from the thumbnail page. (Dave - I hope you're reading). As far as the 300,000 - isn't voting limited to subscribers? And the number of subscribers is MUCH lower.

shihtzumom - I'm certainly not a professional photographer, although I bet some members are. But my photography has improved a lot since I started shooting digital and seeing the immediate feedback of certain lighting conditions, etc. However, most of my shots have not made it into the second round. LOL

Ann

wow I love this site.......

Good morning All!

Just reading your excellent observations and comments about the voting Site. I have a question, and a suggestion, too.

How to you view 5 thumbnails at a time?

Also, regarding the mine vs. the professional gardens and displays, I believe Dave's Garden is for ACTIVE gardeners. "For Gardeners, BY Gardeners." Consequently, I didn't cast votes for pics of the Disneyland professional gardens. There were some instances of a DGer posting a pic of a single flower petal that, because I knew it was a labor of love by a single DGer to grow that petal, earned my vote of a whole team of professional landscapers/horticulturalists, etc.

Just my two cents.

I've been toying with this idea for next time, too. It might cause a riot, but it's only for the sake of managing the enormity of this voting beast. I'm thinking Dave could select a random "panel" of preliminary judges (from among our everyday DGers) to go through ALL the submissions in each category, and whittle them down to a slate of the top 25 for the public vote. Just a suggestion to cut the time it takes to go through all these EXCEEDINGLY, BEAUTIFUL AND HARD-TO-DECIDE-ON pics.

Dave could still post ALL the entries in an "honorable mention" site, so if we wanted to view everything that was submitted, we could go back and look at all the pics at our leisure.

It sure would help me out, and maybe a few others. Again, just a suggestion....

Whew! Only 4 categories left for me to do. I'm sad to say I "tossed" a couple of really magnificent shots in the misc. category because they clearly belonged in wildlife, or scenic-sunset. Sorry that I won't be able to vote for them. Sometimes I can see something being in the wrong cat. because you really coulld be unsure; but these were obvious.

Having said that, I can't say anything but how great the entries are! I'm inspired to work harder at my photo hobby!
Deb

Wasn't the miscellaneous category just that? Miscellaneous - consisting of various kinds, varied, mixed as the dictionary explains.

I think some people used the Misc. category as an overflow area if they had more than 2 pics that fit into a category--for example someone who does a lot of wildlife photos probably had a really hard time narrowing it down to 2, so they put the others in the Misc. category.

Well, yes Dunkirk - sure, if we go with a strict definition. I suppose that could be so. But I thought I recalled from last year that the misc. cat. was for things that didn't fit anywhere else? And in context, that seems logical to me - so that's how I viewed it.

If I'm wrong guys, let me know, because I'll have to change a vote. :)
Deb

Edited to add: Ecane - we cross posted - I figured that some people might be using misc. for that purpose, but that seems to be fudging. We really are only meant to enter 2 photos per cat. Using misc. like that gives you more than that, don't you think?
This message was edited Nov 3, 2007 1:24 PM

This message was edited Nov 3, 2007 1:27 PM

Just to add, I don't mean to sound picky. Sorry. The contest is really just for fun, and everyone's going to set their own internal rules, so to speak. So, ...I guess that's just one of mine.
Deb

I'll agree with Deb on that one. I didn't vote for any in Misc. that would have fit in to other catetgories.

IMO I think birds & other wildlife should be seperate. I had a hard time comparing hawks & frogs. So I ended up going all birds.

I think everyone can vote for what they want, but there was no rule saying you couldn't use the miscallaneous category to post things where you had too many for another category. Maybe there should be a rule like that, personally I'd probably rather see it used for things that really don't have a category, but since that wasn't a rule I'll give equal consideration to things that could have fit into a category.

Speaking of internal rules though--I noticed when I was going through the container pictures that there were a number of pics in there that were just a closeup of an individual flower which I suppose happened to be growing in a container. I don't know about everyone else, but in the container category I was looking for a pleasing grouping of containers in an area, or a pleasing plant + container combination, or a pleasing combination of different plants in a container. So for me at least, the closeup flower shots had no chance of getting a vote. Some of them were very nice and probably would have gotten my vote if they'd been posted in the annual/perennial/bulb/etc category, but in the container category I wouldn't even consider them because all it was was one single flower.

Miscellaneous meant miscellaneous to me, but it's a friendly contest, and people will have to follow their heart, since it was not specified.
Yup, I was one of the ones with 4 pets, 2 entered in the pet category and 2 in the misc. one. How'm I supposed to pick which pets to show and which not to? :D Easier on my mind to just show them all. Sorry if I broke the rules, it was not done meaning to avoid the boundaries in place.

You didn't break the rules--as far as I understood, miscallaneous could be anything.

I'm another who felt that misc. should be for photos that don't belong in other places. And too bad, because a few were excellent. but I also saw at least one that was in scenic and entered again in misc - same photo. And I'm convinced that people used it as an overflow category. A bit tougher is where to draw the lines between perennials or tubers and tropical and I can see that somethings would fit in both places. I think we have to count on all our votes evening out any personal biases. Or at least I hope so. Sure isn't worth getting into a snit about them when so many are really wonderful pics.

Ann

Guilty as charged.....I put one in Misc when I had put in 2 for Scenic. Looking at the quality of the Scenic photos, I should have passed on all 3 of them...LOL!!!

We all make mistakes, what does it matter in what should be a fun light hearted contest.

I put a picture in Misc, because I wasn't sure if it was scenic due to an odd element and then moved it to scenic then back, and in the end, blew it and it ended up in both... I moved a picture of a giraffe I had taken from pets to wildlife and back to pets because it was in a wildlife "park" . I couldn't decide, is it wildlife even if it isn't "wild"? That one I managed to blow as well, it didn't end up in either category. LOL

I think some people are over thinking things a bit. :)

It's that last statement (2 posts above). We have to laugh or chuckle. How many of you actually have your own pics left in the running? In most categories, mine didn't make the first cut, but I am down to 10 roses and 2 of them were mine. I think one is going to be cut soon though.

Another thing that I'm noticing is the amount of stuff in the background in a lot of pics. Ugly posts, a lot of garden hoses (Can't tell you how many times I've removed a garden hose in my own pics - but none that I entered). If I learn to be more aware of what is in the background the whole exercise will have been worth it.

This message was edited Nov 3, 2007 2:24 PM

Hyblaean: I understand your pet dilemma! How could you choose. ;-D I'm lucky to only have 2 pets to photograph.

Sorry I brought up the miscellaneous category thing guys. It really only came to mind because there were some gorgeous photos there that could've been elsewhere and it made it really hard to decide how to vote. I didn't mean to sound petty. Like Tombaak says, Must've been overthinking. Wouldn't be the first time. :-O

Would be the first time I over-thought, but I live for first anyways.

Deb :) today was a day I wished for only 2. Chaos reigned in my house!!

"In most categories, mine didn't make the first cut" Viola, me too! The pets did (due to a complete lack of objectivity on my part) but everything else pretty much got nixed after I saw even a few of the other posts. My rose wouldn't have even made my top 100 for that category ;)

Do you think people would mind if we downloaded their pictures to use as screensavers? There are a handful that I love, and I don't want to lose the ability to see them again.

I agree with ecrane3 about the container catagory. I did expect to see photos of containers plantings not closeups.

I had a hard time with the senic, seasonal, and sunsets catagory. I think this could possibly be done in a different manner that would be better.

All that said, this was first time participating and I really enjoyed see all those fantastic photos and think this is really great of Dave to do this for us!!

So I hope Santa brings me a digi camera for christmas and next year I have some killer photos to enter!!!

This is very hard....I am still on dial-up and so it takes a while.....I have finished in the pet, miss, and I am just in the insects....Man there are some excellent pictures.....I also didn't vote on my own....Doesn't seem right.

Back to voting.....:-)

Lucy waving to nanny!!!! :-)

I'm half done and they WOW me! Whomever took the picture of the Rainbow in the Soler Valley Chilean Patagonia: Please d-mail me. We're going there and would love to get some of your perspectives and where you went.

WHEW!!!!! I am plugging along......this is exhausting!

Just finished the "ROSES" category and I am all bleary-eyed!
I have to say a few things here that may be misunderstood as "negative", but these comments are just my opinions.
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PLEASE do not chastise me, as we all look at, and process, things differently. These observations are ONLY my own. OK???

I tried to visualize every picture as being on a calendar page--since the winning ones will be. Main thing--it HAS TO BE centered!!! And there cannot be too much background on top or on the bottom. Also, if your picture was taken vertically, how will that work on a horizontal Calendar page unless the top and bottom get cropped off?

Here is what causes me to do an instant "SKIP" this one (in "Roses"):

--Overly extreme close ups. Some pictures, if I was not in the "Roses" category, I would not know what flower I am looking at. Kind of the "O'Keefe" effect! Tooo, toooo close! Almost like "abstract art".
I like to see the WHOLE bloom. If the screen area cuts off all the edges of the bloom--you are too close.

--Somehow, the color RED never seems to focus or show any depth.
I have had this problem myself. I do not know the solution. Maybe some extremely professional camera could compensate for the red.

--Flowers not in focus. If you are using a macro-lens setting, sometimes the difference of a fraction of an inch can be out of focus or perfectly in focus. Maybe a tripod would help.
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Before the "Roses" category tonight, I did the "Wildlife" category.
Here are my "issues" with that one:

--The "object" of the category only takes up about 5%-10% of the screen area. The rest is all background, foliage, ground clutter, leaves, tree branches, endless sky and water, etc.--GONE!

--The "object" gets lost in all the grass and leaves and pine needles, or what not. If I cannot spot the critter in a couple of seconds--or make it out--the picture is GONE! It should stand out as "This is what I wanted you to see"!
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Three down and 11 to go! Mama Mia!!!! Will I survive?

Again--PLEASE do not chastise me on expressing my opinion! I have a quick, discerning eye. Bam--bam-- saved or gone! Just letting you know some of my reasons--and I am sure I am not the only one. I am also only one of thousands. A drop in the bucket.

Gita

Gita - I disagree about the need for an image to be centred. In fact, it is generally better to have it at about the 1/3 mark horizontally or vertically than smack in the middle. Of course, you generally need something to balance it. I do agree with you about the real close-up images - at least for purposes of the calendar. As for "art" they can be very interesting, but for use on a calendar, I'm not so sure. And you make a point about the wildlife being visible, but some wildlife is especially interesting because it almost disappears.

I'm thinking of some prints by Robert Bateman - especially a difficult one to find that has a polar bear coming out of the snow squall. This one with a snow leopard is similar in concept - http://cgi.ebay.ca/Robert-BATEMAN-print-Out-of-the-White-Snow-Leopard-art_W0QQitemZ150177689676QQihZ005QQcategoryZ20149QQtcZphotoQQcmdZViewItem#ebayphotohosting

But it DOES fill up the picture.

Ann

Great points Gitagal, and no one should feel the need to chastise you for sharing exactly what many feel, that way others can look at things differently and learn and as you said, these are your opinions.
I know that pictures I took years ago and thought was pretty hot stuff back then would now be deleted from my camera, I have improved my 'quick discerning eye'.

I am overly critical with my own images, I pick each and every one of them apart. LOL...
I take so many and view so many that I can't help it, I think of a better angle, lighting, etc. I was able to go through these fairly quickly because my eye zeroed in on the things that didn't quite make it right to me. But as many mentioned, several stood out right away and while they may not quite be perfect, they brought on a grin many times but mostly a pleasurable feeling that this may be something to enjoy for at least a month and I would like it that long.
Several could have very easily vastly improved their images had the done some simple cropping. I use the easy-to-use Picasa program for a quick crop if needed and in some cases, the sharpen feature. Thats it, just trying to get that image as close to what I saw in real life. I am by no means a professional photographer, heck, I am still on automode with my new camera and know I have steep learning curve ahead of me because I really want to learn to do better, but I know a few basics mostly by trial and error. If anyone wants an example of how to improve with some basic tips either taking pictures or doing simple edits, I'd love to share what few tips I can. I think next year, this contest should really be much more agonizing to judge that this year with everyone's awesome submissions, wouldn't that be a great goal? LOL!

This message was edited Nov 4, 2007 12:20 AM

I did the same as Gitagal. I was visualizing the photos as a calander picture.

Hey LG!! waving back at ya! :)

Doing that should make it easier, but it will eliminate most of the tree pics as many of them are more vertically orientated.

You can put a vertically oriented picture in the calendar, there just ends up being more white space on either side rather than taking up the whole calendar page. But it could be manageable depending on the picture. If there happens to be a winner that Dave can't make work and look nice in the calendar format I think he would put the 2nd place picture in the calendar instead (this already came up in the context of people's time/date stamps and things like that on some of the pictures)

...only the first place photos are printed in the calendar? I realize only 12 months so you think only 12 photos ~ I made a photo calender for my mother and sister last yr using > more than 12 photos.

There is some great software out there that allows for easy arranging of two or three photos on the page in very tasteful sizes. Sort of how wedding albums are done now; some full size, some not. A DG art/graphic design person or team could be the one(s) to lay out the calender using all the 1st place and as many of the 2nd and 3rd as possible.

Here on DG there are so many excellent photos being entered it would be great to feature as many as possible. Plus, from a marketing/advertising company perspective; the more people included also mean more purchases for family and friends as gifts by those people ... just my two cents :)