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When you enter a photography competition, should the photograph be yours?
The obvious answer is, yes, of course you should have taken the photograph. However, as we all know, capture is just the start of the process. What about the editing and post-production where a capture can be transformed into a piece of art? Should this be your work as well?
Again, most people’s immediate reaction seems to be yes, but perhaps we need a little more information.
In non-professional competitions, all the work in the photograph must be by the entrant. Of course, the rules allow you to send your photographs off to a lab or bureau to be printed, but in amateur awards, the photographer is expected to do all the creative input and craft.
Not so in professional competitions. For instance, in advertising categories, the images entered are often the work of a team of people. While the photographer might press the shutter release, what is being photographed could be the concept of an art director, manufactured by a model builder, dressed by a stylist and of course there is hair and makeup as well. And after capture, the image can be transformed by the art director and a digital re-toucher. The photographer is just part of the process and a number of advertising photographers I know say they feel a little uncomfortable receiving an award for something that wasn’t wholly their idea. And many advertising awards allow photographers to acknowledge the creative input of others on their team.
Other genres of professional photography can work in similar ways. Wedding and portrait photographers can have staff back at the studio who do their post-production, commercial photographers can send some jobs out to bureaus. Photography as a business is quite different to photography as a pastime or an art form, but the lines of demarcation are blurred.
So, if you have a professional photography competition, I think you have to accept that professional photographers work with other creative people to produce a result.
There are number of people around Australia (and I imagine around the world) who help photographers with their entries for professional awards.
There’s nothing wrong with asking other people for advice before you enter a competition, and then acting on that advice and improving your entry.
However, is it okay to ask someone to fix or improve your photograph for you, so that their creative input and craft produces a significantly better result?
Is this fair? And is this different to an advertising photographer entering an image produced by a team of creative people?
In the Canon AIPP Australian Professional Photography Awards, the rules say something like this:
“All elements in an image must be the work of the photographer. All aspects of the image must have been produced by the entrant or under the entrant’s direct instruction (including all post-production and printing work). It is acceptable for someone else to produce your prints for you. However, in the spirit of the Awards, this means you cannot give an image to a printer or re-toucher and ask them to produce a Silver or Gold Award! Where entrants work as part of a team (e.g. Commercial category), entrants are encouraged to acknowledge the printer, re-toucher and/or other creative contributors on the entry form if one is engaged.”
And for professional awards, this seems to be the key point: you can’t just hand over an image, ask someone to create a Silver award and walk away.
On the other hand, there’s nothing wrong sitting down next to an expert Photoshop re-toucher and providing instructions for what you want done. This is how professional photography works, and since these are professional awards, the rules should reflect what happens in real life.
So, is this right? What do you think?
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