The Lions Gate Camera Club Celebration of Nature 

Submit images to VCC no later than:

CAPA

North Shore

Lions Gate

Eastwood vs VCC

LIONS GATE CAMERA CLUB CELEBRATION OF NATURE

This is an annual competition organized by the Lions Gate Camera Club, open to other clubs in British Columbia and the Yukon.  Photographers may enter with only one club, and MUST be permanent RESIDENTS of British Columbia or the Yukon Territory.

Your RAW file may be requested by LGCC.

Definition

As “Nature” implies, this competition is devoted to photographic observations from all branches of natural history in an honest and true representation. There are four categories in this competition: “Botanical” includes wildflowers, plants, trees, fungi and algae, germinated and grown without human assistance, although wild plants grown in a botanical garden are permitted; “Nature” is for animals, birds, insects, reptiles and marine subjects all of which can be under the control and feeding of man, provided man’s involvement is not obvious, and no feral or domesticated birds or animals are permitted; “Landscape” is for weather phenomena, geological formations, landscapes, seascapes, natural phenomena, planets, stars and astronomical events, with no hand of man; “Wildlife” is only for living and untamed mammals, birds, insects, reptiles and marine subjects, with no hand of man.   Animals restrained in traditional zoos, open range zoos and game farms are not permitted.  Animals living free in nature parks are allowed, as are scientific bands, tags and radio collars, but no tethers or harness attachments.

Lions Gate has adopted the CAPA Nature/Wildlife definitions and editing criteria, which are repeated herein. There are awards for both club submissions and individual photos, in each category, and “best in show” 1st, 2nd and 3rd. This is a competition in which the VCC has done very well in the past. We won gold last year.

"Hand of man" is allowed in the "Botanical" and "Insects, Reptiles and Amphibian" categories, but only where it is an integral part of the nature story, and even then it must be less than 10% of the total area.  Note that "hand of man" includes jet trails, cables, artificial light, man-made paths, food, cut trees and systemically planted plants. 

"Hand of man" is permitted in the "Nature" category provided it is an element of an adaptive environment, such as where the subject uses a human-created structure for nesting or feeding their young or attracting a mate or eating their food or prey.  No "hand of man" is permitted in the "Wildlife" and "Landscape" themes.

Editing

No techniques that add, relocate, replace or remove pictorial elements (except by cropping) are allowed.  Enhancing techniques such as HDR, long exposure, focus stacking and dodging/burning are allowed, provided they do not change the nature of the story or alter the content of the original scene.  All allowed adjustments must appear natural.

AI renderings generated by text prompt may not be used either in whole or in part.

Removal of elements added by a camera, such as dust spots, digital noise and film scratches, are permitted.  Infrared and stitched images are not allowed.   Borders or digital frames are not allowed.

You must preserve your original RAW or JPEG file unaltered and make it available to Lions Gate should it be requested.

Submissions   

Members may submit to VCC two photos each, no later than October 15 2023. The Club may submit up to six images in total.

Specifications

Image size should be a maximum of 1400 pixels on the horizontal and a maximum of 1050 pixels on the vertical, using JPEG format and sRGB colour space. One dimension must be exactly the maximum allowed and neither dimension may exceed the maximum pixels for that dimension. Maximum file size is 1.8 MB.