Guidelines for Digital Projector Submissions

(click here for a printable .pdf version of this document)

Digital Projector Categories for 2007-08
For our 2007-08 season we will have three digital projector categories: B&W, Color (with B and Salon sublevels) and Open Mind.

We will accept two electronic entries per member for the B&W and Color digital projector category for each Regular competition and three electronic entries per member for the Open Mind digital projector category for each OM competition..

Determining Your Level for the Color Category
If you have never competed in the Digital Projector Color category before and don't have an assigned level, please see http://wpsphoto.org/EvaluationForm1.htm . We need to see a sample of 20 of your images to evaluate so we can assign you to the proper competition level for the Color Digital Projector category.

Image Restrictions
Images should be your own work (no bits of clip art, web images or stock images) and can not be entered into one of our other categories in the same year. Images can not have been entered into the same category before.

You Must Resize Your Images
WPS is currently using a digital projector with a native XGA resolution (1024 pixels x 768 pixels) and 2000 lumen brightness. The projector displays in 4:3 image format. You must resize your images to insure that they will project the proper size on our projector. The maximum image width in pixels that we can project is 1024 pixels. The maximum image height in pixels that we can project is 768 pixels.

If you send us an image with more than our maximums (1024 horizontal by 768 vertical) your image will be too large for our projector and parts of it will be cropped and left out of the projected image. If you send us an image with less than our maximums (1024 by 768) or in a different format than 4:3, your image will not fill our screen. We will not resize your submitted images so please send us the correct image size for our projector.

Blank areas on the screen surrounding your image will be black so if you use a black background in your image, we suggest you consider including a very thin (1-2 pixel) lighter border around your image to provided a visual separation from our black background.

Submit Your Entries To:
Images must be submitted by email to competitions@wpsphoto.org eight days prior to the competition date.

Naming Your Image Files
For the file name of your image, please use the following format:
wps-ssssx-yz-Title.jpg
where
wps = 3 character club code.
ssss = first 4 characters of your Last Name.
x = first character of your First Name.
y = the category code -----> Open Mind = A ; Black&White = B ; Color = C
z = the Entry Number -----> your first image is 1; your second image is 2; your third image is 3; your fourth image is 4
Title = your Title (36 characters maximum). Use only letters and/or numbers.
No blank spaces, No dashes nor underscores, No special characters.

Example: Richard Budnik submits two entries, "Doe with Fawn" and "Big Black Snake" into the Color category. The filenames would be wps-budnr-c1-DoeWithFawn.jpg and wps-budnr-c2-BigBlackSnake.jpg
Note that the file format does not and should not include any coding for the competition level (B, A or Salon).

Adjust or Calibrate Your Monitor
We will use a brightness level (EV) of 9.0 with an upper limit of 11.0 and a lower limit of 8.5 as determined by a reading a pure white image with a hand held light meter. A value of 9 EV corresponds to a setting of f4 at 1/30 sec at 100 ISO.
Our digital projector is calibrated to properly project these reference images:

DicksShirley_sRGB_small.jpg

If these images do not look good on your monitor, you may need to calibrate your monitor or apply a correction factor to any images before you submit them for display with our digital projector.

1. Start with a high resolution copy of your original image. Make sure your monitor is calibrated to some known colorspace (sRGB, AdobeRGB(1998), etc.) or at least to make the two above test images look good. Use your favorite imaging program (Photoshop, Elements, Picture Window Pro, etc.) to prepare your original electronic image as desired to look good on your monitor.

2. Create a duplicate of your original image (In Photoshop, click on Image>Duplicate). Close your original image for safekeeping and use the copy for the following steps.

If you have not previously sharpened your image, sharpen the duplicated image at this stage. For Photoshop's Unsharp Mask filter, I suggest Amount = 150%, Radius = 0.4 and Threshold = 2.

3. Check the size of your image in pixels (In Photoshop, click Image>ImageSize). For this example, my image was 2560x1920 pixels.

4. To resize the image, make sure that the Resample Image box and the Constrain Proportions box are checked. Resample the image by typing 1024 for the Pixel Dimensions Width for a horizontal image or use 768 in the Pixel Dimensions Height if the image is a vertical. Then click OK.

5. Convert the image to sRGB color space (In Photoshop, click Edit>ConvertToProfile).

6. Save your image using the Save As command. Choose a convenient folder in which to save your image file. I used DigitalProjectorCompetition as my folder. Type in a new file name for the image using the following format, wps-ssssx-yz-Title.jpg as discussed above. Choose a moderate level of compression for the jpeg, typically 6-9 in Photoshop to keep the total compressed file size under 500 KiloBytes.

7. Close your imaging program. Then go online, open your email program (AOL, Outlook Express, etc.) and send an email to competitions@wpsphoto.org with your digital projector entries attached. I must receive your entries eight days before the actual competition date.

8. I will reply to your email with a confirmation that I have received your images. I will log your entries into a spreadsheet and burn the images for the competition onto a CD. I will not do any adjustments to your image such as resizing, changing brightness, contrast or color balance. It's your responsibility to send me images that conform to the sRGB color space.

(click here for a printable .pdf version of this document)

Dick Budnik
10/14/07