ORGANIZED BY: This competition is organized by the Red Bull Photofiles.

COMPETITION TERRITORY: international

ENTRY CLOSES: 28th February 2010

PRIZES: the overall winner receives Leica S2 camera + equipment to the value of €30,000 (scroll down for details)

ENTRY TYPE: online upload

ELIGIBILITY: amateur, professional

ENTRY FEES: free

RESTRICTIONS and REQUIREMENTS

• Your Age: You must be 18 years of age or older.
• Data taken: Photos must have been taken after 01.01.2007.
• Photo editing: Photos that have been digitally or otherwise enhanced to change the original impression are only eligible for submission in the Experimental category.
• All digital images must be shot with a minimum 8MP camera.
• Images must be: JPG, minimum 8 JPG compression, min picture size 8MP, max file size 10MP. All digital images must contain original metadata such as date, camera model, lens, aperture, exposure, resolution, etc. If such information is not provided, images may be disqualified.
• Submitted photos may have been previously published.
• All semi-finalists will be required to re-submit the originals in RAW or tiff format at 300dpi.

YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES

• Upon request, photographers must include a model release for all photographs submitted.
• Submitting photographers must own all rights to any photographs entered in this contest. By submitting an image, the photographer represents and warrants that such submission does not infringe any third-party rights or other rights protected by law.

YOUR RIGHTS AS A PHOTOGRAPHER

• Entrants retain copyright over each of their images.
• Entrants grant Red Bull GmbH and its affiliates, subsidiaries and partners right to use the submitted photos without compensation in the context of Red Bull Illume, the Red Bull Illume contests, the Red Bull Illume Tours or for Red Bull Illume promotions, marketing, advertising, events and exhibitions. Notwithstanding the aforesaid this includes – without a restriction in time ¬– the worldwide use of the submitted photos in any media, in particular any print-media (e.g. magazines, newspapers, books) and electronic/digital offline- and online-media (e.g. on Red Bull Illume or associated Websites or social internet-platforms and –networks).
• To protect the copyright of the photographer, the Red Bull GmbH will use the submitted photos only in low resolution whenever this is reasonable and technically possible (e.g. in the internet). Credits will be given according to the customary practice in the media business.
• In the event a medium (e.g. book with semi-finalist images) is produced in connection with the Red Bull Illume Image Quest 2010, all profits resulting from the sale of the medium will be donated to the Wings for Life foundation. Only Wings for Life will benefit from these sales. Photographers submitting to Red Bull Illume Image Quest 2010, accept that their images could be used in such a medium and grant Red Bull a license to use these images for the benefit of Wings for Life.

THEME and CATEGORIES

The theme:

Only action and adventure sports images and images that capture the culture and lifestyle surrounding these sports may be submitted.

Qualifying sports are listed below. Additional action and adventure sports images that are not listed may be submitted as well but the decision to accept and judge images will be at the discretion of Red Bull Illume judges.

Qualifying sports:

• Adventure Racing
• B.A.S.E. Jumping
• Beach Volleyball
• BMX Biking (Street, Flatland, Dirt, Vert, Downhill, 4X)
• Body Boarding
• Breakdance
• Cliff Diving
• Enduro
• Expedition
• Freediving
• Freestyle Soccer
• Hang-gliding
• Ice Climbing
• Inline Skating
• Kayaking (Wildwater freestyle (rodeo), Freeride)
• Kitesurfing
• Motocross
• Motocross Freestyle
• Motor Bike Trial
• Mountaineering
• Mountain Biking (Downhill, Freeride, 4X, Trail, Cross-country, Epic)
• Mountainboarding
• Parachuting
• Paragliding
• Rally
• Rock Climbing (Free climbing, Bouldering)
• Running (Trail/Mountain, Marathon, Freerunning/Parkour)
• Sailing
• Skateboarding (Street, Vert, Downhill)
• Skiing (New-school, Freeride, Telemarking)
• Skydiving
• Snowboarding (Big Air, Freeride, Half pipe, New School)
• Snowkiting
• Snowmobile
• Surfing (Free, Big Wave, Tow-in)
• Trialbiking
• Triathlon
• Windsurfing (Wave, Freestyle, Speed)
• Wakeboarding
• Wingsuit Flying

There are 10 categories available:

• Culture - Images that visually capture the creativity of the culture, music and lifestyle that surrounds action and freesports, or represents what happens before, between, and after the action.
• Playground - Images that showcase the landscapes, locations, platforms, and environments in which athletes play.
• Energy - Images that demonstrate the force that powers an action and show the energy, speed and strength required for an athlete to perform.
• Spirit - Images that portray the spirit or personality that athletic performances produce, as well as the pain, emotion and struggles that go along with trying to achieve ones goals, whether due to injury, failure or simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
• Close up – Images that show extreme detail of one or more aspects of an athletic feat: a tight shot of the action, the equipment, the body, the face, etc.
• Wings - Images that capture the point in a performance in which the athlete jumps, catches air, free falls, soars.
• SanDisk sequence – mages that tell the whole story in a single frame and capture the progression of an action at every stage.
• New Creativity - Images that reveal a unique angle, a visual idea, a different format, light and flash effects… something never seen before! It’s the purely creative image without digital alterations.
• Experimental - Images that have been enhanced digitally or in the darkroom through alterations made in the production or digital editing process.
• Illumination - Images that illuminate your artistic skill, your personal best, your unique style; this is an open category so anything goes – give us your best shot!

You may submit photos to every category but not the same image to more than one category.

Maximum 5 images per category.

JUDGES

There is no information who the judges are.

JUDGING CRITERIA

• technical superiority
• composition
• creativity
• impact
• artistic flair
• overall qualities of photographic excellence

WINNING PHOTOGRAPHS

Overall winner:

• title “Image of the Year”
• Leica S2 camera
• equipment to the value of €30,000

Athletes’ choice:

Who better to choose the best action and adventure sports image than the athletes themselves? We will invite elite athletes from every discipline to give us their opinion. Athletes will vote for one image from the fifty finalists. The image with the most votes will win the Athletes’ Choice Award.

People’s choice:

We also ask the public to lend us their eyes. As soon as the 50 finalists are announced members of the general public will have the opportunity to vote for his or her favorite image. The image with the most votes will win the Peoples’ Choice Award.

USEFUL LINKS

Need inspiration? See final images from 2007!

Read the official rules and FAQ yourself!

Ready to enter? Register here!

Official website of the competition: http://www.redbullillume.com/

IMPORTANT NOTE

I cannot take any responsibility for changing of rules or mistypes in this article. This article has only an informative nature. For official rules always refer to the official website!

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