Den/The Day has decided to complement its yearly international photo competition with Den’s Photo Seasons, a new contest of readers’ photographs, in order to show life online. After a howling success of the competition Winter Photos to Remember, we launched a springtime contest called Spring Online. Indeed, our readers could watch “live,” in the course of three spring months, the melting of snow, the first swallows, the return of birds, and the revival of the entire nature on the competitors’ ingenious pictures.
At the same time, we announced a popular vote for the best picture. As a result, Ihor Karlytsky from Vinnytsia won the contest with his photo “Family Mansion.” Incidentally, the newspaper’s jury also highly esteemed his mastery. “Family Mansion” has already been used as a front-page picture.
According to the popular vote, “A Rose-Tinted Spring,” a photo by Daria Stefanovych from Netishyn, Khmelnytsky oblast, came second best.
The readers also liked “True Friends” by the Kyiv-based
Andrii Nesterenko, a good acquaintance of ours; “Get Down to Work, My Friend” by Kostiantyn Bobryshchev (Kobeliaky), and “White Blossom on Cherry Trees” by Slava Sivovol (Odesa).
Conversely, the contest jury singled out other photos: “A Springtime Aria” by Stanislav Leontiev (Vinnytsia), “Ladybirds in the Sunshine” by Oleksii Storozhenko (Crimea), and “Home at Last” by Natalia and Dmytro Udovyk (Ivano-Frankivsk). Incidentally, Natalia’s and Dmytro’s photo was used as illustration to the Easter Day postcard with which Den/The Day greeted its friends and readers.
Mykhailo Smilyk (Ichnia, Cherhihiv oblast), whom our readers know very well for the unforgettable photo “Ready for Borsch” in the 2005 big photo exhibition, was one of the first to send his picture “Springtime Thirst.” He says he tries to miss no Den photo contests because he likes competition not only in the photography quality but also in the messages carried. “I highly value the newspaper Den because editors choose illustrations to articles on the basis of not so much direct content as the subtext. The text and the photo, at first glance separated from one another, are intertwined with invisible threads and create an inimitable context. When you are photographing, you begin to instill some ambiguity, some hint, in the picture. Den has a flair for and highly values photography like no other newspaper in Ukraine,” Smilyk says.
Our congratulations to the winners who, incidentally, are sure to receive prizes from the editorial board! We thank all the contestants for new ideas and interesting impressions. New competitions are ahead.
