I was recently disqualified after "winning" the Blue ribbon for the weather contest. I know it is my fault for not carefully reading the rules about when the photo has to be taken (I took it this last December), but the submission form is not clear to me. ie. the most recent Fauna contest, I still cannot tell when the pics must be taken to be viable. I see the deadline of April 22 and voting dates of 4-23 thru 4-29... but what are the dates that the shot must be taken? I am new to this site, so clarification would be helpful.
Thanks.
The photo must be taken within the submission dates. You have one week to take the photo. Unless it's a speed challenge, then it is specific how long you have to take the photo. The submission dates for the fauna challenge are April 14-22, so that is when your photo has to be taken.
That's alright Drake Olmstead. I just hope it doesn't scare you off. You have an eye for photography and I can't wait to see more of what you have under your sleeve. ;-)
Sonja
The Fauna show due date of 4-22, so I should always assume that the pic must be taken one week before the due date? Where did you see the April 14-22 submission dates?
tx,
Click on "View Details adn Submit." I belive that in the left margin are the specific instructions and I think it says something to the effect (going with my memory here, bear with me), "photo must be taken during the submission period," or something like that.
This happens over and over again.
Why not specifically state the exposure-dates between which a shot has to be taken. It is not hard to do.
DPC1 did. It is one of the most important rules here, why be so unclear about it. Pointing to the rules is not enough.
Initially I was thinking "why do people find this so hard? the dates are right there" but on thinking about it
"Submission Dates" is really just telling someone when they need to upload the picture but not when they need to take it.
Whilst the obvious answer is that people should read the rules, let's face it, there are lots and lots of people who never get around to doing that.
Maybe you could put:
Challenge: Fauna
Type: Open Challenge
Exposure Dates: 4/14/2003 - 4/22/2003
Submission Deadline: 4/22/2003
Submissions: 255
View Details and Submit
PS I'd also prefer to see the date written like this:
22 March 2003
For those of us used to having day before month it's sometimes confusing to see it written in the current format.
When someone comes up with DPchallenge.co.uk, then the dates will be in european format :)
The military also uses this format for clarity. I designed security badges for an Army installation here in New Jersey and we were required to use that date format so as to avoid confusion.
I think it's a good idea for an international site like this to accomodate its users.
When someone comes up with DPchallenge.co.uk, then the dates will be in european format :)
Why would dpchallenge.co.uk have anything to do with a European date format ?
It's written differently in the UK as well. That's why having the day number and the month in words makes life a whole lot simpler for the majority of people who use this site.
(A European dpc would be dpchallenge.eu.int and would have to be translated to a minimum of 11 languages - 12 if you count American)
Sorry about the DQ, your image was wonderful! At least you owned up to your mistake and weren't trying to get around the rules, sneaking in an older submission. Mistakes happen, but there are probably people on this site deliberately breaking rules. Anyway, I hope you will continue to submit, it seems you will do very well here.
I pointed out the probl;em with US date format in the early days of DPC, as its an area I deal with quite often.
The correct solution is harder to code than just picking the sensible default of dd/mmm/yyyy (03 Feb 2003) format, but it goes like this:
1. Allow the user to select output date/time formats and input date/time formats in the preferences.
2. Include:
US (mm/dd/yyyy) 02/03/2003
EU (dd/mm/yyyy) 03/02/2003
ISO (yyyy-mm-dd hh:mm:ss) 2003-02-03
language-dependant (dd mmm yyyy) 03 Feb 2003
long (dd mmmmmmmm yyyy) 03 Febuary 2003
Note that the last two contain English words, but as the site is english based anyway it wont matter that much.
3. Pick a sensible default, which would be language-dependant or ISO and definitly not US or EU formats.
4. Get your final solution reviewed by an idiot and a pedant. Normal people just say 'That looks OK' and you learn nothing from them.
I believe the following functionality would cut down on the unintentional submission of photos taken outside of the submission dates:
1. Don't prepopulate the Date of Exposure with a date. Leave it blank so that the photographer has to populate it.
2. Add a line at the top that displays the Exposure Dates (I know this is mentioned to the left, but it's less likely to be seen there).
3. Add validation to the exposure date that the photog enters (since it no longer defaults) that provides an error if the date is outside of the acceptable exposure date range.
What I am confused about is this...
On the submission page. It DOES say "Exposure Date" And gives drop down options with the Month in Abrieviations (Apr). Out of the photos we have DQed for Date...I think only one of them told the truth on this by putting the actual exposure date (not within the time frame). To me...this is quite clear. Exposure Date means exposure date no matter what country you're in. If you know your photo was taken in X month (or x YEAR in one case), why would you put that it was taken this week? You don't even ever have to read the rules to get this one right.
Heather, I think it's easy to overlook because the field pre-populates and people might just skim over it because it already has a date in it. That's why I suggested having it blank instead of pre-populated.
Adding the other stuff (spelling out exposure dates and validation on dates) are great additional steps, but blanking the date out in the first place will probably have the biggest impact because it forces people to take a look at the date and the title of the field.
Heather, I think it's easy to overlook because the field pre-populates and people might just skim over it because it already has a date in it. That's why I suggested having it blank instead of pre-populated.
Adding the other stuff (spelling out exposure dates and validation on dates) are great additional steps, but blanking the date out in the first place will probably have the biggest impact because it forces people to take a look at the date and the title of the field.
You may remember that I used to disagree with this, yeah 'used to', you've talked me round.
I like it pre-populated because it's convenient. Well if blanking it means that these mistakes go away then scr** my convenience.
Drake, bad luck on the DQ, but at least you know that your photo was very popular. Good luck on the next one : )
When someone comes up with DPchallenge.co.uk, then the dates will be in european format :)
Why would dpchallenge.co.uk have anything to do with a European date format ?
It's written differently in the UK as well. That's why having the day number and the month in words makes life a whole lot simpler for the majority of people who use this site.
(A European dpc would be dpchallenge.eu.int and would have to be translated to a minimum of 11 languages - 12 if you count American)
If you can't figure out when the picture is supposed to be taken, how the heck did you EVER learn to use your digital camera?
Not trying to be rude, just gimmie a break. Date formatts?? Come on, no matter what order the day/monthe/year it given, I think you should be able to decifer the date.
