Voting is now CLOSED. Learn more about the winners.
Fall in Maine…there’s nothing like it! The same is true for winter. We are again celebrating two of Maine’s spectacular seasons with our second annual Fall in to Winter photo contest.
We want to see-and possibly award a prize to-your fall and winter photos of our beautiful state. Maybe you’ve got leaf-peeping photos from an autumn hike in the Moosehead region. Or perhaps you’ve got images of Western Maine buried in a beautiful blanket of snow.
This year, we added new categories. We want to see your LANDSCAPE fall and winter photos (also your wildlife pics, see below), but we also want to see photos of PEOPLE outside enjoying fall and winter activities like hiking, snowshoeing, skiing, sledding, and more. No selfies, just you and your friends and family enjoying themselves in the natural setting of Maine’s great outdoors.
The four categories are:
- Fall landscape/scenic (with or without wildlife)
- Winter landscape/scenic (with or without wildlife)
- Fall outdoor recreation (people doing activities outdoors)
- Winter outdoor recreation (people doing activities outdoors)
And in case you’re wondering whether to snap horizontal or vertical, the answer is: BOTH! Providing your entries in both landscape and portrait allows the most flexibility and counts as a single entry, and while providing them in both formats or either one won’t affect your chances of winning, it WILL improve the chances of your work making it into one of our publications, maybe even our wildly popular Nature of Maine wall calendar!
Before you submit your entries, be sure to read all the details below. We cannot accept photos that do not meet the specifications. Please also tell us your town of residence as we like to include that when we share photographers’ photos on our website.
There’s even more fun: The winners will receive some pretty awesome prizes from local Maine businesses as well as NRCM swag!
Don’t worry if you don’t win, though. There’s a good possibility that we’ll use your image submission, with credit to you, in a future publication, social media post, or elsewhere
Submissions are now closed.
Here’s the Fine Print*
- Each photo must be sent in full size-do not reduce size for emailing.
- All photos much be at least 2188 x 2819 pixels in size. If your photo is smaller than that, it will be ineligible to be entered into the contest.
- Please be sure to include the name of the location where you took your photo and a short description or caption to go with it. If you’d like, please also share why you chose to visit that particular place or inspiration for the photo; identify any natural features in the photo(s) (water bodies, mountains, parks or preserve names); and include any additional information you would like to share.
- For the photos that you submit that include people under the age of 18 who are clearly recognizable in the photo, please include written permission from the parent or caregiver stating permission is granted for NRCM to use it according to the conditions listed for this contest.
- Photos can include wildlife so long as the animal does not appear stressed and you followed wildlife photography ethics to capture the shot. The season (winter or fall) should be clearly recognizable in the photo.
- Photos entered in 2021 Fall In To Winter photo contest may not be re-entered this year.
- NRCM board and staff members and their immediate family members are not eligible to enter.
- You may enter a maximum of three (3) photos in each of the four categories.
- A photographer may only win in one of the four categories. If a photographer gets the most votes in more than one category, they will be awarded the prize for the category for which they received the most votes.
- Winning photos will be selected within 30 days of the end of the contest.
- By submitting your photos to this contest, you are granting permission for the Natural Resources Council of Maine to use any or all of them in our website, newsletter, videos, advertisements, social media platforms, and other media. We may also, on occasion, provide the work to a third party, so long as it is in clear association with NRCM. We will always give you photo credit and will do our best to notify you in advance. By submitting your photos, you agree to these terms.
Disclaimer: By submitting photos to this contest, for the purposes stated here, you thereby state that you are the photographer and hold all legal rights to the photo(s). You, not NRCM or any member of the staff, shall be responsible for any claims, legal or otherwise, made in regard to photos you submit as your own. NRCM Board and staff members are not eligible to enter.
Sponsors & Prizes
We would like to thank our business sponsors for their support of our contest and their donation of great Maine prizes:
Harvest Time Natural Foods
$50 gift certificate
Monkitree
$50 gift certificate
Reclaimed Maine Co.
$25 gift certificate
Goodpost
Gift bag of eco-friendly gifts
Hello I’m interested in joining and have one question, would you like the images with or without a water mark?
Thanks for your time
Thank you for your question, Thomas. We would like to have the photos without a watermark, please. We will include photo credit whenever we use a photo that someone has sent to us. Thank you!
Hi Beth. My name is Jim Knox and I guess I came in to late for sending pictures in for your Fall/Winter contest; However I would love to take part in something like this when you folks do something else like this again….Love the pictures! Nice site. Thanks.
Thank you for your interest in future NRCM photo contests, Jim. This was the second year we did a Fall in to Winter photo contest, and we have a couple of other ideas for photo contests later this year. If you aren’t already signed up for our email list, I would encourage you to do so, as we email people about contests like this when they happen. If you wanted to sign up for just one email a month, I would suggest you sign up to receive our monthly enewsletter here: https://www.nrcm.org/get-involved/take-action/nrcm-action-network/
Thank you again for your interest in our photo contest. If you have Maine photos that you would like us to share as part of our My Maine This Week web feature, I encourage you to do that, too. You can see past photos and learn more at https://www.nrcm.org/our-maine/my-maine-this-week/.
Do you only win by getting the most votes? Or are there judges for the photos ?
This is a contest voted on by the public, so the photo from each category that gets the most votes wins.
Hi Beth, who will be eligible to vote and on what platform (Facebook)?
Hi John,
Thank you for your question. Voting will be open to the public and will be through our website, not on Facebook. We will post on this page the link to voting as soon as voting opens.
Beth
Sounds wonderful- time to start choosing images! So fun! I LOVE MAINE!
Hello there I was able to click on the photos that I chose but there’s no submit button at the bottom or anywhere else that I can see. Sorry for you!
Great photos
Tried voting. Not sure vote went through. How do I find out?
If you hit the “submit” button at the bottom, then your vote was recorded. Thank you for voting!
Love Shannon’s work
Fun contest
Hello,
Great photos!
I am not sure if it recorded the vote? Did not acknowledge submission.
Thanks
Laura
There is not an email sent to acknowledge your submission, but there would have been language on the page after you voted (you may have needed to scroll down) to say that your vote had been submitted.
Beautiful work!
I did notice a near duplicate for one that I voted on…within the same category…Ross Knowlton’s Baxter State Park. I had a hard time choosing between the two.
Thanks for sharing all of these absolutely gorgeous pics!
Fabulous photos! Had a hard time choosing only one. Congrats to all who submitted!
If you’re ever feeling down, just take a gander at the majestic photography of Maine. It’s like taking a Prozac without the side effects!
Help! Most of the photos are not downloading onto my screen.
Marilyn, please try visiting the contest directly at: https://www.surveylegend.com/s/4qvs to see if the photos load more quickly. The photos are large file sizes, so may take a few minutes to load depending on how fast your internet connection is.