World Best Top 4 Photography Competitions ( Based on the size of the contest and the number of entries )



Top four most famous photography competitions in the world


There are so many photo contests all over the world every year.

Photography technology, which started with the camera Obscura, has been converted to digital through film, and today it is mainly consumed by mobile devices and is entering the AI era. Photography has a meaning of record at first through these changes and then gradually moves into the realm of art.

Through that process, the desire to promote one's photographs increased, and in line with this, a photography contest was created.

I also have a photo contest held in South Korea, but I've been looking for famous photo contests around the world to expand my area of knowledge.

I learned a lot of information while looking into many overseas competitions, and I am gaining a lot of experience by challenging the competition myself. So based on my experience and the information I learned, I would like to recommend my own authoritative and famous competition.


First of all, I summarized the world's four major photography competitions that I selected.








1. INTERNATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY AWARDS™

The host of the contest is IPA Headquarters: International Awards Inc 1318E, 7th St., Suite 140, Los Angeles, CA, 90021 US. It's an organization centered in the United States.


Last year, the entry fee was $25 for a single image, but it went up $5 to reflect the inflation rate. 😢

There is a reason why the entry fee is high. This contest has a high level of applicants. That's why the application fee is set a little high, maybe for the reason of suppressing the application. If it is not recognized globally, I don't think this contest can increase the application fee like that.

I'm leaving a link to the homepage of this contest.

https://www.photoawards.com/awards


Introducing IPA support for 2024, the main photo of the page is curiously the 2022 winning entry by South Korean artist Youngkeun Sur. It's a very proud and touching piece.

https://photoawards.com/winner/zoom.php?eid=8-1659806306-22



2. Sony World Photography Awards

The full name of SWPA awards is the Sony World Photography Awards. It has to be famous. It has the name Sony.

Sony is now a huge influence in the mirrorless market. The impact started in 2006 when Minolta sold AlphaMount to Sony. Sony took over Minolta's technology and developed its cameras like a Walkman or a PlayStation by combining their own electronics manufacturing know-how.
Sony starts a photo contest immediately after acquiring AlphaMount.
It's a great company. 😅

This Sony contest didn't have Entry Fee until just two years ago. From my experience, it does.

Sony World Photography Awards promoted photo contests for free like this. So the number of applications once exceeded 300,000. Since the year before last, I expect that the number of applications has decreased slightly because some of them have been paid. As far as I know, up to three works are free of charge.


Link to the main page of this contest.

https://www.worldphoto.org/




3. Wildlife Photographer of the Year

Wildlife Photographer of the Year was founded in 1965 by BBC Wildlife Magazine, then called Animals. The Natural History Museum joined forces in 1984 to create the competition as it is known today. The annual competition and touring exhibition are now run and owned by the Natural History Museum, London.

In wild photography, it is recognized as a world-renowned competition.

The contest adheres to the principle of protecting wildlife. So the funds for the contest are being used to promote the conservation of wildlife by the organization. So if you pay for the association's fund, you can apply for six photos per category, up to 25 photos.

I think it can be difficult even to be selected for this contest because I mainly take pictures of flowers. If you look at the selected pictures, the quality is very high and the power of a picture is huge. But because it's a long-standing and meaningful photo exhibition, I put it on my own list.

This photo exhibition has a popularity vote among the final selected photos. Please refer to the contest website.

The website where you can apply for the Wildlife Photographer of the year contest.  https://www.nhm.ac.uk/wpy/competition


The 2023 Photo of the Year page among the Wildlife photographer of the year main website. The sight of an Arctic bear sleeping on the ice looks peaceful, but it is also heartbreaking because it shows an environment where glaciers are shrinking due to global warming.

https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2024/february/wildlife-photographer-of-the-year-59-peoples-choice-winner-announced.html





4. Le Prix de la Photographie de Paris ( PX3 )


The PX3 contest is a very familiar one to me. If you've read anything else on my blog, you can understand it.

It's based in Paris, France, and it's a pretty famous contest, especially in Europe.

It does not disclose the total number of applicants or entries for last year. It is expected to be a little smaller than the IPA Awards. It can be said that it is smaller than the IPA Awards, but there are quite a variety of scope and categories that can be applied and the level of competition is quite high.

Currently, as it is widely known around the world, various photographers from many countries are applying.

Link to the PX3 awards homepage  https://px3.fr/




I've applied to all four of the international photography competitions mentioned above. I won two of them. I'll tell you more about it later in another article.

Wildlife photographer of the year seems to be a difficult wall to overcome, although I have applied for it. Photographs of wild animals are the main photography competition.

Sony World Photography Awards are a photo exhibition where so many photographers apply for multiple entries that, if you don't stand out in an instant, you can say it's hard to even get a compilation. I applied last year, but honestly, I don't have much chance of getting good news in April.

The majority of the World Photo Contest allows duplicate entries. However, some photo contests do not allow duplicate submissions, so please be aware of the RULES of the photo contest and apply.

Fortunately, I understand that duplicate support is possible for the above photo exhibitions.

Next time, I will deal with another category of overseas photo contest. 🙏


* Additional writing

The 2023 winners have been announced at Sony World Photography Awards. 

I recommend that you go to the link above to the Sony Contest and appreciate the works of great winners.

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