Commons:Wiki Loves Monuments 2014 Canada
   Wiki Loves Monuments contest is now ready to receive Canadian pictures. During the whole month of September, participants can upload their pictures of Canada's monuments and historical sites. Pictures may have been taken at any time but need to be uploaded before September 30, 11:59 pm to be eligible for the contest. And now, the biggest photo competition is launched! From September 1, the uploading valves of Commons, the media repository used especially by Wikipedia, are wide open. If you have pictures of historical sites on your hard drive, no matter when they have been taken, you could win the international prize. Even the pictures you have taken during your last trip outside Canada are accepted as long as they have been taken in one of the participating countries; you could win the national prizes of this country. The only rules of the contest is that you need to have taken the picture yourself, that the subject of the picture is recognized as a historical site by the government, and that you accept to put the picture under a CC BY-SA 3.0 licence. Last year the contest raised more than 2,500 pictures of Canadian historical sites, all under a free licence. In total, 370,000 pictures from the 50 participating countries were uploaded! Those pictures can be used to illustrate the 285 language versions of Wikipedia or any of the 11 other sister projects of Wikimedia, but also by anybody on any website thanks to the free licence. We must not forget that the photographers of the 350 best pictures in 2013 benefited from the increased visibility and that some pictures were not only featured on the Wikipedia main page, but were also used to create the Wiki Loves Monuments calendar.
A picture under a free licence is not a picture without licence or in the public domain! The CC BY-SA free licence, widely used by the Wikimedia projects, forces anybody reusing the picture to credit the author. The licence also allows one to edit the picture, to reproduce it, and to distribute it even for commercial purposes, so long as the author is credited. It is not rare that journalists or magazines reuse media from Commons which allows some of our photographers to get a good reputation.
Winners will be chosen in two rounds. The 30 best pictures of Canada will be submitted to the Canadian judges who will select a total of ten and send them to the international judges. The best pictures that will have the highest score will win international prize. If a photographer submit pictures of monuments from other countries can be also submitted the jury from this country; more chances to win! The Canadian judges panel is composed of photojournalists and directors of photo clubs.
 Wikimedia Canada announces its participation for the third year in the largest photo contest in the world, Wiki Loves Monuments. Users are invited to take pictures of historic places, then, during the month of September, upload their best shots in Wikimedia Commons. You have pictures of monuments stalled in your computer since your last trip? This is a great opportunity to give them a second life in this Wiki Loves Monuments contest. In addition to being seen by everyone, your pictures could be included in Wikipedia and contribute to the preservation of Canada's cultural and historical heritage. Over 12,000 historic places are listed by Parks Canada, but only 20% of these places have freely licensed images to illustrate Wikipedia articles... not to mention that some sites, such as the Port Refuge archaeological site, are inaccessible; even Parks Canada has no picture. Freely licensed photos collected through Wiki Loves Monuments may also be reused elsewhere than in Wikipedia. Photos may have been taken at any time; last year's winning Canadian photo was a winter scene. The key criteria to be eligible for the contest are that they be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons in September 2014 ... and that they have been taken by you, of course!
 You do not know where to go for your holidays this summer? Why not plan your route using the interactive map of Wiki Loves Monuments? The green marks refer to historic sites where no photos under a free licence are known to exist. The locations shown in red already have photos available in Commons, but you can definitely take better pictures or zoom your lens on architectural details. There is no minimum age to participate, and there is no participation fee. Besides WLM being a competition, it is first a fun activity, ideal for families. The competition also allows us to inform our cultural heritage, while improving our photographic talents!
Launched in 2010 in the Netherlands as "Rijksmonument", meaning "monument of the nation", the contest gave us 12,500 free pictures of Dutch monuments. The success of that competition attracted the attention of several other Wikimedia chapters, and the 2011 edition of Wiki Loves Monuments extended to 18 European countries. Within a month, more than 5,000 participants upload nearly 170,000 photographs under a free licence, a world record, certified by Guinness Book of Records. The 2012 edition of the Wiki Loves Monuments left Europe, and this time 35 countries took part in the competition to beat WLM's own record: 15,000 participants uploaded 350,000 pictures on Wikimedia Commons. In 2013, several other countries join the competition including Antarctica for a total of 51 countries who upload 368227 pictures and beats again, his own record.
Winners of the Canadian leg of Wiki Loves Monuments 2013 have now been announced. Again this year, a huge number of Canadians participated, leading to more than 2,500 photos of historical heritage sites in Canada. In the rest of the world, participants from more than 50 countries uploaded 370,000 images under a free license. All these images are freely reusable by anyone under the terms of the CC BY-SA 3.0 license. After a national screening by local juries, each country participating in Wiki Loves Monuments sent their ten best images, to the global second round to be judged by members of the international jury. The three Canadian photographers who obtained the highest scores took home the Canadian prizes: gift certificates for $500, $250 and $100 at the online store Camtec photo, the official sponsor of Wiki Loves Monuments 2013 in Canada. For the first time, a Canadian picture has been selected to be among the global ten best pictures of the competition. The image, selected among the 500 photos submitted to the international jury, is of a sunset over the former pavilion of the United States in the heritage site Île-Sainte-Hélène in Parc Jean-Drapea, Montreal, now converted into a museum dedicated to the environment called the biosphere. The 2012 iteration of Wiki Loves Monuments was recognized by the Guinness Book of Records as the largest photo contest in the world, with over 353,000 images uploaded to Wikimedia Commons.[1]
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 Wiki Loves Monuments is an international photographic competition to promote historic sites around the World through Wikimedia projects (mainly Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons). Everybody can participate. There are a lot of historic monuments in all participating countries. The goal of Wiki Loves Monuments is to encourage people to take pictures of those monuments, and to put them under a free licence so that others may access them through the Internet. To achieve that, an international contest will take place in September 2014. This page introduces the Canadian part of this competition. In September, you may upload as many picture as you want of monuments that you have visited. Pictures don't have to be taken in September, but must be uploaded that month to be considered. On October 1 the contest jury will begin evaluating the photographs and awarding international prizes for the best pictures. The competition is organized by Wikimedia Canada. How to participate British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador, Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut See a map of Historic Places 1. Select historical places to photograph, either on the official lists on Wikipedia, or on the map of geolocated places. It is imperative that you take the photos yourself. Here are some tips to increase your chances of winning the contest.
National JuryAllen McInnis is often at the front of the events as well as being photojournalist daily The Gazette for several years, his images sometimes around the world. Frequently asked questionsIs the contest free?Yes, there is no cost to participate. You must only have an account on Wikimedia Commons and upload you pictures. When can I take pictures?Any time. The contest takes place during the whole month of September, but you can submit pictures taken at any time, even ones taken several years ago. The only rule is to upload them to Commons between September 1st and September 30th. Am I allowed to retouch my pictures?Yes. You can retouch your picture with any software. Can I submit any type of pictures?No, they must represent a monument or a historic place on the repertoire of Historic Places of Canada. Can I submit pictures taken in another country?Yes, if it is a historic place recognized by the government of that country. However, you will have to upload through the upload wizard of that country and you will be eligible for the contest of that country. On maps, why are markers not of the same color?On maps of historic sites, there are red marks and green marks. When an image is added to one of the lines of the lists, the mark turns red. The card system can take up to 24 hours to update. A red mark does not mean Wikimedia Commons will not take more photos of this historic site, a photo in the repository can be improved, whether it is a better picture quality or better weather. The green mark does not mean that there is no picture in the repertory, it simply means that no user has added an image in one of the lists. If I didn't find an answer to my questionIf you didn't find an answer to your question, ask on the help chatroom #wikipedia-en or #wikilovesmonuments. |
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Timeline - Progress - Tools - FAQ - Media - Sponsors - List of landing page, monuments and uploadlink - Winning photos
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