Focus on the T-shirt: Faculty of Science’s Jan Kříž on the Faculty’s Photography Contest

16,000 CZK for a photo is not a bad deal. That is the prize money for the winners of the Faculty of Science’s photography contest, in which the focus is on the faculty T-shirt. It is an attractive challenge for those who like to take photos, who like to stylize and compose their pictures and even those who are just lucky to be at the right place at the right time and snap something interesting. An even greater reward than the prize money is the future life of the three plus one winning photos, because this is only where things get started. Jan Kříž, student of cartography and geoinformatics and the 1^st vice-chair of the Academic Senate of the Faculty of Science for the student chamber, gives the details about the contest and the faculty T-shirts.

This is one of the many art contests held at the Faculty of Science. What’s the story of the competition and the T-shirt itself? Two years ago, when I started in the student chamber of the Senate, we were thinking that it would be nice to have fashionable T-shirts like the ones other faculties had. Our old ones were sold out, there were only four different versions of them and there was next to no interest in them. That’s why we came up with a contest in which students themselves could design what they liked and what they wanted. The response was surprisingly good – we received 36 designs. They naturally varied in quality, but in the end we chose the best one and I’m happy to report that it’s been received very positively. The Dean and the administration of the faculty deserve thanks, as they supported the competition and even provided a financial reward. All of this happened about a year and a half ago. And now we’re doing the photo contest – to promote the faculty and to find new ways of furthering the identification of the students with the faculty. Any photo can be submitted, as long as it contains a faculty T-shirt.

Jan Kříž, student of cartography and geoinformatics and the 1st vice-chair of the Academic Senate of the Faculty of Science for the student chamber

I can see you’re wearing one right now, it’s full of characters proudly representing their fields of study.

Yes, our T-shirts come in 26 colours, 13 gentlemen’s and 13 ladies’. There are two versions – a faculty one and section ones. There’s always the coat of arms of the university and characters representing different subjects studied at the faculty. The name under the drawing belongs either to the faculty as a whole, or to different subjects – you can have a T-shirt saying “geography”, “chemistry”, “biology” or “environmental studies”. Different sections have different characters, performing activities typical for the subjects.

I can see you’re wearing one right now, it’s full of characters proudly representing their fields of study.

Yes, our T-shirts come in 26 colours, 13 gentlemen’s and 13 ladies’. There are two versions – a faculty one and section ones. There’s always the coat of arms of the university and characters representing different subjects studied at the faculty. The name under the drawing belongs either to the faculty as a whole, or to different subjects – you can have a T-shirt saying “geography”, “chemistry”, “biology” or “environmental studies”. Different sections have different characters, performing activities typical for the subjects.

Who can take part in the contest?

The competition is naturally targeted at students, even from other faculties. In fact, anyone can take part – if a professional photographer submits a picture and wants to compete with us, it’s not against the rules. We haven’t received anything like that so far and we expect there to be no limitations on who can take part.

Are there any technical or stylistic requirements that all photos have to comply with?

There are no requirements really, because we wanted the contest to be as open and accessible as possible. There are no limitations on the subject matter. It can be a portrait, a group photo, a snapshot, a stylized art photograph, anything goes. We have but one technical requirement: it has to be a standard digital photograph in a certain (or bigger) resolution. The exact specifications are in the terms and conditions of the contest.

How many authors have submitted so far and how many photos can be submitted by one contestant?

Some have already submitted their entries, but there haven’t been a lot of them yet – it’s in the order of tens now. But each participant can submit as many photos as they like.

How will you proceed in selecting the winners? If you receive 150 photos, will you narrow down the selection and choose among the best?

A committee of three members of the academic senate will select the three winners, and after that, also importantly, another winner will be chosen randomly from all the submitted pieces. The exact evaluation procedure is up to the committee, so I believe it will be adjusted to the number of submissions. If there are too many of them, there will likely be more rounds. As for the lottery: All participants will get a chance, but to prevent people who send in 100 photos from having an unfair advantage, each author will be represented by up to three photos. Still, if somebody submits 100 pictures, he or she can choose the best one to represent him.

When will the judging and the lottery take place?

The whole process is administered by the student chamber of the faculty’s senate. The final deadline for the photos is on March 12 and the evaluation will take place right after the session of the Academic Senate the following Thursday, which is five days later. The sessions of the senate are by the rule open to the public, so anyone can come and watch. After the official session, winners will be announced and the lottery will take place. If there’s anybody who’d like to submit their photographs, the exact rules and contacts are on our website. We will be happy to receive more pictures.

What happens with the winning photos next?

We of course want to publish the winning photos and show the contexts and environments our T-shirts appeared in. We will do so in a photo gallery on our website and we will also exhibit them on a large bulletin board at the faculty, which is situated at one of the busiest places of the faculty. More importantly, we have a full support of the faculty, who would like to use the best photos to promote student activities. Our ambition and our goal is then to use the results of the competition to gain support for the student community and student life at the faculty and the university as a whole.

(Marie Kohoutová)

Translation: Jaroslav Švelch