Welcome to Coldfear’s
Winter Climbing Photo Hold’em Tournament
OVER $3,000 in prizes up for grabs from sponsors
Rab- Microlight Jackets and other goods
Grivel- Quantum Tech Ice tools, Ice screws, v-threaders
Beal- Stinger 9.4 70m golden dry rope
Scarpa – Rebel Pro Boots
Cilogear- 26Z WorkSack – This is a new pack in the line!
Alpinist Magazine- 5 one year subscriptions
Alpine Training Center- two months worth of personalized written training done in Boulder,Co or remotely.
Registration is now open for what will become the world’s greatest winter climbing photography contest.
What is it?
It is a photo contest with a little poker strategy. But mostly, it’s just another excuse to get some more eye candy up for people’s viewing pleasure.
How Do I Enter?
You must send a photo of yourself (preferably humorous) to aaron@coldfear.com by midnight, October 27th, 2014. Along with this photo, please provide your full name, hometown, contact information and a 200-word description of yourself to intimidate, bluff, or otherwise psych out the competition. All bios will be posted on www.coldfear.com to introduce the players in the game. Remember that your bio and photo will introduce you to the voters, and poker strategy may be relevant. Make it count.
Along with the photo of yourself and your bio, include your initial photo to play as your first hand in Round One.
Registration will close after 28 contestants enter, or October 27th arrives (deadline extended until we have 28 entries) whichever happens first. All applications can be submitted to aaron@coldfear.com. There is no fee to enter.
How Does the Competition Work?
In each round, players are randomly bracketed against each other to play their chosen photo. The public will vote on the photo they prefer in each pair. Whichever player’s photo gets the most votes advances to the next round. In each round, the competitors play a new photo. Basically, each competitor holds a handful of photos and reveals a photo in each round, until they receive fewer votes than their competitor and then they are out.
Timeline:
October 29th: Players’ photos and bios will be posted on www.coldfear.com to introduce the players of the game.
November3rd: Round One begins. All 28 players will be randomly paired off and photos will be posted in a bracket fashion. Voting via www.coldfear.com begins and will be very easy for everyone.
November 10th: Voting in Round One ends. The player in each bracket with the most votes advances to the next round. Two wild card competitors will also be chosen from the losers of Round One to enter Round Two. The two wildcards will be chosen by a board of 3 people. All 16 winners/wildcards have 48hrs to submit their Round Two photo entry.
November 14th: Round Two begins. Brackets will be assigned and new photos will post. Voting on www.coldfear.com begins.
November 21st: Voting in Round Two ends. The player in each bracket with the most votes advances to the next round. All eight Round Two winners have 48hrs to submit their Round Three photo entry.
November 26th: Quarter Finals begin. Brackets will be assigned and new photos will post. Voting on www.coldfear.com begins.
December 3rd: Voting in Quarter Finals ends. The player in each bracket with the most votes advances to the Semi-Finals. The four winning competitors have 48hrs to submit two Semi-Final photo entries.
December 8th: Semi-Finals begin. Brackets will be assigned and two photos for each competitor will post. The photos will be voted on as a pair. Voting on www.coldfear.com begins.
December 15th: Voting in Semi-Finals ends. The player in each bracket with the most votes advances to the Finals. The two finalists have 48hrs to submit four photo entries for the Final Round.
December 18th: The Final photos will post and voting will begin on www.coldfear.com.
December 26th: Voting ends. Winner will be announced.
Definitions and Recommendations
Photo of yourself: Get creative. This can be a self-portrait, or can be taken by somebody else. The setting is not limited to the genre of winter climbing.
Photos submitted for tournament: Ice climbing/ Alpine climbing: More creativity, please. A climber does not have to be in every shot. In fact, we love lifestyle photos, but feel that they are harder to capture in the form of a quality photo. The more unique and creative photos will do better, but ultimately we just want photos that capture the essence of winter climbing. Feel free to add a short caption if you like, but it is not necessary.
Voting: Votes will be counted by a third-party app that will be embedded in each post. A simple click and the votes are counted. Any ties will be voted on by the board of three people.
Resolution: This is not a contest only for people with an expensive camera. We would encourage both professional photographers and point-n-shoot users to enter. Let us know what camera you are working with and we will consider handicaps if necessary.
Size: We thought about requiring you to send us specifically-sized photos. But fearing that we will not get enough participants, we will not have size requirements. However, photos should be high-resolution, 150-300 DPI. Photos can be sent at 250 DPI, 1500 pixels wide for vertical photos and 2500 pixels for horizontal images. You can also just send us the photos and we will resize them accordingly.
Disclaimer
Coldfear.com reserves the rights to do whatever we want, and to change this contest as necessary, so just play along and feel free to ask questions as necessary. This is a grassroots winter climbing photography competition. Dates can and probably will be changed by a day or two depending on current climbing conditions. By entering this contest you are agreeing to let Coldfear.com use your images on our blog. If Coldfear.com wants to use photos for anything other than this contest, you will be contacted for permission. Remember this is for fun and not intended to fund the next two years of your life or pay off Gweeto.
Huge thanks to Todd Gillman and The Range Life for creating the tournament and Darin McQuoid for the advice.
