Wildlife Photographer of the Year 63

AI policy

(7) For the avoidance of doubt the following digital adjustments are not permitted: (i) adding, moving or removing objects, animals or parts of animals, plants, people; (ii) the removal of dirt, highlights, backscatter, bubbles, debris and similar elements, except as expressly permitted under rule 5(6); (iii) composites: (iv) painting the foreground or painting out the background; or (v) AI generated photographs or images; (vi) any post processing method that adds new image content to the photograph via AI algorithms or by manual intervention. If you submit, or we reasonably suspect you have submitted, a photograph that breaches the authenticity or image-processing requirements in rules 4 and 5, we may take action under rule 4A.

RAW files

(4) If your photograph is shortlisted for the Final Round judging, you will be required to provide the following: (i) RAW files (e.g. .ARW, CR2/3, .NEF, .ORF, .PEF), or original untouched JPEGs (with a range of ‘before’ and ‘after’ original untouched JPEG files); and original transparencies or negatives, will be required for authentication. DNG files are only permitted if this is the native RAW format of the camera;

Editing rules

Rule 5(6) permits adjustments that do not deceive the viewer or misrepresent what the camera captured: tone and contrast, burning, dodging, cropping, sharpening, noise reduction, minor cleaning such as sensor dust, HDR, stitched panoramas and stacking for focus, exposure blending, noise or longer exposure when shot as a continuous sequence at the same place and time. Rule 5(7) forbids adding, moving or removing elements, composites, painting in or out, AI generated images and any post-processing that adds new image content via AI algorithms or by hand. Shortlisted entrants must supply RAW files or original untouched JPEGs for authentication.