Royal Society Publishing Photography Competition now open for entries

The Royal Society Publishing Photography Competition, now in its second year, opens for submissions on Monday (22nd February 2016).

The competition celebrates the power of photography to communicate science. Entries must not only be aesthetically beautiful but convey an interesting scientific phenomenon.

The competition, open until 1^st June 2016, will be judged by a panel of experts in science and photography. Judge Professor Alex Badyaev, a multiple winner in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition says:

“Science and photography are similar because in both we take the complexity of the natural world and construct out of it -- with ideas and logic or with light and focus -- our narrative. And we succeed when this narrative uncovers natural phenomenon and a pathway for us, human observers, to explore and understand it.”

Also on the panel are behavioural ecologist Dr Claire Spottiswoode, Dr Ulrike Muller who studies animal locomotion and movement, and award winning nature photographer David Maitland.

Last year first place was awarded to biologist Bert Willaert an underwater shot of a group of tadpole’s seemingly in flight and silhouetted against a bright blue sky. The photo’s unusual ‘frog’s eye view’ put a common biological event in a new light with an unexpected perspective.

This year the competition has four categories: Ecology and Environmental Science; Evolutionary Biology; Behaviour; and a new category for 2016, Micro-imaging. The new category goes beyond what can be seen by the human eye and into the hidden world beneath the microscope – a winner will be selected from images captured through a microscope lens.

Images and drawings have long been used in scientific journals to communicate research findings and illustrate theories that are difficult to get across in writing. In the 21^st century Royal Society journals continue to publish striking images, which have inspired the Royal Society Publishing photography competition- led by five of the Royal Society’s scientific journals; Biology Letters, Interface, Philosophical Transactions B, Proceedings B, Open Biology and Open Science. 

The winner and runners up in each of the competition categories will be announced in September and all the images will be on display at the Royal Society on 17^th -18^th September 2016 as part of Open House at the Royal Society.