About the competition
The photo contest of the Russian Geographical Society was first held in 2015. It immediately set out to become the largest Russian wildlife photography contest. In the first year, 25 thousand participants sent about 200 thousand pictures. And in six years, the number of photos sent has increased to 510 thousand.
Any person can become a participant of the competition, regardless of place of residence, citizenship and age.
The only condition is that the photographs must be taken in Russia.
Marina Loshak
Director of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts
Photos like these give an incredible burst of energy!
I look at the pictures with the eyes of an artist who chooses one image or another and creates it. I envy people who can turn on deep loving meditation within themselves to get such pictures.
How we evaluate works
We tried to make the assessment of the participants' works as simple and transparent as possible
- At the first stage, the photographs are evaluated by the members of the Expert Commission – these are 16 professional, reputable photographers and photo editors.
Andrey Polikanov
Creative director of the “Takie Dela” portal. Previously, photo editor for Time magazine, head of the editorial photography department of “Russian Reporter”. Jury member of the World Press Photo competition.
Dmitry Kupratsevich
Landscape and travel photographer. Multiple winner and finalist of the photography contests "Wildlife of Russia", 35awards, "My Planet", "The Most Beautiful Country" and others.
Egor Nikiforov
Underwater photographer. Finalist and winner of such photo contests as “Golden Turtle”, “Wildlife of Russia”, Sony WPO, Nature image photo, Underwater photographer of the year and others.
- Each work is evaluated by at least three experts on a 5-point scale.
- Works with an average score of 4+ go to the semifinals.
- 10 finalists in each category are selected from among the semifinalists at the in-person meeting of the Expert Commission.
- The experts do not know the authors of the works. This ensures an impartial assessment.
This is what the in-person meeting of the Expert Commission of the competition looks like.
Photo album "The Most Beautiful Country"
All works of the finalists are published in a colorful photo album. A finalist receives the album for free. Any participant in the competition can buy it
at the online store of the Russian Geographical Society.
In addition, photographs of the finalists and winners are exhibited in Russia and around the world.They will also be presented at an online exhibition with elements of augmented reality, which will soon appear on the website
rgo.ru. With the help of a special application, you can "bring to life" the best photographs of the "The Most Beautiful Country". The wait is almost over…