Photo contest – Community science
From May 1st 2023 to AUGUST 15 2024!
To account for weather uncertainties, we have postponed the submission deadline to August 15, 2024. Send us your nice photos!! ❄ ❄ ❄ ❄ 📸
Share your experience when you met the microscopic world of the snow!
The 2023-2024 Alpalga photo contest is open. The rule is simple. If during a hike or any other activity in the mountains, in Europe, in Asia, in the Americas, in Oceania, in Africa, or in the sub-Arctic or sub-Antarctic zone, you have the chance to see colored snow, take a picture! This one might be beautiful, intriguing, original, unexpected,… Submit it on this page, with the following information: date, title, GPS coordinates, and any other information you think interesting.
Take your cameras and smartphones with you on your hikes in the late spring and summer of 2023 or 2024! You may also have treasures: photos taken several years ago, 5 years, 10 years, or even before digital technology. If you still have the date, the place, if you can find the GPS coordinates, these pictures will have an aesthetic value but also a precious scientific meaning for our research.
Alpalga is a scientific project, so we will present the results by posting all the pictures on a map (we will start to disseminate the results from autumn 2023). Your contributions will be extremely useful for us to start a global census of snow algae blooms, based on your own experience. We will be able to re-examine the phenomena that you will report, for example by widening the field of your observation using satellite data. We will rely on your testimonies to evaluate hypotheses in the current context marked by climate change. Some of your pictures will perhaps incite us to study new sites, unknown until now.
Share your emotion when you see splendid red snows in a breathtaking scenery, but also do not hesitate if you have seen that algae color snows in unexpected places.
For scientists studying snow and ice algae, you are invited to contribute as well, by indicating the name of your project, photos that stand out for their scientific, aesthetic or unexpected value, and some information in the comment section. All contributions will be collected on a map available for the scientific community, and we will make our best to include your projects, make it visible and share with all as soon as possible with the contributions of hikers, trekkers, sportspeople, and nature lovers.
The contest is open from May 1st 2023 to April 30th 2024! This will allow to cover the seasons in both hemispheres, as blooms are most frequent in late spring and early summer…
It is also a contest. The jury will select the best 20 pictures! This jury will be composed of Rebecca Bilon, director of the Museum of Grenoble, Anne Delestrade, director of the Research center for alpine ecosystems, Marie Dumont, director of the Snow research center, Kilian Jornet, ski mountaineering champion, Eric Maréchal, coordinator of Alpalga and Jean-Gabriel Valay, director of the Lautaret Garden. Following your expressed agreement, these pictures will be displayed on the website, in a public exhibition in Grenoble, France, in 2025 and in other dedicated formats presented soon!
To your cameras and smartphones! And be careful, no image modification or filter that amplifies the colors! Share nature in its natural state!
