Meet our international Wiki Loves Earth 2022 winners!

She is Katerina Zareva-Simeonova. She was the Bulgarian representative in the nine-person jury last year, which evaluated the photos at the International stage in the “Wiki Loves Earth” contest. The curious detail is that in 2015 the contest was organized in a total number of 26 countries, but not all of them had representatives in the jury. Bulgaria was invited to appoint a jury member, although the country takes part in the contest for the first time.

Due to the contest specifics, the appointed jury member had to be a biologist or ecologist with experience in photography. Katya is much more than that – she is also a big friend of the Free Encyclopedia. 🙂

After the “Wiki Loves Earth” contest finished and we announced the results, we asked Katya for an interview. We wanted to learn what it means to be a juror in a contest with so many breath-taking pictures…

Katya, present yourself in a couple of words. 🙂

My name is Katerina Zareva-Simeonova, I live in Sofia and my formal education is ecology. I have been working for 17 years in the Sofia Zoo, and I am currently the head of the Ecological scientific-educational centre in the Zoo. This is the department that accomplishes the Zoo’s function of providing education in ecology, develop educational materials and projects, one of which was the joint project with the Bulgarian version of the Free Encyclopedia Wikipedia.

Apart from the area of zoology, my interests are related to photography and popular science documentaries. I have published photos of animals and nature in various journals and books, and I have authored more than 100 educational and documentary ecological films, mainly about Bulgarian nature.

You have been juror in other photo contests, too. Tell us more about them, and what made the difference with the “Wiki Loves Earth” contest?

Yes, I have juried for competitions for children photographs and pictures, as well for film competitions on national level. For me, it was a great pleasure to be part of the International Jury of such a public photo competition like WLE, with already shortlisted pictures from 26 countries around the world. We had to review and evaluate 259 photos, showing the nature and biodiversity in the protected areas in these countries. For this purpose, we were provided with a special software tool and system for evaluation, helping jurors to calmly and independently evaluate all the photos.

What were the criteria, which the jury used to evaluate the photos. What was the most difficult part of the contest for you?

The criteria for the “Wiki Loves Monuments” contest are specific, since the contest has the certain goal of stimulating people to take pictures of the nature in their countries and create and extend the freely licensed information in Wikipedia, and in Commons in particular.  For this reason, the criteria of evaluation were: technical quality, originality, and encyclopedic and educational value.

What hindered me was the huge choice of pictures of high quality and intriguing content. That was challenging for my evaluation, that had to be a very accurate and objective one. In the same time, that was for me a thrilling aesthetic and cultural experience, unveiling for me unbelievably beautiful natural landmarks and sceneries I haven’t expected to exist. I think that the concourse delivered its message and accomplished its mission, getting me to know and love the Earth even more than before!

None of the Bulgarian photos has been distinguished among the Top 15. What did we miss, in your opinion?

The winning pictures from the Bulgarian national stage of the competition depicted landscapes and animals from the natural parks of Rousse Lom River, Vratsa Balkan, Belasitsa, Belogradchik Rocks, Strandzha, Pirin and Rila mountains. All of them were gorgeous and rightfully represent our nature. At least for me, the pictures that affected me mostly, were the Belogradchik Rocks and the panorama view from Peak Vihren in Pirin.

However, the competition was really tough, and I think that our pictures lacked some originality. Both the audience and the jury are satiated with visual information, they want more colour, more of the wow-effect. It’s no surprise that the winning picture is a landscape from Pakistan, featuring buildings. Humans need to see themselves and the trace they leave onto nature, in order to compare themselves with it.  

Katya, you are the head of the Ecological scientific-educational centre in the Sofia Zoo. In your opinion, how such photo contests contribute to raising the society’s awareness about environmental issues?

First, the contest participants have the opportunity to express their attitude to nature and show a favourite place or animal of theirs. On the other hand, in this very competition, where images are made freely available, this message reverberates, carries knowledge, and is capable of changing the mindset of many people.

I believe that nowadays, when people are impatient enough to watch even several minutes of a video in the Internet, photography has a particularly pronounced and direct impact. An image can take the breath away and cause great excitement, especially if it captures a beautiful natural landscape. I still think that beauty can save the world, and this is why I rely on it, rather than on the aesthetic of ugliness or of shocking imagery.

Which picture was your personal favourite?

I won’t try to hide that for me the most interesting photos were the ones depicting animals. This is my field of expertise, and I well know how hard it is to take a picture of an animal, especially in wildlife. My favourite photo, which turned out to be favourite for the rest of the jury members as well, came from Brazil and captured the moment of birth of an Apis Mellifera drone. That image received the special jury prize in the contest.

When we talk about photos of animals, why is it important to have them pictured in their natural habitat?

Taking pictures of animals in their natural environment is critically important, as it raises the educational and encyclopedic value of the photos. Animals are part of a certain ecosystem, and must not be considered outside of it. Such images are the most appreciated ones and the ones most difficult to take, especially when it comes to species that inhabit a different from humans’ environment, like river and ocean species, birds in flight, or underground dwellers.

Nowadays, with the recent advance of technologies, cinema and photography have allowed us to peek into almost every corner of our planet and see amazing and intimate moments of the lives of its inhabitants. These images have a huge scientific value, too.

Katya, thank you for this interview, and for you being a juror in the Wiki Loves Earth contest! It was really important for us that we had an appointed representative in the International Jury, as of the first participation of Bulgaria in the concourse. And even more so, that our representative was you. 🙂

Interview and translation: Vassia Atanassova
Editor: Maya Marinova

In this blog post we present you a personal insight on Wiki Loves Earth from the point of view of Australian Wikimedian User:Gnangarra

As we near the mid way part of WLE in Australia I thought I would share a few observations about what its like to run the event in a country for the first time.  The first step took a little bit of work to establish but nothing one person can’t co-ordinate.  This was followed by a review by a couple of very help people on the organising team who suggested a few additions. Finding judges for the Australian section was fairly easy because I was able to draw on people from GLAM partners who have existing relationships.

Already for WLE we awaited for the first uploads on May 1st and what we received was the ultimate in Austalia’s iconic environment a place at the heart of our national psyche Uluru.  From there we have had photos of penguins, pelicans, fish (no chips), seals, Koalas and echidnas.  Of course the mandatory kangaroos that visitors to Austria oops I mean Australia are always looking for. With that comes another almost mandatory photo  from Arakoon National Park of kangaroos bounding along a white sand beach.

But of course WLE is about the Earth, its natural environment and places that are protected Australia has many of those, some very remote. There’s a litle track known as the Gibb River Road, its one the ultimate challenges for those into 4wding. Travelling along that road you can see the Barnett Range, so remote en Wikipedia doesn’t even have an article yet but we now have a photo, a beautiful 8000 px 53mb panorama that also demonstrates just how vast and remote parts of Australia really are.

As we near that half way point what can I say about WLE; it is really easy to participate – all it takes is one person and a bit persuasion. You’ll be pleasantly surprised by what it produces.

When I put this to WMAU committee for approval for funding of prizes I said WLE could be considered a success with just 500 photos uploaded, and I’d be over the moon with 1000. We passed the 500 figure just 5 days in, now with 750 images uploaded WLE-au is well on the way to surpassing 1000 dare I dream of passing Australia’s most successful photo competition WikiTakes Waroona – 1849 images from 2013.

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Today we present you an intimate story by one of the participants at the first edition of Wiki Loves Earth in Bulgaria in 2015 – Spasimir Pilev – who visited a number of protected areas in order to donate pictures of them to Wikimedia.

Thanks to its geographical position, Bulgaria has exceptionally rich and beautiful nature. Most interesting for me are the still well conserved ecosystems in the bordering mountains – Strandzha (bordering Turkey), Slavyanka (called also “Ali Botush”, bordering Greece), Belasica (bordering Greece and Republic Macedonia), Osogovo (bordering Republic Macedonia) and Ruy (bordering Serbia). While Bulgaria was part of the Eastern Bloc, these mountains fell in the 30-kilometre-wide border zone which required a special permission to get in. This is one of the reasons why nature has remained almost untouched by humans for decades.

During last year’s Wiki Loves Earth photo contest, in June, I decided to visit some protected nature reserves and areas in the inner parts of the country. My most visited destinations were the Sredna Gora and the West Rhodope Mountains.

In some parts of the declared protected areas, endemic and relict species are preserved.

For my birthday, several days after the end of the competition, I made myself the present of climbing the highest peak of the tenth highest mountain in Bulgaria – the Big Bogdan peak in the Sredna Gora mountain. It belongs to the Bogdan reserve where oak forests of average age of 150 years are preserved.

For the rest of the days I had the good motivation to upload pictures from previous years to Wikimedia Commons – from the protected areas in Pirin, Balkan Mountains, Belasica, Rhodope Mountains. Many of them were used for illustrating numerous articles.

All of those protected areas – national parks, nature parks, reserves, protected areas, nature sights, protected “Natura 2000” zones – are of crucial importance for the preservation of nature and us, humans. Travelling with motor vehicles, hunting, and cutting down trees are forbidden, and walking is only permitted along the marked paths. This is important for Wikipedia, too, because the more is known about the importance of these unique areas, the bigger is the possibility to get a clear notion that they are of great importance for humans’ life, too, and thus help for their preservation.

Major morphological feature of the reserve is the Uvac River canyon valley which includes the valleys of its tributaries. The special value of canyon parts of the river valley are curving meanders. The relative height of meander heads is 100 m at places.

The surrounding is characterised by karst surface with numerous karst formations: plains, depressions, sinkholes, rock shelters, caves and potholes. Caves are numerous and vary in size, including Usak Cave System, the largest known cave system in Serbia (6185 m). Caves are very rich in speleothem deposited by the action of dripping water to form stalactites, stalagmites, columns, draperies etc.

Variety of intact habitats, presence of endemic, rare and endangered flora and fauna species have special importance in terms of preservation of biodiversity and geodiversity and, by itself in terms of development and promotion of tourism potential of the reserve.

Sources

• Official site of Special Nature Reserve Uvac
• Travel to Serbia