Four Photosynth winners announced

We have four winners for the Picture the Horses Photosynth challenge. The judging was done on three levels of elimination. Nearly 150 people submitted URLs for the challenge.

"The number of entries was impressive," said Democrat and Chronicle photo editor Christina Dicken, who worked with D&C photographers and artists to narrow the list to 11 entries. "We looked at several factors as we were narrowing them down. First, and most important, was navigation. Did the Photosynth operate smoothly? Did it rotate 360 degrees and were you able to zoom in to see details. Second was creativity. Were there different angles and focal lengths? Third was technical quality. Were the photos exposed properly, were they in focus, etc."
 
Participants were charged with finding one of the dozens of horses that were showcased in the 2001 Horses on Parade community event. From the list of 11 finalists, another group of judges picked four to win the prizes. The prize for the week one challenge is a Kodak S730 digital picture frame, and two tickets to the October 31st gala.
 
"We thought that the top four stood out because they gave the viewer a smooth rotation as well as the option to go in and view detail," said D&C multimedia editor Scott Norris, a judge for the final round. "They also seemed to be a bit easier for the user to navigate than those that were near misses." The Democrat and Chronicle Marketing department will contact the winners this week with information on claiming their prizes.
 
RIT students and faculty will select two additional winners, who will receive the same Kodak S730 digital picture frame and tickets to the gala from RIT later this week.

Here are the usernames of the winners and their Photosynth URLs:

Tazwalker
(View PhotoSynth)

klesko86
(View PhotoSynth)

Poinky
(View PhotoSynth)

igator210
(View PhotoSynth)