Inspiring Images of Orienteering – Young Orienteers’ Photo Competition

We’re delighted to announce the winner of the Juniors’ photo competition congratulations to Yann from MAR Orienteering Club (MAROC) for this great shot that captures one of the dimensions of our sport: the beautiful places many of us associate with classic forest orienteering.

Inspiring visual content is really valuable for development work to raise wider awareness of orienteering, and help new audiences understand better how it might be something for them. Strong images and well-captured moments that really show orienteering in action help tell our story in ways that words alone can’t.   

Scottish Orienteering is always on the look-out for quality photos, and welcomes donations by members of suitable images that can be used in communications work, whether by SOA itself or to support clubs with resources. In particular, we’d love action shots of people (of all ages) that showcase orienteering as something fun that can be enjoyed with friends in interesting places.  These might be photos of participants at events (ensuring subjects are happy to be snapped of course) or staged photos that can be set up with a few willing club members. It’s really helpful to include features such as one or more people moving, with a map, towards a kite, in an appealing or interesting environment.  Images have positive impact when they get across a sense of enjoyability, capturing smiles and camaraderie – as well as being relatable to non-orienteers. A core  message is that orienteering is a sport for everyone, not just highly competitive athletes!

Listen out later this year for another competition. In the meantime, if you would like to contribute some of your photos for development use then please do get in touch – contact either of the Development Officers (Louise and Heidi) louise@scottish-orienteering.org/ heidi@scottish-orienteering.org or email info@scottish-orienteering.org.  Any images used will be photo-credited to the owner of course.

Finally, safeguarding is of course a consideration when using images publicly, particularly for juniors.  SOA has a photography and video policy, here. This is in the process of being updated and will align with BOF’s recent publication (photography and filming guidance) which offers lots of useful guidance in the meantime.