Jafo - Fair points, and criteria I'd expect to be applied.
However, as an example of what has confused me:
I created 2 wallpapers based on photos taken in London of the Palace of Westminster. One was accepted, the other not.
One was taken from the south bank, between the legs of a Dali-esque elephant using its legs to frame the famous clock tower with a sunset behind it all. The other includes just the skyline of the Palace of Westminster in silhouette. With both pictures I worked up and applied a purple-ish framing texture, with a white-ish boarder line (in differing styles).
With the better photo (IMHO) between the elephant's legs I added a very subtle "thin film of oil on water" texture (which I was very pleased to come up with) over the purple area and a slight smog appearance over the photo area and called the result "Toxic London", finally adding this text subtly in the bottom right corner. I was particularly pleased with this result as on the day I was there, I’d noticed the smog haze over London from the London Eye, and this wallpaper summed up this impression of London for me…oil on water, smog, but with surreal art and impressive architecture too.
With the weaker photo (IMHO) I applied a less aesthetically pleasing frame (IMHO), a simpler and less strong (in terms of the artistic merit IMHO) overlay, and didn't add any text.
"Toxic London", was rejected - and "Seat of Power" (submitted a couple of days later and before I knew the 1st had been rejected) was accepted....Since in many ways, the subject matter and the style was similar, do I conclude that the first one was rejected for having had some text added in the corner?
This theory would fit with most of the other rejections - one I called "Time leaves not a gentle mark" based on photos of pealing paint, rusty metals etc also had the title text subtly included...I suppose what I want to know is, if the text or something else is the problem, can I make slight changes to get these accepted?
I'm not entirely sure why I'd like to have the things I've made included here. I think the very fact that not everything is accepted and thus makes me strive to do better, is in itself rewarding.
The first 3 attempts I had to create wallpaper for here were rejected, and certainly should have been when I look at them now...they were very naive and show some of the Photoshop traps you mention – along with some other traps equally bad.
The very fact that some efforts are rejected makes me think "Right! I will make something good enough to be accepted!", so I’m not objecting to having work rejected – I'd just like to know why so that In can improve in an informed way, rather than blindly
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