Submission Requirements
The National Space Society’s (NSS) SpacEdge Education Program in collaboration with Blue Origin’s Club for the Future and the SmallSat Education Conference is looking for student artists to create ORIGINAL illustrations to share their vision of…… My Vacation in Space.
DEADLINE
Sunday, October 5, 2025
(11:59 pm U.S. Pacific time zone)
Winners will be announced at the SmallSat Education Conference October 26, 2025
GENERAL
- There is no entry fee to participate.
- Multiple entries are allowed but must be submitted separately.
- Open to full-time students between the ages of 10 and 25.
- Students 18 and under must have parental permission.
- Must agree to contest’s Terms and Conditions for submitted artwork.
- All artwork submissions must be the original art of the submitter.
- Artwork must not include any copyrighted materials, in whole or in part.
- Submissions will only be accepted via the Roadmap to Space Art Contest Submission Form.
- A postcard of the artwork may optionally be provided for flight aboard one of Blue Origin’s rocket flights. See Postcards Section (FORTHCOMING).
- A screening process will be in place and the review committee reserves the right to reject any submission without showing cause.
- Images created whole or in part by generative artificial intelligence are NOT allowed.
IMAGE SUBJECT MATTER
- All artwork must be the original work of the student.
- All submitted art must be REALISTIC. Realistic means as accurate as possible both in science and engineering, and as closely as possible to what a real-life future in space would actually look like. Art that has merit but is less realistic looking may still be accepted for display, but would be very unlikely to be a winning entry.
- The artwork MUST be consistent with this year’s theme: My Vacation in Space.
Additional details as to acceptable content and how judges will be evaluating the artwork can be found in the Judging Guidelines for submitted artwork.
IMAGE TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS
You are free to choose any media to use for the creation of your artwork, but submissions must be in digital format with minimum dimensions of 5500 pixels by 4250 pixels (or vertically, 4250 pixels by 5500 pixels). Photographs or scans of the artwork must be trimmed to the edges of the artwork. Images that are obviously enlarged to meet the size requirement (with resulting degradation in quality) will be rejected.
The initial submitted images must be full size and in JPEG format and must not exceed 8 megabytes in file size (which may require some file compression). If an image is one of the winners of the contest, the artist will be required to submit the original uncompressed version.
Artwork can be submitted in landscape or portrait format.
If an image is one of the winners of the contest and the medium used to create the artwork was not electronic, the artist may be required to send the original piece of art to the contest for public display. Exceptions will be granted if this poses a hardship.
Questions?
If you have any questions regarding the contest, please email the NSS SpacEdge Contest Coordinator.
