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Ah yes. Check the terms and conditions before you enter ...

I'm glad to see that somebody has.

Let's hear it for exploitation.

I sense an opportunity to cause CHAOS here!!!
Imagine 100 photographers taking photos of large groups of people who would then ALL be asked to sign a modeling waiver form, while the bands are playing!!!

Extraordinary.

You won't hear any music after the first couple of bars because of the thousands of people besieging the stage to get the musicians to sign consent forms. Then there's the great surging crowd trying to get security guards to sign consent forms of their dramatic battle images of those guards in front of the stage trying to impede the crowds invading the stage for their signatures, even while the battle continues.

I can only think they need such rigorous measures because they have some scheme in mind such as they want to use the winning entry as a background in a tobacco ad showing Tony Abbot solo line dancing nude in an Indonesian slaughter house. (... or has that become normal?)

The only good thing about this is that they're not banning photography. You take your 600mm lens along and show the gatekeepers the entry form, saying I'm here to take photographs at the request of the organisers. You just don't enter the competition.

I believe this:

The Entrant warrants that any person depicted in their photographic entry, has granted permission to be portrayed in the photograph.

is not of any consequence, since (as we've all learned from numerous discussions and submissions about photographers' rights over the last few years) you do not need people's permission for them to be portrayed in photographs. What you do need their consent for is commercial use of their image. If a photograph simply enters and wins a photography competition then that doesn't count as commercial use. If you (or the BDO organisers you signed your rights over to) wanted to use the photograph to promote the event or any other merchandise then that would be commercial use and require model releases.

However, this purpose is merely hypothetical to you as the photographer and competition participant because BDO have not stated that they will use the photographs commercially. They've only asked you to sign over the copyright to them. It should be up to them, at the point in time they make the decision to use the photograph commercially, to obtain the necessary permissions.

In short, this sounds like trouble, I'd give it a wide berth

Cheers
Steffen.

Big Day Out wrote:the Promoter ... [can] ... license, communicate, modify and otherwise exploit the Entry

While it's hard to imagine they really intend to commercially exploit the image, I interpret those words to say they have given themselves permission to do so. I think requiring evidence of permission is also equivalent to requiring a model release although the demand is clearly absurd. It's hard to imagine a court would support them if they really did go down that line, though.

I think the point is that the organizers are not going to be held liable for any images for which the photographer has not been granted permission. Hardly mischievous. The other clauses are problematic.