Shortly: text is key to understanding images.
A photo essay tells a story — it has a topic, a point of view, and often a beginning and end.
A photo series shows a subject or theme, but doesn’t have to tell a full story.
In this festival's context, photo essay includes a text to help explain what we’re looking at, and text is equally important to tell the story.
In a photo essay, the images and text work together to say something bigger — not just look nice.
A photo series might be about “dogs on the street,” but a photo essay could be about “a year in the life of a stray dog in Porto.”
If you’re just showing a mood, style, or subject — that’s a series.
If you’re trying to make the viewer feel, understand, or learn something — that’s a photo essay.
