Jericho here.

I've been at work all day kinda following along with the goings on via messages from Ciara. Against her wishes, here's my take on this (mainly to take some stress away from poor Rongi):

When the auditions were over and the participating models were selected, each one received an e-mail listing each round and what the theme of those rounds were. They were told to submit shots and that certain shots would have restrictions placed upon them (model must be wearing glasses, model must have new makeover, background must be crystal, etc). It is the models' responsibility to ensure that their submissions meet the criteria that have been provided. It isn't Rongi's responsibility to individually look through every submission and resubmission throughout the entirety of the contest to ensure the validity of each photo per the rules of the round.

The models' should look at their photo multiple times before submitting and ask themselves, "Does this picture meet the requirements? Is this a good picture? Do I feel that this shot is weak and could get me eliminated?" If you are uncertain or doubtful about any of those questions, then you should not use that picture. If you leave something questionable per the perspective of the voters, you are leaving open an avenue that could come back and bite you in the backside. Your only way of ensuring this does not happen is by taking a conclusive shot that leaves absolutely no room for question. Hence why Ciara went 100% crystal for her background. There can be absolutely no question that she fulfilled the initial shot requirement whatsoever.

Yunie and Tinsley submitted gorgeous pictures for this round. Now... the crystal they selected is a "tree", and it branches out and in total the tree itself does cover a wide area that could constitute ~80% of the shot. But, on the other hand, between those branches and twigs and crystal leaves is a lot of open space. If viewing the background simply for how much raw crystal is contained within, then these shots are far less than 80%, perhaps as low as 40-50% total crystal. The interpretation of this is left to the voter to decide, and it represents a controlled risk taken by the model. Leaving such a question open for debate means that you could lose votes and risk elimination.

For future rounds, I suggest the models take this critique to heart. I've watched plenty of these sorts of reality contests on TV and I have seen contestants eliminated from the competition on a technicality because they failed to meet some requirement or another. Crew members and judges panel of the shows weren't there to constantly tell them "you need to do this, don't forget to add this, I don't think this will meet the rules of the contest", etc. Don't expect that sort of treatment here, either. It is your responsibility to make sure your submissions meet the criteria that has been dictated. If you have a doubt then don't use that submission, because if you can doubt it yourself... so can your voters.

TL;DR: Rongi should submit whatever you send him as your final shot. It isn't his decision whether the shot meets the criteria... that is up to you (before submitting) and the voters (after submitting).