This was the first round of the Print Trophy Competition at Farnborough Camera Club in the 2023-2024 season on the 5th October 2023. Both images were allowed to be open images.
Synchro boots
On the second day of my workshop with Valérie Jardin in Paris we visited the Île Saint-Louis . These girls were crossing the Pont de la Tournelle towards the island.
Summary of judge’s comments
… [] look at those boots, they are quite extraordinary, the heel must be a couple of inches thick
… what the photographer has captured here looking at the foreground boot is both feet are in step , the right foot is back as they are walking along, it is blurred to give us a sense of movement,
… it has been very well seen
… I think mono works really quite well there [as] you’ve got the texture of the ground that they are on and we don’t need to see a lot of detail , it is about the shape and the synchronicity of the two people walking together
… we have space for them to move into, that works well
… I think we have got detail there and I think we need just a little bit more detail in the black trousers of the figure in the foreground because they are completely blocked shadows , you can’t always get the detail of black trousers, just possibly a little bit more
… it is very well seen and very well put together
South Stack Lighthouse
This image is the result of focus stacking three images taken on Anglesey on Robert Harvey’s 2023 Snowdonia Tour. From the judge’s comments I need to do some more processing on the image that focussed on the lighthouse. I had expected to be criticised for the lack of space at the tip of South Stack.
Summary of judge’s comments
… the photographer has captured very effectively is the way these very strong cliffs are coming down into the sea, we have got some foreground interest with the colourful flowers on the right hand side and then our eyes go around the coast and our eyes rest upon the lighthouse itself
… as I mentioned earlier the one genre of photography that needs light more than any other is landscape, I do not think the photographer was blessed by great light on this occasion, that doesn’t mean that they haven’t made the best that they can of the light available
… but, the central part of the image particularly the where the lighthouse is, looks a little flat to me because of the way the light is falling, I thank there is great interest on the top right there but but the light in the central element is just a little flat
… you have the light that you had when you were there and you have made the most of it but it isn’t quite working in those central areas
… we have got sort of a blue halo along the horizon
… compositionally you’ve got it absolutely right, I think the flowers are really adding something there and I like the balance between the flowers near to us and the lighthouse in the distance areas
… I am really please that that lighthouse is below the horizon and not cutting across it because I think works compositionally very well indeed
The scores
There were 26 images in this round in the Advanced Division.
“Synchro boots” scored 8.5 and “South Stack Lighthouse” scored 7.
The original images
Synchro boots
Second day of January Paris workshop TBA
South Stack Lighthouse
original image
Visiting Anglesey on Snowdonia Tour TBA