News Just in from Las Vegas – Alicia WINS at WPPI!

A few weeks ago I sent of the entries for the WPPI awards in Las Vegas. The WPPI stands for ‘Wedding and Portrait Photographers International’ and the awards co-incide with the biggest trade show and convention for photographers anywhere in the world. So it’s pretty much a huge event to be a part of.

I’ve never entered international awards but with alot of prompting from a photographer friend, I prepared an entry. Then I figured while I was at it, I’d throw in an entry from a concept shoot I photographed back in April last year. There was a perfect category for the photoshoot; Album non-wedding informal. This means the photos can be of anything that isn’t a wedding and isn’t an ‘event’ like a bah-mitzvah or christening etc. It’s a very broad category.

The original entry has scored okay but it was the last minute entry that has left me absolutely STUNNED. I wasn’t expecting much from it and my mind has been officially blown. On Monday I found out I had scored 94 out of 100 which was the highest score in the category, however this doesn’t mean that I had it won. The three highest scoring albums have their scores wiped and are rejudged to decide first, second and third with the winners announced at a huge awards dinner.

One hour ago I received a call from the dinner and nearly fell off my chair! My album was FIRST PLACE! I had won the entire category! As you can imagine, I am still grinning from ear to ear like a Cheshire Cat.

Due to lots of questions about the album and the layout I have decided to post it here for viewing just as the judges have viewed it. Most of the images below are how you would view a double page spread in an album. The competition entry also states that you can show ‘detailed’ areas to draw the judges attention so there are some ‘detail’ images presented also.

Enjoy the album! (and yes, I’m still smiling)

Front cover

inside front cover

detail

detail

detail (this little girl was just brilliant)

detail – The entire concept actually started with this boy. This is my oldest son, Ashley. He often gives me the same expression as he shows in this photo. I photographed him last year giving me this look and I wanted to find a way to showcase it. One thing led to another until I came up with the idea for this shoot. This image also earned a silver award at the 2009 Australian Professional Photography Awards last June.

Last page

A massive thank you has to go out to the kids from Junction Park State School who were so enthusiastic and positively threw themselves into these images. I couldn’t have acheived this without their energy.