Professional Photography Awards – The Wrap Up

 2011 has been a great year for Savvy Studios when it comes to awards and we’re thrilled to finally be able to show you our award images.

ALICIA’S RESULTS

I started off the year entering a single portrait image at the WPPI Awards in Las Vegas and this image came home with a nice score and a pretty ribbon telling me I had earned an ‘accolade of excellence’. I then entered the same image into our Qld Professional Photography Awards (QPPAs) where it attained a silver award. I now call this image, “the little image that could” because in it’s third and final turn at competition at the Australian Professional Photography Awards (APPAs)  in Sydney it picked up a score of 88 -- so so so close to a gold award (90 -- 100). One of the judges even tried to argue it up but just didn’t quite get there. I’m absolutlely thrilled. This was an image shot with a very pregnant mother at 5am on a summer morning and required a fair bit of shifting around. How incredible was Mel to get into this position and look so damn comfortable there! She’s an absolute champion.

Pin It

My next image was one that I was incredibly lucky to capture and it was a huge risk entering it. The judges would either totally love the image or totally hate it. I am proud to announce that the image was awarded a GOLD AWARD at APPAs (woohoo!). The argument was apparently a good one and I am so happy that the judges totally understood the moment captured was a photojournalistic image of new motherhood at it’s finest. Thank you to the judges and to everyone who has commented on this image. Also a huge thank you to Tracy and gorgeous baby Kobie for allowing me to capture such a perfect moment.

My last two images that I entered I was a little unlucky with. The shot of the two gorgeous girls jumping for the umbrella earned a silver award at the QPPAs (yay!) but just missed out on an award at the APPAs (bummer). The image of the pregnant lady was taken in the doorway of a disused mineshaft in a Brisbane national park. I love the shot but the judges didn’t agree and again it just missed out on earning an award at APPAs. I still totally love the images so here they are.

 

Most exciting though was the introduction of a brand new category at the Australian Professional Photography Awards called ‘fusion’. Fusion is a slideshow that is a combination of stills and video that is merged to create something really cool… well, hopefully if you do it right. I’m not a videographer in any sense but I thought I would give it a go just to challenge myself and see what would happen. As the first few videos were played I felt sick and wanted to withdraw mine. There was professional studio production VS my slapped together video produced without any proper editing knowledge whatsoever as I’m 100% self taught. My video ended up being the very last one played and it was painful. Then the score was announced; a silver award at 82!!! My little video scored higher than a video that was used as a national television commercial!

I was excited, happy, overjoyed and relieved all rolled into one. I did it for a bit of fun and came away with an award. How cool is that?

This video runs for 2mins 4seconds

ALEX’S RESULTS

Alex didn’t fare so well at the Australian Professional Photography Awards this year which was a bit of a downer however his entry to the Qld Professional Photography Awards had a vastly different result: Alex was awarded Runner Up Qld Documentary Photographer of the Year. SQUEEEEEE!

He went with his heart in selecting the images. Three of them were shot in New York last year and one was shot during a street photography shoot here in Bris Vegas. These are his award winning documentary images from the Qld Awards. (Personally, I think Alex rocks… but I might be a little biased.)

Every year the awards bring us something different in terms of results. This year is no different. Ups and downs everywhere and there is nothing better than succeeding with much loved images and also following the successes of friends and peers. We are proud of our work as photographers and so happy to share our industry with some of the most outstanding photographers in the world.

Seriously awesome stuff.