Round One Black & White
ROUND ONE WINNER, YOUNG AMATEUR PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR
Our black & white round always attracts a huge number of entries, and this year was no different, with more than 1,300 images submitted for judging. Our team of ten judges, which included AP editor Nigel Atherton, photographer Gavin Prest and Olivia Harris, Saturday picture editor at The Times, whittled entries down to the top ten you see here. To see more, including the 150-strong shortlist, and to enter, visit www.photocrowd.com.
1 Ian Bramham UK 100pts
Nikon D800, 16-35mm at 16mm, 1/15sec at f/8, ISO 140 Guest judge Gavin Prest says:
‘This atmospheric image has been handled extremely well, particularly as it was shot in conditions that can be tricky. Despite its bright highlights and dark shadows, giving a very wide range for the camera’s sensor to record, Ian has managed to capture detail in every part of the image.
‘The verticals have been kept vertical, which helps the viewer appreciate the scale of the architecture. The perspective and lead-in lines take you through the image, but everything is brought together by the gure walking through the scene on the right. Silhouetted against the bright fog and carrying a bag, they make me start to ask questions. Where are they going? Where have they been? What is in their bag? Why are they the only person in the image and where is everyone else? This small but perfect detail completes the image. Creating a narrative that makes your viewer stop and ask questions always makes a picture all the more compelling and effective.’
2 Jim Cumming Canada 90pts
Canon EOS 7D, 70-200mm at 123mm, 1/500sec at f/2.8, ISO 160
Wildlife in black & white is notoriously dif cult to do well. All too often, images bear all the hallmarks of simply being converted for the sake of it, rather than for the right reasons. Here, we have an outstanding example of an image that quite clearly works better in b&w than it would in colour. Our eyes are drawn to the whites of the elks’ eyes, and the almost perfect symmetry of the composition. The texture of the antlers and fur is almost three-dimensional, and the negative space created by those antlers is a crucial element of the shot. Set against a pure white background, the creatures almost jump out of the scene.
3 Ron Tear UK 80pts
Canon EOS 5D Mark III, 17-40mm at 40mm, 1/8000sec at f/6.3, ISO 1600
Ask most landscape photographers what they aim to achieve with their pictures, and they’d probably say they want the viewer to feel part of the scene. This shot is a huge success on that front. It’s extremely easy to imagine standing alongside the photographer as this picture was taken, drinking in the sheer majesty, depth and drama of the snow-covered mountainscape. Scale is provided, of course, by the line of climbers. Without them, there would be nowhere for the eye to settle. Finally, the range of tones is something Ansel Adams himself would be proud of.
4 Roger Evans UK 70pts
Canon EOS-1D X, 300mm, 1/2000sec at f/2.8, ISO 64,000
In the same way as it can be tricky to make a successful wildlife image in black & white (see our 2nd-placed shot), converting a sports image to mono needs to be done for all the right reasons. This outstanding capture of a diver in action is a case in point. In colour, this image would lose everything that makes it so powerful – the tightness of the diver’s pose, the expression of concentration on her face and – above all – the sharpness and detail in every backlit droplet that’s spraying from her hair as she spins. Beautifully timed, beautifully executed, and beautifully converted.
Muhammad Amdad Hossain Bangladesh 100pts
Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 50mm, 1/800sec at f/7.1, ISO 160
What a great picture! The tonal range is exquisite, with the silhouetted gures and tree in the foreground a deep black, the next line of trees a mid grey and, further back, a tree line of light grey. The gures are perfectly positioned in the frame and the shot is perfectly timed.
Badly timed silhouettes can look a confusing mess without the third dimension to help explain what you’re looking at, but here the limbs of the gures and even the legs of the cow are perfectly separated to aid immediate recognition. It’s hard to see how this shot could be improved in any way.
5 Pete Baker UK 60pts
Canon EOS 80D, 30mm, 1/125sec at f/7.1, ISO 250
This is the kind of action shot that appears very simple, but we expect it took a great many shots to achieve one where everything came together in the way it does here. The dancer’s leap appears almost effortless, and her releasing of the our is perfectly timed. The directon of the light creates an almost threedimensional effect and is very nicely handled indeed. Converting to black & white allows the viewer to appreciate the overall shape and tone.
6 Wendy Davies UK 50pts
Canon EOS 7D Mark II, 28mm, 1/1000sec at f/8, ISO 1000
Here, Wendy has created a beautifully blended composite of two separate images, which come together to make a very effective whole. With both bird and man silhouetted perfectly within the white rectangle on the wall behind, she has created a frame within a frame. The image could be timeless were it not for the subject’s smartphone. The textures and tones of the background and the cobbled street create a perfect backdrop for the foreground interest.