SNAPSHOT:
From dramatic rural scenes to stark cityscapes, Yorkshire looms large in the Landscape Photographer of the Year awards. Charlie Waite.
N 2007, landscape photographer Charlie Waite had an idea.
While the photographic world had no shortage of awards, he wanted to set up a new competition which would be open to both amateur and professional photographers and which crucially would celebrate both urban and rural Britain.
Six years on, Waite along with a panel of other experts have seen thousands of photographs ranging from salt marshes to ancient woodland and from industrial mill buildings to historic churches. What they all share, is a desire to capture a quintessential image of the country.
This year was no different and perhaps given its diversity, it is also no surprise that Yorkshire featured highly among the winning and commended entries.
Some spent hours patiently waiting for the perfect light to take their winning shot, while others stumbled across a scene and took the opportunity to catch on camera an image which moments later may well have disappeared.
“Photography has evolved in a way that the early pioneers more than 180 years ago could never have imagined,” says Waite, himself a renowned landscape photographer, whose images are often likened to paintings. “It has permeated into so many aspects of our lives, with many millions of pictures being made and shared every day through social networking sites and online.
“Yet despite this flood of images, this year’s entries have once again met the very high standards set when Landscape Photographer of the Year was launched in 2007. Over the last six years photographers have taken their cameras and set off in pursuit of images they have been determined to achieve.
“Whether through sheer tenacity or that glorious and often seemingly magical chance moment, they have once again made a series of images for us both to wonder at and, just as importantly to remind us of the wonderful country we are so fortunate to live in.
“I have heard some suggest that to photograph things separates the photographer from the experience, but I would strongly refute that. I’ve always thought that a camera was the most obvious and natural method to get closer to a scene.
“I think these images prove that and I hope that by gazing at them we can be transported in some way to that same place where they stood and may enjoy the same response that they enjoyed.”
The Landscape Photographer of the Year exhibition runs at the National Theatre in London until January 12. A book of the same name is out now, priced £25, and is available to buy from the Yorkshire Post Bookshop on 01748 821122.
I was travelling along the A171 between Whitby and Middlesbrough when I saw huge plumes of smoke billowing into the air from the Moors. On investigation I found it was controlled heather burning. I approached (with caution), taking a few shots at varying focal lengths with the sun partially backlighting the smoke. I framed the shot with emphasis on the smoke, placing the beater in the bottom corner to provide scale and show the enormity of the scene.