For the past 12 years, the Australian Photography Society has held the Australian Digital Photography Awards which is open to all photographers across Australia and APS members.
This year was my first time entering the competition and I was blown away with my results receiving a Bronze Medal in the Open category with ‘Holy Moley Bat Ears’. I also received a Merit for ‘Who’s Lookin’ at You’ in the Open.
I also did well in the Monochrome category receiving a Highly Commended award for ‘SuPAWdog’ and a Merit for ‘Rocky Wave’.
How I captured Holy Moley Bat Ears
I’ve been wanting to capture this photo for so long and in fact had moved this log into position on a disused walking trail in a little wetland area.
I’d been having some troubles with my focus and capturing a speeding staffy coming straight towards you is a challenge in itself. Luckily she is happy to run towards me several times in order for me to capture the shot I want!
The thing with log jumping is not only do you want to catch a sharp image, you need to catch it at the exact moment they are jumping the log. AND in fact, this image is actually made from TWO captures.
The Post Processing method
I really loved the pose of her body in one photo but had just missed the focus on her eyes and so I composited her head from a second photo to ensure it was sharp in all the right places.
The grasses were that awful yellow green and so I decided to tone all the colours to harmonise with the Blue Fawn coat of Lexie which really helps to make the image uniform without colours fighting for your attention.
Have fun sliding between the before and after
Not only did I change the colours but it’s also important to try and remove or reduce distractions as well which can become quite a time consuming process.
However winning an award sure does make all the effort that little more worthwhile. 🙂
Other photos awarded
As mentioned above I was also awarded a Highly Commended (which means I was <—this—> close to being awarded one of the top three, and two photos received a Merit which I believe means they were in the top 20% of high scores. A few of my other photos received acceptances but clearly need more refinement or just didn’t grab the attention of the judges on the day! 🙂
I was super excited that one of my favourite photos from my session with Ros and her family was awarded a Merit.
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