We are happy to announce that the winner of the RSDS Photo Competition for February 2024 has been chosen. Congratulations to Luisa Weinert with her photo "I'm hiding".
Luisa wins a free stay at the RSDS village of her choice. You can view the winning photo, and all the February participants here.
If you would like a chance to win, simply register on our website and upload your photos from our competition page. Each day we choose a 'photo of the day' from the selection of entries. Anyone can register on our website and vote on photos entered into the competition. At the end of the month our Photo Pro and photography workshop leader, Paul ‘Duxy’ Duxfield, looks at the votes and chooses a winner from the highest scoring photos. Full terms and conditions and prize details are available here.
Congratulations again to Luisa, and good luck to all those participating in the coming months!
From Paul Duxfield, our competition judge:
It’s all in the details.
That's how I felt after judging the February entrants, as the eventual winner struck me as being so close to not winning but for one very tiny detail. More of that when I get to it though.
Another good month marked out by unusual subjects and strong compositions.
Beautifully composed close contenders from Shannon Moran with a brightly lit dolphin juxtaposed with a free diver, and the pair of dolphins in opposing diagonals by László Földi both great images of these regular visitors to RSDS.
The head on Whale Shark by Wioletta Jozwiak also well framed and worthy of a mention.
A couple of noteworthy captures with the Velvet Fish and the Gas Flame ’Shaun the Sheep’ Nudi from Anders Larsson and Christine Osten respectively. These were also nicely angled, with both Anders and Christine adopting very low angles to increase the drama of their subject matter.
My favourite this month though goes to Luisa Weinert with her gorgeous shot of a Whip Coral Goby, these aren't a particularly uncommon subject however the details are what make this shot for me.
Compositionally its a lovely sideways curve, nicely lit and focused, a lesser photographer may have been happy enough to just leave it at that, but the detail of the whip corals polyps being out and providing a haven that the goby could hide in, could have just as easily spoilt this picture, but allowing the cover to not obstruct the fish too much and vitally not obscure the pupil of the eye has meant that this picture has clinched the top spot this month, within a very strong field of runners up. So well done Luisa great shot.
It’s worth mentioning that whilst it’s starting to fill up nicely this years Fotofest at Marsa Nakari still has some places left.
Me and Sarah O’Gorman will be running the workshop.
I’ve decided to run the Fotofest 2024 workshop with a big emphasis on hands on individual help and advice, and the lectures which will be short and sweet, will focus on composition and creativity in the main, this way everyone from GoPro users to higher end mirrorless or DSLR's should all get a fair crack of the whip. More details can be found here.
