Every year hundreds of photographers throw their best work into the AIPP Australian Professional Photography Awards, and every year they always say “sending in some gold!” hoping that their image gets up to a Gold level. Golds are pretty rare, you need a score 90 or above to get one from 5 judges who are considered to be some of the best photographers in the country and even some from overseas.
I’m pretty consistent with my entries, i’ve ridden the Silver wagon for years, I have picked up a gold before but it’s been a while. This year I had some solid images, I was happy with them but being a judge too, I know where what an image needs to go that extra mile to take it to gold. And to be honest, I was expecting a strong showing and hoping for a gold. Realistic expectations, especially entering the wedding category which is notoriously hard to get a gold, in a good year maybe 10 are given out.
Well this was my year it seems, after watching my first 2 prints drop out of award contention (still high in professional practice) I was hoping for a couple of silvers to make me happy. And I got one! The one below i’m pretty proud of, got a solid silver so that had my hopes up…. but the judges were being hard and everything was going against the print I had left getting up because it wasn’t a typical gold image, it was more photo documentary in nature and wasn’t overly photoshopped, two things that can hold an image back when being judged next to ultra stylised and worked prints.
So it came up and got a silver distinction, but that wasn’t the end of it… one judge put it into the Gold range and challenged the score. That means the judges debate and get a chance to re judge the print with a new score. And it got up to GOLD.
I was standing in the back of the room and had to go for a little walk. Getting a gold in wedding is still blowing my mind a bit. And it’s pushing and pushing me to do it again…
