Masterclasses from Sony

As part of the World Photography Awards, Sony is laying on a series of photography masterclasses at London's Somerset House on Friday 26, Saturday 27, and Sunday 28 April. Michael Wayne Plant will be demystifying photography, there will be session aimed at students looking to make photography their careers led by Magdi Fernandes, and the team from What Digital Camera are looking at the past, present, and future of full-frame photography. Sessions cost £5, but that's redeemable against the cost of entry into the Sony World Photography Awards exhibition.

Full details about timings and booking are on the WPO website.

Sony World Photography Awards: Open Category winners

Starry Tree by Elmar Akhmetov, Kazakhstan, Winner, Low Light, Open Competition

The swanky gala awards ceremony for the Sony World Photography Awards 2013 draws closer, and the winners of the ten Open categories, the 3D category, and the Youth cetegory winners have just been announced.

Taking the spoils of a Sony A77 each for their prowess in the Open categories are:

• Architecture - Martina Biccheri, Italy
• Arts and Culture - Gilbert Yu, Hong Kong
• Enhanced - Hoang Hiep Nguyen, Vietnam
• Low Light - Elmar Akhmetov, Kazakhstan
• Nature & Wildlife - Krasimir Matarov, Bulgaria
• Panoramic - Yeow Kwang Yeo, Singapore
• People - Hisatomi Tadahiko, Japan
• Smile – Ming Hui Guan, China
• Split Second -  Matías Gálvez, Chile
• Travel - Manny Fajutag, Philippines

These ten amateur photographers are now up for being awarded the title Sony World Photography Awards Open Photographer of the Year on 25 April 2013 at the aforementioned swanky gala ceremony, and will be presented with $5,000 in addition to their new camera.

As for the 3D award, that's going to Matjaž Tančič, a Slovenian fashion photographer based in Beijing and Ljubljana. 

The overall winner of the Youth category will also be announced on 25 April, but the finalists for that honour are:

• Culture - Alecsandra Dragoi, Romania
• Environment - Xu Wei Shou, Taiwan
• Portraits- Berta Vicente, Spain

The professional photographers have been shortlisted; the winner of the Iris d'Or will be unveiled on 25 April in London.

(All images copyright their respective photographers and courtesy of the 2013 Sony World Photography Awards.)

Photographers of the future: Sony World Photography Awards Student Focus finalists

'Jackpot', by Aimee Turner (UK). Student Focus Finalist, 2013 Sony World Photography Awards

The judges of the Sony World Photography Awards Student Focus competition have named their ten finalists. They come from ten different countries, across six continents, and were selected from 230 universities.

The finalists can't sit back and rest on their submitted images to be in with a chance of bagging €35,000-worth of Sony photography equipment for their college or university, though. They've been given a brand new Sony Alpha 65 and the brief of shooting a series of between six and ten images on the theme of family.

All of the finalists will, however, see their final-making photos exhibited at Somerset House as part of the Sony World Photography Awards Exhibition between 26 April and 12 May 2013. They'll also be treated to a trip to London for the gala awards ceremony on 25 April.

The final-making images are on the carousel up there. What do you think? Is this a good example of the depth of student photography and how does it make you feel for the future?

And for the record, here are the finalists:

• Zanele Plaatjie, Vaal University of Technology, South Africa
• Eugene Soh, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
• Anshul Mehrotra, Jamia Millia Islamia, Dehli, India
• Andrea Azema, École nationale supérieure des arts visuels de La Cambre, Brussels, Belgium
• Natalia Wiernik, Jan Matejko Academy of Fine Arts, Krakow, Poland
• Sarai Rua Fargues, Institut D’Estudis Fotogràfics de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain
• Aimee Turner, Coleg Sir Gâr, Carmarthen, Wales
• Marcelo Sanchez, Tecnológico de Monterrey, Monterrey, Mexico
• Kim Annan, The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
• Maria Candelaria Rivera Gadea, Escuela Motivarte, Buenos Aires, Argentina

2012 Sony World Photography Awards return to London

After four years sunning itself in Cannes, the Sony World Photography Awards tried out London this year, and it seems as if it found the climate agreeable: the awards are set to return to London for their 2012 incarnation.

Events kick off on 26 April, with the swish and swanky awards ceremony, followed by the - likely even swisher and swankier - gala dinner at the Hilton Hotel on Park Lane. Over the weekend 27-30 April there will be a few select events taking place, as well as the winning entries from the awards being on display at Somerset House.

From then until 20 May, there is a jam-packed programme of talks, seminars, workshops, and exhibitions planned for anyone who has the slightest interest in photography. How about four nights of conversation with some world class photographers, including the recipient of the Sony World Photography Awards Outstanding Contribution to Photography, as they tell their stories and share their experiences?

Maybe you'd prefer a workshop session that helps you to take better portraits? Or you could spend an evening sipping a glass of wine and pondering some of the photos in the exhibitions at the Wine and Critique session.

That's just a few of the highlights. Keep an eye on the Festival Programme page to see if anything else piques your fancy, and you can pick up tickets here.

Sony World Photography Awards open for 2012

The World Photography Organisation has just opened the Sony World Photography Awards 2012 for entries. There are some exciting new categories this time around, making for an even bigger and hopefully better competition, which reflect the changes that’re happening in the photographic world right now. As ever, it’s divided into two sections: professional and open (you have to choose between one or the other) and it’s free to make submissions. Whatever you submit, though, it needs to have been shot in 2011.

Building on the success of the inaugural Moving Image award in 2011, which was won by Will and Matt Burrard-Lucas’ Migration (and giving opportunities to everyone who loves using their dSLRs to make films), this category has been expanded and divided into six categories: nature and wildlife, people, extraordinary, commerical, fine art, and documentary. There’s also the brand new Youth competition, with its environment, portrait, and culture categories, which is for photographers under 20 years old. Good to see some encouragement happening there. Don’t worry: the Student Focus competition, for photography students, is still running.

Migration from Will & Matt Burrard-Lucas on Vimeo.

A nature and wildlife category has been added to the professional section. I can’t think why there hasn’t been one before now. In the open section, there are three new categories: low-light, split-second, and enhanced. Again, these seem to be taking into consideration developments in photography and how people are taking their pictures now.

Winner of the Open Award 2011: Buffalo Race, © Chan Kwok Hung courtesy of Sony World Photography Awards 2011

If you don’t think that you’ve shot anything yet this year that’s suitable for submission, don’t worry. You’ve until 23:59 (GMT) on Wednesday 4 January 2012 to get it in. You can do that over at www.worldphoto.org.

The winner of L’Iris d’Or – the over all winner of the professional competition – will walk away with US$25,000 and some Sony photography equipment. The winner of the open competition gets US$5,000 as well as some Sony photography goodies. Those prizes will be presented at a swanky awards ceremony in London in April next year, which is part of the World Photography Festival.

Time to get cracking, then. Everything you need to know to enter is on the World Photography Organisation website.

(Featured image: The Hunter 1, part of L’Iris d’Or-winning series, © Alejandro Chaskielberg – courtesy of Sony World Photography Awards 2011)

Sony World Photography Awards - the winners!

Many congratulations to the winners of prizes at last night’s Sony World Photography Awards, in particular Alejandro Chaskielberg who took home the Iris d’Or, Chan Kwok Hung who was named as overall Open winner, and Bruce Davidson for his Outstanding Contribution to Photography Award. It was a very swanky night, and indeed the first time that the awards have been hosted outside of Cannes, with lots of lovely pictures to contemplate.

Chaskielberg won the People award in the Photojournalism category with his ‘High Tide’ series that explored the lives of a community of islanders who live on the Parana River Delta. He then went on to compete against the twelve other winners from the Photojournalism, Commercial, and Fine Art categories. Given the ridiculously high standard of all the entries, it was surprising to hear that the judges found it relatively easy to pick their overall winner: ‘These carefully directed pictures tell solid truths – about toil and communality and marginal economic survival – in a splendidly allusive way.’

The Hunter 1, part of L'Iris d'Or-winning series, © Alejandro Chaskielberg - courtesy of Sony World Photography Awards 2011

I thought that all three of the selections in the campaigns section of the commercial category were fabulous. And I did wonder if the judges might have second-guessed themselves when Fabrizio Cestari’s series of Christ-like surfers, which came third in the Lifestyle section of the Commercial category, raised the first spontaneous round of applause of the evening.

Surfism - A New Religion, third in the Lifestyle award, © Fabrizio Cestari - courtesy Sony World Photography Awards 2011

Amit Madheshiya’s series of images that recorded people attending travelling tented cinemas in India brought a huge smile to my face. That won the Arts and Culture award in the Photojournalism category.

Winner of the Arts and Culture award, © Amit Madheshiya - courtesy Sony World Photography Awards 2011

Congratulations are also due to Will and Matt Burrard-Lucas for their film ‘Migration‘, which won the Moving Image Award and the Student Focus winner, Louis Boulet of the Ecole Superieure Louis-Lumiere.

Winner of the Open Award: Buffalo Race, © Chan Kwok Hung courtesy of Sony World Photography Awards 2011

But the final word should go to Javier Arcenillas, who won both the Current Affairs and Contemporary Issues awards in the Photojournalism category: ‘Photojournalism… it’s very hard.’

Sicarios 10, © Javier Arcenillas - courtesy Sony World Photography Awards 2011

You can see all the winning images on-line at the World Photography Awards site, or take a look at the exhibition at Somerset House, which runs until 22 May.

World Photography Festival, London

The shortlist for the Sony World Photography Awards was announced earlier this week. With over 105,000 entries coming from professional and amateur photographers in 162, the judges have certainly had their work cut out. The winners will be unveiled at a posh-frock do at the Odeon, Leicester Square, on 27 April 2011. But, there’s a whole lot more to the champagne-fuelled awards ceremony going on that week.

26 April to 1 May is the World Photography Festival. For six days there will be a glut of photographic activity happening in London. Exhibitions, naturally; seminars, but of course; workshops, you betcha. And not forgetting the awards ceremony, either.

Serra da Laba, Angola, © Kostadin Luchansky courtesy of Sony World Photography Awards 2011

You can have your portfolio critiqued by a pro; if you’re a student there’s advice on how to start out in the big, bad world of professional photography; you can even leap on a guerilla photoshoot, in studio or on location around London. Exhibitions will feature the images from the Sony World Photography Awards, as well as those from the Student Focus Awards, the university showcase, and the Save the Children project.

The Kitchest Bear, © Antoine Beyeler courtesy of Sony World Photography Awards 2011

And finally, if you fancy attending a fancy do, there are a few tickets available for the public to attend the awards ceremony. Prices start at £22 and go on sale on 4 February 2011. Want more details? Go here.

World Photography Festival, London: lots more information from the website.

Shy, © Arup Ghosh courtesy of Sony World Photography Awards 2011

(All images are shortlisted images from the 2011 Sony World Photography Awards Open Category. Open category winners will be announced on 22 March. For further information see www.worldphoto.org.)

Sony World Photography Awards

If you haven’t already entered the Sony World Photography Awards competition, you should probably think about it. Whether you’re a professional or an enthusiastic amateur, there is almost certainly a category that you can enter, and there are some pretty neat prizes on offer, too!

It’s divided into two sections: professional and open. Okay, so the pros do have a substantially larger prize fund available to them: $25,000 compared to $5,000, but if you win the open competition, you’ll be flown to the next Sony World Photography Awards ceremony and World Photography Festival in London. (I wonder if that means they’d fly me out of City Airport and into Heathrow?)

There’s a vast array of categories into which you can submit images, and a fairly awesome judging panel.

You can be any age to enter the open competition, but if you’re under 16 you will require consent from parents or guardians. Closing date is 5 January 2011.

The competition is free to enter and supports the Bill of Rights for Competitions. What are you waiting for? Lots more information is available here for the open competition and here for pros!