THE SCOTTISH LANDSCAPE PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR 2014
Congratulations go to 39 year old Craig Aitchison from Kirkintilloch, who has become the first ever “Scottish Landscape Photographer of the Year”. Craig won the overall title for his portfolio of classic panoramas of the Scottish Highlands which were captured on a Hasselblad Xpan camera. Craig’s images caught the eye of the judges and achieved the highest aggregate score out of all the images entered into the competition.
The Landscape Categeory was won by 46 year old Brian Kerr from Carlisle for his stunning image of a boat set against Threave Castle. Other winners include Willem Vlotman from London in the Seascape Category with his image entitled “Splash”, which captures a huge wave against the Aberdeen harbour lighthouse. The Urban Category was won by Donald Cameron with his image entitled “Steammotion” that captures the movement of the iconic Falkirk Wheel. The Youth category was won by Fiona Pulfrey for her image entitled “A Ray of Hope”.
The competition attracted photographers from across the globe and the standard was remarkably high. The competition included categories for the best in class individual photographs in the Landscape, Seascape, Urban and Youth categories. The grand title was decided based on a portfolio where the photographers top three scoring images were judged on factors such as image quality, capturing the essence of the scottish landscape and technical skills. All images were judged “anonymously”, where the image was viewed by each judge without any other information such as name, title or location.
Of the photograhers who were shortlisted for the overall title, the standard was exceptionally high and the quality of the images were breathtaking. The aim of the competition was to award the grand title to the photographer whose images showed a set of classic Scottish landscapes whilst demonstrating a high standard of photographic skills. Craig Aitchison was chosen as winner because from his entire submission, any combination of his images would have made a final portfolio of 3 images for the judging rounds.
The number of entries to the competition took everyone by surprise and it was originally planned to showcase around 40-50 images from the competition in the awards book. This and the skills of both the photographer and the quality of their photographs entered made it the most challenging of tasks to select the eventual winners. Such was the quality of entries that the number of commended images has been increased to award more photographers with a place in the competition book.
The competition book will be available to pre-order in a few days and it is hoped that exhibitions will be held to showcase the winners in the coming months.
We would like to thank each and every photographer who entered the competition, and congratulate all the winners, runners up and commended photographers.
Winning images can be viewed here.
Full list of winners, runners up and commended images can be viewed here.
