Having read the “article”:http://www.silvertraveladvisor.com/blog/cruise-hurtigruten-blog/the-travel-photographer-of-the-year-awards-with-hurtigruten by Andrew Morris on the Travel Photographer of the Year exhibition, it sounded worth visiting, but as I’m on the verge of completing a Summer Photography Course with the Walthamstow and District Photographic Society, it was a must.
The competition, now in its 12th year, has moved its exhibition to the University of Greenwich which even though I live in London, is a bit of a hike by tube and DLR. However, it was worth it.
At 10.30am on a Tuesday morning, the well-laid out, well-lit gallery was pretty empty and it was lovely to walk around virtually on my own.
There are a number of categories for both portfolios of four photographs and single shots. All the categories, winners and photographs are shown on their “website”:http://www.tpoty.com/winners/2015 so if you can’t make Greenwich, you can still see the images.
As well as colour images, a number were in black and white (there is a separate category for monochrome) and it was good to see that they’re keeping up with the times by having a category for a photo taken on a smartphone or ipad.
We were encouraged to vote for our favourite photograph and if you made a donation (suggested value £1), you were entered into a draw for a holiday. A board showed the top ten photographs as voted for the previous day. In number 1 was a rather “stunning shot”:http://www.tpoty.com/resources/images/winners-large/2015/TPOTY-MomentLight-Com-GStreu.jpg purple with the Northern Lights.
My favourite images were those highly commended in the People and Cultures portfolio and taken in Burma of young novice nuns in vibrant red and pink outfits by Sue O’Connell from the UK.
As well as appreciating the photographs, after my course, I was now fascinated by the technical data attached to each one: the f stop, shutter speed and ISO and it took me around 90 minutes to view the whole exhibition and buy a book of the photographs (£9.95) although post cards and greetings cards of some of the images are also available.
There were also two huge maps on the walls and on one you were encouraged to put a pin on the country you were from, and on the other, the country you’d like to visit. It would appear that most visitors were from the UK and that the country on most wish lists is New Zealand.
The exhibition space has good facilities: lift, small café and loos (including disabled).
Just in case you’re interested, the portfolio categories for 2016 are (1) Mankind, (2) Land, Sea, Sky, (3) Journeys and Adventures, whilst the single image categories are (1) Wildlife and Nature, Shaped by Light and (3) Cities.
