September 26, 2011

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I don't understand photography competition judging

By Alex Wild

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This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American

Really, I don't.

This spectacular spider image, captured by John Brackenbury, is a highly commended entry in the "Hidden Wildlife" category of the British Wildlife Photography Awards. As it should be. It is a striking composition. It is original. It is beautiful. And it is technically challenging to create. Properly lighting a small, backlit subject sitting that close to a wide-angle lens requires a masterful knowledge of exposure and strobe.

If Brackenbury's orb-weaver is a runner-up, certainly the winning entry must be incredible. But no. Not in my opinion:

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The winning scorpionfly is a fine image. It is properly exposed and focused. It is better, in fact, than any scorpionfly photo I've ever taken.

But I would not have picked this over the orb weaver. There's nothing novel or technically challenging here. The composition is standard bug-on-a-leaf. The light is ambient. The backdrop is distracting and not particularly thought out. Dozens of similarly composed, and similarly competent, images are uploaded to flickr every day.

Maybe I'm missing something. What about the scorpionfly merits a higher ranking than the orb spider?

Alex Wild is Curator of Entomology at the University of Texas at Austin, where he studies the evolutionary history of ants. In 2003 he founded a photography business as an aesthetic complement to his scientific work, and his natural history photographs appear in numerous museums, books and media outlets.

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