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Keswick Photographic Society’s annual Portfolio of the Year competition was held via Zoom on Wednesday 31^st March. It was judged by Stephen Fowler, a Northern Counties Photographic Federation judge from Ryton. The competition normally consists of prints and digital images but this year, because of the limitations caused by Covid-19, entries were restricted to digital images only. Members entered four images with each one of the four being of a different photographic genre. Entries were marked out of twenty and an award is given to the member achieving the highest combined score for his or her images. Twenty members entered the competition, giving a total of eighty digital images. These can all be viewed in our gallery pages:

KPS 2020-2021 Galleries

The eighty images featured the following photographic genres: nature (fauna and flora), landscape, weather, creative, sport, the hand of man, people and portraiture. Before awarding a mark, Stephen gave a critique of each image. Three images achieved top scores of twenty and these were ‘Rajasthani Lady’ by David Woodthorpe:

 

‘White Tailed Sea Eagle Landing with Catch’ by Alan Walker:

 

and ‘Radiant Smile’ by Tom Stenhouse:

 

Nine images received impressive scores of nineteen and these were: ‘Gone to Seed’ by Tom Stenhouse, ‘Old Soldier’ by Marilyn Woodthorpe, ‘Golden Dawn’ by Marcus Mackay, ‘Goshawk with Prey’ and ‘Rock Swirls, Painted Desert, Utah’, both by Ronnie Gilbert, ‘Common Buzzard’ by Tony Marsh, ‘Obscured by Clouds’ and ‘Together’, both by Bob Given and ‘Can I Help You Comrade’ by Alan Walker. Twenty-three images were awarded excellent scores of eighteen and these were: ‘Moody Ennerdale Sunset’, ‘Milky Way Core Over Algarve’ and ‘Hazelnut Sorbet’, all three by Richard Jakobson, ‘An Intimate Conversation’ and ‘Hanging On’, both by Keith Snell, ‘I Can Swallow That’, ‘Church of the Spilled Blood’ and ‘Stellar Catch on Ice’, all three by Simon Roberts, ‘Arctic Landscape’ and ‘Medieval Warrior Queen’, both by Alan Walker, ‘Red Squirrel’ and ‘Winter’s Touch’, both by Carol Minks, ‘Anna Ahead’, ‘Autumn Leaves’ and ‘Stripes en Pointe, all three by Annie Given, ‘Green Iguana in Breeding Colours’ by Julie Walker, ‘Black Tailed Godwit’ and ‘Poppy’, both by David Rayment, ‘Moonset Behind Grizedale Pike’ by Tony Marsh, ‘Mist in the Hills’ by Tom Stenhouse, ‘Mick the Dealer’ by Bob Given, ‘Evening Round Up on the Marshes’ by Ronnie Gilbert and ‘Goshawk with Grey Squirrel’ by Fred Bell.

At the end of the judging, Stephen remarked that he had thoroughly enjoyed looking at the images which, he stated, represented a superb combination of the different photographic genres. Stephen chose his overall winning image of the competition and this was ‘White Tailed Sea Eagle Landing with Catch’ by Alan Walker. This image was also awarded the accolade of  ‘Best Nature Image’. Stephen chose ‘Golden Dawn’ by Marcus Mackay as his ‘Best Landscape Image’:

 

‘Autumn Leaves’ by Annie Given as his ‘Best Creative Image’:

 

and ‘Best People Image’ was awarded to Tom Stenhouse for ‘Radiant Smile’.

When the individual authors’ marks were added together, the winner of the Portfolio of the Year competition was Alan Walker with a superb total score of seventy-five out of a possible eighty. In second place, and only one point behind, with an excellent score of seventy-four was Tom Stenhouse. Bob Given was third with a score of seventy-three and in fourth place was Ronnie Gilbert with seventy-two. In all, eight members achieved very commendable scores of seventy or more.

Tricia Rayment

Jo Knight, an award-winning photographer who has exhibited in many different countries, was our speaker tonight. The theme of her talk was the obstacles that she had to overcome in order to progress from a complete beginner to achieving her first distinction with the Photographic Alliance of Great Britain over a period of four years.

Jo only took up photography in 2013 when she decided to take photographs to show her father of the wildlife she encountered on her daily walks with her dog. She bought a third hand camera but found the manual, which was full of technical jargon, hard to understand. She then joined Penrith and District Camera Club and there found the help and support that she needed to progress her photography. She quickly developed her skills and achieved success in club competitions.

 

 

Jo has a disability and she has also suffered from a long-term illness with the result that she is in constant pain. Both her mobility and her energy are limited. While she could cope with photographing wildlife during the warmer months of the year Jo realised that the cold winter months would present a problem so she needed to find another outlet for her photographic skills. She decided to venture in to studio photography and to convert her tiny second bedroom for this purpose. This presented a second obstacle as her budget was limited so she purchased most of her photographic equipment second hand or cheaply through eBay or Amazon.  Instead of hiring professional models, she bribed friends and relatives to pose for her. She then turned to taking photographs of herself often in elegant gowns, again purchased at a low cost, and, using the skills she had developed in mastering processing software, she incorporated these in imaginative and beautiful composites.

 

At first Jo’s images were not appreciated by club competition judges but her huge success in international and other competitions shows the extent to which she has conquered this obstacle. The final obstacle was to overcome her own lack of confidence in her work but she has now learned to trust her own gut instinct.

Jo showed us numerous examples of her exquisite work during the evening and kept us entertained with a lively and highly articulate narrative. She is a talented and creative photographer who has faced numerous obstacles in her life. Her determination and dedication in overcoming these to achieve such recognition and success in the photographic world is an example to us all.

Julie Walker