Attached Link: Article & Gallery

of all the ones  I looked  at the winner is my least favorite..It doesn't say anything to me..

The man with no legs is good..but I would have to spend more time to really decide

I need to know more about the credentials of the judge, Andrew Sayers, ... how he got his position, his training, what sort of images he records, ...  

As to the other finalists ... some that I liked ...

Bruce Pascoe  by Kim Batterham

Len Green by David Sandison

... and that's about it. 

The images of the Bondi Explosion had a lot more zap to them. 

--Martin

The least worthy of the set, I'd say.
Not surprising , though, it fits perfectly into the present fashion in art in general.
Nick Serota would probably LOVE it.

Hmm Cant say it does much for me either .. Even the horizon if a tad off kilter via the wide angle the print looks better with the guy standing in front with his two sons.. The Bruce Pascoe image and the clever 50 years are more to my own taste.

This must be confusing to the other entrants of why this was the winner while many of the others were so superior.

Firstly it is not very easy to judge from the digital representations shown.

Looking at the image which shows the whole print, with artist and sons, it is clear the image in the article, and indeed the digital gallery,  is a very poor representation of the original.  The composition has been totally changed by cropping off the image in the article. Not only this, it is clear the light has been altered too, a lot of detail has been lost in the image in the article.

This maybe the case with the other portraits too, which is what makes judging an impossible task from these web images. 

However looking at the photograph which includes the original print I have to say the composition is very strong,  the strongest of all the images.   For originality this image scores well with me, many of the others are very cliched, with few signs of originality of thought or composition.
I like the way the subject is handled with the boys mirroring in both: position and character.  It gives the image a lot of dynamic energy to me. 

I disagree with the article and believe it is probably the best photographic portrait .  There is my initial reservations though that it is very difficult to tell from these cropped and altered images we have been shown.  

From me: Yes - top honours deserved .

Perhaps we should look directly at the current exhibit,
National Photographic Portrait Prize (20 March - 24 May 2009). 

There are close to 60 images ... all should be reviewed to get the full picture. 

I don't yet know if the images on the NPG site are better/different from
the ones in the originally cited news article, 

The entire site begins here ... National Portrait Gallery.

Comments, please ...

--Martin

Without even looking at the images, I would say this is probably another example of why I do not enter photo contests. Your particular photo may greatly please 99 of 100 viewers but if the 100th viewer is the judge, you lose. Judges are just human after all despite how loftily their talents may be sung. They bring with them their own personal likes and dislikes and the images that have formed them into what they are. I prefer photo contests with one entry and one viewer and I easily accept that the person may not like what they see. They might like one another time.

In a way, Renderosity is a one on one photo contest because if the thumbnail does not grab someone, they move on to someone else's photo or art work. I believe it has to catch the eye to get people to bother looking unless it has a nudity warning, in which case you have to view it to get any idea of what is there.

While I'm on my rant, another thing I don't like about photo contests is that many of them are fronts for magazines to get free photos to publish by using the guise of a contest. Potential entrants should always read the fine print in the contest rules. There are magazines today that publish nothing but free photos and stories submitted by their readers, while rewarding the entries with cheap 10¢ prizes. I prefer to donate my photos to non-profit magazines such as "Branchline" who use the funds earned to support locomotive restoration. Okay, the rant is over!

Thank you Martin - they are better copies displayed in your link than in the newspaper article.

The exhibits are all of a high quality as you would expect. I feel some are particularly Australian in nature and perhaps I do not share or understand the emotions the photographers are trying to show.

I have not revised my opinion, that the right image won. 

I would also give a highly commended to: Assorted Toppings, which I like very much. I particularly liked the way the toppings had an Islamic style to their imagery, in the context of being an ice cream cone something universally recognised throughout the world.  It was this that I first picked up on when I saw the image.

Quote - I would also give a highly commended to: Assorted Toppings, which I like very much. I particularly liked the way the toppings had an Islamic style to their imagery, in the context of being an ice cream cone something universally recognised throughout the world.  It was this that I first picked up on when I saw the image.

Assorted Toppings would have been my first choice as well. I also liked the people is the baobab (sp?) tree. And others. Interesting how the winner doesn't strike most people right away.

Quote - Perhaps we should look directly at the current exhibit,
National Photographic Portrait Prize (20 March - 24 May 2009). 

Comments, please ...

--Martin

Sorry, you failed to mention (notice?) that there's nudity in that gallery.

Oh and peekaboo from ghost-land (crawls back into hiding)

For me the winner is pure portrait - tells me something about boys' characters and has no social commentary which is why I place it higher .

I was not certain Assorted Toppings told me enough about the individual because it has the secondary theme of a social commentary. 
Maybe it does say all there is to say about this Muslim  woman living, and selling ice cream, in a secular society but I can't help but feel that there should be something more. Perhaps if there had been someone at the counter she was interacting with her own personality could have come through.  Perhaps that forlorn look to the horizon and isolation says it all ?

I dunno... I can tell why it won, though...

If you're a fan of folks like Emmet Gowin and even Annie Leibovitz, this would be the pic. The more quiet art approach. A curator or gallery organizer would be more in line with picking this image.

I WILL add that I do see what he's getting at - that the tiles, the pool wall and the lines of the walls lead you to the center where the boys are - you're lead into the shot. Technically it's got some skill, though I have no idea if it's accidental. This could very well have been a family snapshot he entered into a contest and got lucky.

Aside from that... Not my thing...

My personal tastes, however, like a LOT of the other ones in the small gallery better - I don't remember their names, but the black woman with the red bag in the cyan/green background, the man sitting in his cluttered bedroom, the man with no legs, the Muslim woman in her ice-cream truck, and the older couple redoing their portrait from years ago left impressions with me that the winner did not.

I like social relevance, I like illustration, I like a hint at who the person is in a portrait these days. All I get from the boys is that they're indoor swimming, with that look on their faces like, "Dad, take the picture sometime today..."

-Lew

I have to agree with the writer of the article.  I don't think that that image is prize-worthy.  I went and looked through the gallery linked by MGD first, to get my own impressions of the image without reading what the author thought.

My opinion?  I've spent a lot of time the last couple of months studying up on how to take good portraits, and I do understand that in certain cases, rules can be broken.  This does not come close.  The children are not the main subject.  They look very uncomfortable.  The lighting is poor.  The BG adds nothing to the image.  The cones, while by dint of color associate themselves with the younger boys flippers, add absolutely nothing to this shot.  The doorknob on the far right of the frame is a distraction.  The use of the edge of the pool as leading lines directing your eyes towards the children does work and was used well.  (Although, its really kind of sad that that is the only good thing that I can say about the photograph as a whole.)

When I look at the image, I ask myself what the point of the photo is, and I just can't figure it out.  What is the subject of this photo?  Is it the kids?  The pool?  The austere background?  The cones (they are the point of highest contrast in the shot)?  Everything in the shot is given equal weight (even the distracting doorknob).  If everything in the shot has equal weight, then everything is supposed to be important, which means that nothing is. 

Are the cones there to represent that they are in a construction zone?  If so, why was that not made more apparent?  Is it the pool in unusual circumstances (a plain white room with a couple of cones in it)?  The kids in an unusual room with a pool in it?

I personally do not get this image, nor do I understand how this shows a father's love for his children, and I would also have deleted it from my memory card if I had shot it.  If this is what an award-winning portrait looks like, then maybe I should stop now, 'cause I don't get it.

My opinion; this shot that I took of a little girl having fun at an event at the local mall is a much better shot than that one.

Thanks for reading my two cents.

Mike

MGD highlights the two that I thought stand out, but as to the rest I feel I see images equally good or better in our gallery here.

I think the winning image is in a class of its own; the more I look at it, the more I see how everything falls into place like a perfect fitting glove. It really is a very ingeniously composed and conducted portrait. Only two or three of the others come 'close' by a fair margin, but still not on the same level.

The jury deserves all credit for not falling into the trap of being distracted by emotional interest, social relevance, superficial attraction or artistic beauty (I agree that the winning image has none of those 'qualities').

The jury deserves all credit for not falling into the trap of being
distracted by emotional interest, social relevance, superficial
attraction or artistic beauty

Hmmmmmmmmm ... I wonder what the rules were for the judges? 

Inquiring minds want to know.

--Martin

 lol?

  Any photo should leave me completely unmoved.  The winner did a magnificent job

As somebody here said, it makes me realise why I never enter art competitions of any kind.

Nick.

"Any photo should leave me completely unmoved.  The winner did a magnificent job"

HAHA!!!
-Lew ;-)

Well, the winning photo leaves me completely unmoved too. I don't even like it at all. It lacks everything that I find attractive in an image. I wouldn't hang it on my wall.

But it's still the best photograph of them all. At first it looks like an uninspired snapshot; but that is only very deceptive, because if you care to look twice, you can (could) see that it's perfectly composed, perfectly lit, perfectly balanced, perfectly conceived and perfectly orchestrated. These are objective qualities. I think if any of the other entries had the same qualities, they also could have won.

Social relevance, emotional interest, beauty or attractiveness (I like it / I love it) are subjective qualities; could be relevant in a popularity contest, or for humanitarian or for commercial purposes or what not, but I don't think that was the goal of this Photography Portrait Prize. They just had to choose the very best portrait, and so they did.

Is it that hard to say: "I don't like it, but it's really good"..?

The author of the winning image is the leading contemporary portrait photographer in Australia. The man knows what he's doing. Comments like I read in the linked article: "My seven year old son has taken better photographs" sound a bit ridiculous.

Bit surely a portrait is meant to make the viewer feel something about the character being portrayed: their emotions or character or thoughts.

Deciding that a portrait competition should be won on technical grounds alone seems to be against the idea of portraiture.

I actually find the shot very flat and characterless technically, just because of the way it is lighted.

Anyway, as I said I have entered one photo comp, was not even mentioned and totally could not work out why the winner won: not aganst me...tyhere were far getter shots than mine in the comp, but against other shots.

I have seen many others, that I was not in, about which I felt the same. So never again.

Nick

Beauty they say is in the eye of the beholder..  As I said at the outset the image on the wall with the winner in front with the two boys seemed to me to be in another class to the others of this same image, on any of the links..

Subjective observations may reveal a whole host of possibilities,  They talk of love of the father for his son's for example.. Maybe so, I also saw it could be interpreted another way,  are the boys looking just a tad  coerced into standing there with froth on the face ,and almost at atttention!   I can imagine they may be thinking, I hope none of my mates see this!!

The other aspects are important, and we can argue if  this image  may have been by accident or by design..  We can give the benefit of the doubt, and for sure the guy is laughing all the way to the bank in any case.

We should take another look at "Still Life with Vanitas Symbols (after David Bailly)" by Kevin Best, one of the entries in the NPPP 2009. 

Then compare it with the original, "Self-Portrait with Vanitas Symbols"; David Bailly; 1651. 

Yes, Best's submission is derivative ... but also quite interesting in its own light. 

BTW, the Web Gallery of Art could be a useful resource, and worth a visit. 

Comments, please. 

--Martin

http://www.usanetwork.com/characterproject/

Other references by well respected portrait artists. Granted, this is more portraiture for commercial aesthetics, not necessarily "art".

The shot by Mary Ellen Mark has BOATLOADS more character "in my opinion" than the winner, yet it's incredibly simple - from the lighting to the lack of elegant posing. But keep in mind, what are probably the most important set of words in that last sentence are "in my opinion".

Really, it's all subjective, and a contest is decided by the subjective view of the judges. There is no math to this - no 2+2=4 way to decide what is "good" and what should "win".

I recognize some things like I mentioned before-  the lines leading you in to the boys - but I just don't get the comments about "masterful lighting" and "can clearly see the love for his boys" - they looked bored to tears, told to stand "here" so dad can take a shot when they'd rather be swimming.

Just because it won doesn't mean every pair of eyes will agree with why it won.
-Lew

-- "We can give the benefit of the doubt, and for sure the guy is laughing all the way to the bank in any case."--

I know I would be laughing all the way to the bank, and even more so on the way back... :rolleyes:

No great shakes IMHO, I thought this far better.

I agree with the outrage and would expect it....still, judges are judges and juries are that, too.  I have found amazement and depression both in the choices of juries of art competitions and juried events.  You see, judge or jury member, folks are folks and all can be infected by the position.  Some actually do a fine job.  

I did like the shot of the two kids at the pool but that is not my favorite. Times change.       TomDart.

Ho ho! Well seen.  Little boys or girls and a red room.