I had a pleasant surprise today – I submitted a picture a couple of weeks ago to a monthly travel photo competition held by The Times and found out today I was one of the finalists!
About a week ago they posted a second set of nominees (they post 2 sets of nominees per month) and I wasn’t in either the first nor the second, so I’d figured I didn’t have a chance. They announced the winner today and posted the top 10 pictures (I assume in order since the winner was first). I was flicking through them just to see what pictures had made it through and when I got to number 8 was surprised to see my own! Unfortunately I missed out on £420 worth of camera, but I’m not going to complain about 8th place!
Check it out here. (Click on the “December’s finalists” link under the “Multimedia menu partway down the left-hand side of the page – you need to scroll down a little – and mine is the 8th picture (some of the others are worth a look as well, like 4 and 7)).
It’s a picture of some Hungarians playing chess in the Széchenyi baths in Budapest, Hungary, taken on the 11th of September this year (with a Nikon F65 camera – bought in Budapest after my previous one broke!)
[...] the original post: The Times Photography Competition « That Place Called Home The Spit Shine: National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest Winners …WOOPIE! Merry Christmas! [...]
Great photo… i can see why you did so well in the competition with this one..
Hi Catherine, thanks for the comment!
I had the picture up on my wall (along with several others I took while in Hungary) and didn’t think more of it until a couple of people pointed that one out as being better than the others. So I submitted it, not expecting to get anywhere, and then at the end of the month, since I wasn’t contacted, figured I wasn’t even close to winning. Then I checked the finalists and got quite a pleasant surprise!
Update: As if being one of the finalists wasn’t enough, I just won a Lonely Planet “Traditions” themed competition on Flickr with this shot. It’s only a weekly competition which is voted on by members of the public and the prize is a guidebook, but hey, I won!