The Leica iiic Competition – Andrej’s Winning photo

I thought it about time I announced the winner of the Leica iiic competition officially. With only one vote in it in the end the photo that received the most votes was Andrej’s photo of the tree trunks in the snow taken with a Yashica mini-j.

Contrary to my comment in the top ten post about not wanting to appear biased, I did actually go on to mention a couple times on Twitter etc this photo was one of – if not was – my favourite of the photos that was entered into the competition. Though I should add, out of the final 10, it was definitely a tough call. In fact it would have been a tough call for me if I’d included a further 10 photos in that post; there were some very good photos that found their way to the cutting room floor. For me though, the most important factor was that the photo didn’t give away its origin as a one taken on an inexpensive camera, and to my mind, the tree trunks in the snow photo was one of the entries that best fit that part of the brief. For that reason alone, I’m pleased that enough votes were cast for it to win.

Some thoughts and reflections on the process

Looking back, when picking the final ten, I feel a little like I was swayed by the content of some of the images over picking photos that just belied their origin. Of course, it’s hard not to be swayed by content over objective quality, especially when I had my wife help me pick them – as it’s also hard not to be swayed by her opinion. I think, were I to pick another 10 today, some of them would be different, but picking them again tomorrow I might just as easily have picked the same 10! Hopefully that goes some way to emphasise just how close a lot of them were to making the cut.

One of the biggest problems I faced when picking the photos, and the main reason I enlisted Hannah’s help, was not being moved or influenced by the emails that came with them. Obviously, had Hannah read the emails, she would also have been influenced, so instead I chose to show her the photos in isolation. The emotional impact of the emails that came with the photos was something I had not counted on at all. I’m not going to go into any detail, I don’t want anyone to feel singled out, but to say some people made it quite clear – for various fairly personal and often quite moving reasons(!) – why they wanted the Leica, would be an understatement.

It’s certainly been an interesting process to go through and it’s definitely caused me to feel a lot more reflective about my life and the things I own than I could have ever have counted on. I’ve had many interactions from all across the globe throughout this process, mostly positive, some more moving, and one I’m not sure I would want to repeat… but none I would have done without I don’t think. It’s been really interesting chatting with some of the people who got in touch, and I think, or at least hope I’ve made a few good connections with people that will hopefully continue long beyond the end of the competition.

So thanks again to everyone that entered, and keep an eye out, I’m already starting to think about doing something similar again!

Cheers

Hamish

p.s. Andrej, the camera is in the post 😉

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