Christmas competition winners

A special thank you to everyone who entered our 2010 Christmas competition. We had some fabulous entries which made judging extremely difficult but enjoyable. In fact we spent some time debating the merits of composition, focus, quality, creativity, popularity and standout. But we have chosen three winners...

1st place - photograph number 115, Viktorija Vaisvilaite Skirutiene - child on sledge
Judges comments: Fantastic shot, excellent focus on child’s smiling face with other child in the background, crisp contrast, excellent black & white image, fun in the snow, wow we loved it

2nd place - photograph number 43, Ian Whitehead - Robin on icy twig
Judges comments: Best and superb wildlife shot, excellent colour saturation and composition, great use of focus as eye drawn to robin retaining  crispness of ice on branches

3rd place - photograph number 50, Alan Rossiter - Heh da, where’s me bike?
Judges comments: Well executed - captured the moment perfectly, good framing, appealing subject and good contrast with the shape standing out in the virgin snow, good use of black & white, excellent combination of landscape/close-up

iPad, Kindle & camera prizes will be sent out shortly.  Photographs are numbered according to their position on our Wall, where 419 photographs are entered (there are some additional entries in Links). We also wanted to mention the following entries which are highly recommended and popular:  

378  Rob Hawkins, 41  Kerry Shaw, 44  Dylan Walker, 69  Colm Henry, 77  Taklong Blurblur, 83  Ale Fletcher, 139  Martin Hudak, 149  Kerri Ogg, 191  Charles Chad Valentine, 196  Alex Oneofmanyalexs, 207  Wii Fii, 358  Conor Doherty, 372  Jack Hood

To celebrate the completion of the contest, we are collating entries and will post a montage of our giant Christmas card, personalised with your wonderful pictures next week.

Thank you again. Happy Christmas & New Year from all of us at Optimalprint.