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HP Red Sea 2012 Daily Reports |
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| Sharon Rainis | |||||
>> Day 7 - Winning Ceremony
The HP Red Sea 2012 official awards ceremony took place tonight and it was an evening full of surprises and excitement. A huge screen was placed on the lawns of the Isrotel Yam-Suf hotel in Eilat, and hundreds of curious eyes were staring at it with hope. Standing on stage and looking at all of these great photographers who’ve been waiting the whole week for this festive night, I wish we could grant them all with a prize. They well deserve it. But in life, you win some - you lose some, and those who didn’t go back home with a prize, got back with an impressive database of wonderful images, memories from an unforgettable week and hopefully - the inspiration to keep practicing and improving in preparation for next year’s competition!
Amir Stern from Israel was the one to win the highest prize of them all, a $10,000 check, courtesy of HP, the 1st prize in the 5 Best Images category. This was the second year in a row that Amir takes the first place, but this year – using nothing but a compact digital camera system! I interviewed Amir earlier that week, as I was surprised to see such a professional and experienced photographer hanging around with a compact photo system. Amir, very confident of himself (and for every reason in the world, apparently!) explained to me that this time he intends to prove how the 1st prize can be won by a photographer using a compact camera. In addition, Amir carried out only about 6 dives during the shoot-out, which is probably less than half the dives other participants carried out, emphasizing how calm and relaxed the shoot-out can be when you’re well prepared, trained and qualified. And so, Amir submitted a breathtaking portfolio by all means, which allowed him to fully make his point. Way to go!
And as if that’s not enough, one of Amir’s images also awarded him with the prestigious Jury’s Prize!
The Spanish team won the National Team category. They competed against the Israeli and Russian teams, and won both the public and judges’ voting phases. The judges, who reviewed the portfolio submitted by the Spanish team on stage during the ceremony, all complimented the team for a work well done. The images submitted were visually impressive and also worked together wonderfully as a portfolio. When the talented team came up on stage to collect their prize, they were holding the Spanish flag, smiling, chanting and dancing all over. What a joyful moment!
In general, you could say that the Spanish members did very well on their own this year. In addition to winning the National Team category, Esteban Tore won the Mayor’s Prize,. David Barrio won the Fish of the Year category and team members also won other 2nd and 3rd place prizes, as well as being nominated to quite a few categories. I must say that the Spanish photographers were a great asset for the competition also during the week, as they’re so social, happy, positive and great to have around!
Tobias Friedrich from Germany was the photographer who won the Fish ‘N Fashion category, with a series of 5 beautiful images. His model, Tal Navarro, picked up the prize on his behalf, as Tobi had to fly back to Germany after the shoot-out. You would be amazed to know that this is the first time ever for Tobi to participate in the Fish ‘N ‘Fashion category, or even to capture underwater fashion images to begin with. Tobi also completed all of underwater fashion in less than one diving day!
The Best Singular prize went to Yuzuru Masuda from Japan, who won 1,000 bottes of Macabbe beer, generously shared with all other participants and guests. The winning ceremony is a high tension event in which I rarely manage to pay attention to the details, but I can tell you this - When Yuzuru’s image was displayed on the large screen, a great and enthusiastic “wow” was heard among the guests.
For all other nominees and winners, click here. So I guess this concludes the HP Red Sea 2012 competition. I’d like to thank you all for such a great week together, you guys and girls are amazing and the reason this event is as fun and memorable as it is! We’re now working on the “Behind the Scenes” video clip, which presents all HP Red Sea members in action, so stick around for some fun stuff!
See you next year, on October 20th, 2013!!
While this was a completely free day for all photographers, who took advantage of the opportunity to rest and to interact with each other, the production team was busy with finishing up on weekend announcements and ceremonies. The judges finalized their (hard) decisions and the winning ceremony team started to prepare accordingly. In an event that awards photographers with such valuable prizes, one should leave no room for error and arrange everything to be as festive as this event deserves to be!
In the evening, the Cypriot party, which is sponsored by the Cyprus Tourism Organization, took place in the Manta diving center. Cypriot music, drinks and traditional snacks, make this evening so happy and special every year again. Photographers, assistant divers, production members and friends all gathered tonight to celebrate the end of the shoot-out, the beginning of the weekend and the great week we had all spent together.
Happy hours during the week are surely characterized by an impressive consumption of alcohol, but nothing ever competes with the Cypriot party. The combination of good music, quality beverages, amazing company and the need to dismantle the tension of the shoot-out, results in an evening that is all about having fun and celebrating the moment. While it’s common to say “it’s not over till the fat lady sings”, in the HP Red Sea event - it’s not over till the producer in drunk…
Tomorrow is the HP Red Sea winning ceremony, in which all categories winners will be announced and all prizes will be awarded, including a $10,000 check. For those who won’t be able to be there with us, the winning ceremony will be live broadcasted on the www.eilatredsea.com website, so stay tuned!
Up until 10 o’clock in the morning, the competition was still very much at its peak. Photographers were reviewing their images at the computers room and making their final selections. It’s a tough call, as just like in the “prisoner’s dilemma”, your chances in each of the categories very much depend on other submissions in that category, directly affecting your choice of images and distribution of your images among the categories. This becomes even more complicated due to the fact that evaluations and calculations here are far from being accurate or objective.
You would think that after finishing up with the competition and submitting final images, photographers will all rush out, grab as much bottles of beer as they can handle (proven to be an extremely impressive number!) and look for the first party to crash. However, just like Cinderella at midnight, the diving center, which was crowded and intensively active throughout the week, became one of the most calm, quiet and relaxing locations in the afternoon. It seems that photographers had lots of sleeping, eating and resting to catch up with before they head out to party. Offering a participant to join a “fun dive” today was practically out of the question!
During the day, the jury panel had already gathered behind sealed doors in order to review, evaluate and rank competition images. So while we were all playing around in the Happy Hour, our jury panel was playing around with a $10,000 check…
Tomorrow, Friday, the festive announcements begin. On Friday night, photographers will be finding out about the lucky winners of the World Shoot Out competition through a winning ceremony that will be uploaded online. On Saturday night, photographers will be introduced with the winners of the HP Red Sea competition. I guess all that’s left to do now is to sit back, apply some sun lotion, wear your darkest sunglasses and wait for some good news to come…
That’s it, the Eilat shoot-out has concluded and images submitted to the HP Red Sea 2012 competition can no longer be taken. It sounds like the difficult part is behind us, but anyone who had ever taken part in the Eilat shoot-out knows that the most difficult task is still ahead of us – selecting the images which will be submitted to the various categories. The computers room was already full with photographers tonight, reviewing their images, consulting with their colleagues and trying to make fateful decisions. Tomorrow morning it’s going to get even more hectic there, as the final time for submitting images is 10:00 am!
In addition to making their own private decisions, photographers participating in the new National Team category also have to join forces and to establish a portfolio of 6 images together. It’s the first year of this category on the competition, but already draws much attention and it seems as if many photographers are already planning how to gather a team so they can enter this category next year. Pietro Cremone from Italy, for instance, promised that next year he will show up with a bunch of talented Italian photographers who will definitely submit the winning portfolio in this category (no way back now Pietro!!!...).
During the day, our judges have closed themselves up behind sealed doors for the purpose of selecting the winners of World ShootOut categories. Their decisions will be introduced on an online winning ceremony, which will be uploaded to the competition website on Friday evening, 20:00 GMT +2. So stay tuned and keep your fingers crossed!
Tomorrow at 10:00 am, after all images have been submitted, the REAL party starts. From that point onward, photographers’ responsibilities all sum up at sunbathing, consuming beer, resting and mainly breathing air at a rare pressure of 1 ATM. Imagine that!
The second day of the shoot-out has concluded and by now most photographers look (and feel) like fish. Long hours were spent underwater in attempt to produce award winning images and gallons over gallons of condensed air were consumed. I’m pretty sure that the Red Sea fish are overwhelmed and dazzled as well, but hey, there’s a price to glory!
As the years go by, we get to see more and more photographers advancing to DSLR systems and it always seems that these systems are just a bit larger and bulkier than they were in the past year.
Today was the first day of the HP Red Sea shoot-out, which is always characterized by great tension, high expectations and also some drama. All photographers taking part in the competition rush into the water in order to start producing amazing portfolios which will hopefully grant them with a prize, preferably a $10,000 check…
Tobias Friedrich from Germany, for instance, spent no less than 7 hours underwater today(!). Judging by the speed of photographers as they were gearing up with their huge systems, running into the water, hurrying back to the diving center to replace batteries, memories and tanks and practically racing back to the water for another dive, I’m pretty sure that 7 hours underwater wasn’t a breaking record here today!
The production team, in their constant quest for new challenges, carried out an underwater fashion display which included mannequins, human models and tones of fishing lines, invisibly connecting them all together. Why mannequins you ask? Well, when you come to think of it, why not. They don’t consume air, complain about water temperature or ask for breaks. In fact, they could have been the perfect models, if only their limbs wouldn’t have unflatteringly fallen apart every once in a while…
Most divers found it difficult to distinguish between human models and the mannequins when first arriving at the scene. It was quite a scene to watch assistant divers mistakenly providing the mannequin with a regulator while the model standing next to it strives for air!
As the tension builds up, the first day of the shoot-out usually results with some drama as well. One photographer floods his expensive camera while the other tries downloading his images to a computer just to find out that the memory card he used for producing no less than 1,300 images today is completely corrupted. At the same time, the first day of the shoot-out also consists of much hope, as whatever went wrong during that day can usually still be fixed during the following two shoot-out days. Apart from that flooded camera, god forbid…
The atmosphere is great and you can sense some real teamwork, especially among photographers participating together in the National Team category. Even competitors seem to share much information, realizing that it’s the talent and creativity that eventually count. Of course once in a while you still bump into a photographer who’s willing to do anything in order to gain an advantage over others, such as providing the most intimidating competitors with slightly misleading information. So if you hear about the purple dolphin swimming around the area of the wreck, wearing sunglasses and producing pink bubbles, I assure you - it’s not there. I checked!!
Today was the first day of the HP Red Sea 2012 event. It was the official registration day and photographers started arriving in the diving center with huge bags of diving equipment, enormous camera systems and tremendous motivation.
It’s interesting to see that as the years go by and the event gains an international leading reputation, the number of foreign photographers signing up to the competition significantly increases, reaching approximately 30% percent of all competitors this year!
With 3 prizes awarded in each category, the chances of going back home with a prize are higher than ever. In addition, a short peek at the event’s schedule is enough to figure out that the HP Red Sea week is much about celebrations as it is about triumph and an unforgettable experience awaits all photographers, winners or not. Producer David Pilosof greeted all underwater photographers and guided them to "have fun, enjoy great dives, meet interesting people, capture stunning images and consider triumph and prizes as an added value..."
In the evening, an opening ceremony took place, in which the Crainoid was announced as the “Fish of the Year”. Conveniently enough, the Crainoid is best photographed during night dives, which makes it easier for photographers to participate in this category without having to “spare” any day dives required for producing images that will be submitted to other categories. This also means that photographers will have to take it easy during the “Happy Hours” in the afternoon, as we cautious divers, we don’t drink and dive…
Tomorrow is the first day of the shoot-out and I doubt if the Red Sea is prepared to the amount of bubbles it’s about to absorb during the next 3 days. The good news is that divers bubbles are 100% environmental friendly. The bad news? Well, at the moment the sun is shining, the sky is bright and all Red Sea Crainoids are preparing for one of the most extreme strobe-parties they’ve ever witnessed before. The only bad news I can think of is the fact that I still haven’t found the perfect shoes for the winning ceremony. Troubling, I know, but I’m sure I’ll sort it out soon. Good luck to all HP Red Sea participants and may we all have an amazing week together!
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