The top three winners of the Photographer of the Year category each received an iPad Mini while the top entry from each category won a gold bar. Missed this year’s competition? The iPhone Photography Awards are already accepting entries for next year.
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By starwolfy (57 min ago)
This kind of smartphone rubbish trend is so hilarious.
Yes any good photographer could succeed to produce a great image with any gear.
What I dislike is all this kind of “rebel” trend where people just shoot with smartphone to show the world they are so good they don’t need anything more.
Then you hear all the wow and waw and people starting to say: I’ll try to use my smartphone more !
If everyone is following the same trend, then it not being rebel anymore.
If some people are serious about photography why they use a smartphone is beyond me. What do they want to prove ? I don’t mean they cannot produce the goods with a smartphone but I guess there are plenty better small cameras out there for a small, light and discreet package.
Maybe they like to hide behind the “tourist like” feeling this grants…then they need some more balls maybe.
This pics are great, but it doesn’t teach more than the usual photoshop and auto effects. There are tons pics like that on Getty and Flickr.
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By ManuelVilardeMacedo (1 hour ago)
Proof that, when you have the talent, anything will do. Some of those pictures are excellent by any standards.
That said let’s not get overexcited about the iPhone’s image quality. There are obvious highlight issues in some of the pictures shown and an overall lack of definition that Instagram does disguise but not eliminate. Besides, one can’t stop wondering how much further a dedicated camera would have pushed these iPhonographers’ creativity.
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By Dames01 (5 hours ago)
Nice set of pictures. In the end some people have talent and others do not. It does matter what camera you have with you…
Nevertheless, under some lighting conditions as well as for certain types of composition, a camera phone will not be up to scratch.
Comment edited 5 minutes after posting
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By Decoboy (1 hour ago)
Agree some great compositions, but it does matter what ‘tool’ you use.
Ignoring that this WAS a phone contest, why would any one DELIBERATELY use an inferior tool? Why use a blunt chisel if you know you might need a sharp one – too lazy to sharpen it?
Everyone of these glaringly show the limitations of very low end sensor/lens/processing.
This deluge of phone vendor marketing is dumbing people down – they want us to believe photography is only about convenience, let’s ignore the noise, crummy focus, non existent shadow detail, blown highlights, inconsistent colour, distortion……lets all pretend that because someone with talent can use these tools they will magically turn one’s narcissistic dreams into reality – with no real effort of course.
Much of the great technical advantages from the digital age are being sacrificed purely on the alter of convenience – most of these images would have come out just as good with a 70 year old box brownie – or a tiny film camera.
Comment edited 4 minutes after posting
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By rurikw (6 hours ago)
Very inspiring. I certainly will use my iPhone camera on midsummer holidays and try to SEE. The last winner must be in the wrong category. Those guys don’t look like travellers. They probably work there every day. Or maybe it’s a typo: should be travail, not travel. Great pic though.
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By Sean65 (8 hours ago)
I gather Holly Wesley must be a very good friend of the the judging panel. What a load of rubbish.
I’m really quiet sure there exists somewhere iPhone photos that are a hundred times better than this lot.
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By AussieBarb (8 hours ago)
I looked at the winning pics and then opened my camera pics (Samsung BTW) and thought to myself …. mine look pretty darn good compared to these. Then I read the comments and now I feel vindicated. Just very ordinary and totally underwhelming.
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By Sam Carriere (12 hours ago)
Gee, just imagine what these people might have accomplished if they had been using cameras.
By agentul (8 hours ago)
just imagine how we would just care about the pictures if no one had made a big deal that they were taken using iphones. this is just like telling someone “you are such a great professional, even though you’re a different race than i am”.
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By Decoboy (1 hour ago)
eopix – not true – every one has such glaringly poor IQ that they would be significantly improved if the the same person used a better tool – one worthy of their talents.
agentul – I would care – because we are encouraging people to remain ignorant about an important part of photography – get the best shot you can first – not the easiest, and don’t be lazy, if you have the talent, invest in a bit of extra effort (inconvenience ) to maximise the results.
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By lap777 (13 hours ago)
1st place surely got his butt kicked by the horse after setting of a flash in its eye, so he deserved at least a prize 😉
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By ingram98ab (13 hours ago)
butt kicked by the horse?? i tought it was a selfie taken by the horse itself!!!
By UCSB (14 hours ago)
1st place … this is a joke … right???
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By agentul (8 hours ago)
no, it’s a photobomb by the horse.
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By CeleryBeats (14 hours ago)
I’m generally a postivie guy and don’t like to be negative. But while some of those are excellent with a great composition and originality, three or four of those images are a joke to be winning. Compared to the others at least!
The flower, lifestyle shots are very nice. Architecture and photographer of year 2nd place are nice as well. Don’t care for the rest tbh.
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By klopus (19 hours ago)
I dunno why the first image was considered tops. Composition isn’t all that original and visually I think it’s overdone with that harsh, flat and mundane Instagram filter look. Last image also to me is spoiled by the obvious smartphone camera look though to a lesser extent.
Other images, especially St.Petersburg in winter and Indian Holi festival, are much better. They are simply good, not iPhone/mobile/etc. good, but in general great. That unless you want to print them exhibition quality 🙂
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By Johnsonj (20 hours ago)
These images are awesome. Love the iPhone imaging look. The best camera is the one that’s with you. Every day, more photos are taken with the iPhone than any other camera.
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By RobCMad (17 hours ago)
We know who you work for.
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By agentul (8 hours ago)
@Johnsonj
and every day more people are involved in car accidents than meaningful conversations on the internet. what’s your point?
Comment edited 26 seconds after posting
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By Decoboy (2 hours ago)
Nonsense – I’m sick and tired of this fortune cookie quote “the best camera is the one that is with you”, Only if you didn’t know you needed one – i.e. if you knew you were going to take a shot why would you take an inferior tool? To show how trendy you are? Oops I blurted out the secret reason many people buy things.
IMO most of these show fine composition, such a shame that the IQ is so atrocious in every one that it borders on pathetic.
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By Anepo (1 day ago)
How the hell did the second image from the bottom win an award? Its garbage the third from the top is also crap
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By eopix (23 hours ago)
You mean the snowstorm? I love that. It’s not about resolution or camera stuff, rather about feeling. I think the composition is great too.
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By RobCMad (17 hours ago)
I agree, I like the woman seen through snow picture.
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By vadims (17 hours ago)
I guess Anepo meant third from the top in the strip (the hangar), and I have to agree it’s… well, not too impressive. Second from the bottom could only get there by mistake (like somebody clicked on wrong file while uploading 🙂
Others are very nice though.
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By GaryJP (15 hours ago)
I think the third picture from the top (if you mean the snow) is superb. There goes that varying mileage for you.
Comment edited 23 seconds after posting
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By Nigel Wilkins (8 hours ago)
The snow picture should’ve won IMHO
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By Felix E Klee (5 hours ago)
@eopix No snow storm, I guess it’s shot through a snow covered car (?) window. Anyway, great image.
The second from the bottom I perceived as an illusion: When I first viewed it on a phone’s small screen (!), I thought it depicts a piece of jewelry. Only on my laptop I realized that it’s a snow covered swing. As such, I enjoy it.
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By jcmarfilph (1 day ago)
Seriously? Credit goes to overdone filters and PP to mask mediocrity of these images.
By LensBeginner (19 hours ago)
Maybe he has a smartphone, not an iToy…
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By PredatorsPrey (8 hours ago)
That’s how it is nowadays. Even photos that look more like photo manipulations are nowadays winning photo contests. I mean it’s a photo contest, not a photo manipulation contest but that doesn’t seem to matter anymore.
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By Decoboy (1 hour ago)
Agree, and BTW the rules specifically state that no desktop PP can be done – what a joke, does anyone believe lots of these weren’t tortured outside the phone?
How would you check it? And did they bother to check any of the finalists? Oh I forgot this is more about propagating the myth of convenience over quality, and selling more ‘camera’s that are worse than digital P&S from 10 years ago.
Phone cameras record only limited exif data, and this can easily be swapped back to the original data with quite a few exif tools.
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By sir_bazz (1 day ago)
Some of these images are very, very good.
Just reiterates to me that there’s so much more to producing good images beyond the size of the sensor thats being used.
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By howardroark (20 hours ago)
If you set up a hundred different cameras on tripods in front of the most gorgeous image the world has to offer and then walk away guess which camera will produce the best image. None, since none of them took a picture. Opportunity, skill, equipment all are required to interact together to get a photograph. A better photographer with a better camera might be able to get significantly better images from the same scene thanks to skill and equipment. However, if a good photographer is in the right place at the right time with a lousy camera the image can still be great.
Comment edited 2 times, last edit 2 minutes after posting
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By Johnsonj (20 hours ago)
So true, sir_bazz. So true.
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By Decoboy (1 hour ago)
More fortune cookie statements – I’m sure Ansel Adams would have agreed with you – that’s why he lugged that huge land camera around instead of a box brownie right?
BTW can you point me to ANY images from the all time heroes of photography taken with the lowest quality tool available?
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