WINNER: Fleurieu Sun, Brian Littley

An interesting, attention-grabbing artistic image, Littley makes excellent use of the available symmetry in the field rows and tractor whilst leaving plenty of room for the tractor to “drive into”. A striking composition.

Although the tall crop was necessary for the newspaper, this image benefits from a 16:9 crop and monochrome conversion – it would look great on canvas on the wall of Mr Littley Snr!

RUNNER UP: Fleurieu Sun, Dani Brown

One of the greatest tools in a photojournalist’s bag is the ability to pre-visualize. In this image, Brown has taken a concept tossed around the office, overcome a number of difficulties and created its reality in the field resulting in a quirky front-page photograph for her newspaper.

(If you’re without speedlights and struggling in the field to evenly light a subject, you could try placing the sun behind them or move into full shade, like the doorway of an equipment shed)

THIRD PLACE: The Courier, Scott Murphy

Murphy has made an arresting environmental portrait of a CFS member in a locker room, somewhere the public don’t normally see, thus peaking viewer interest. Contrary to the usual upward view of a uniformed person, Murphy has shot down on the subject which feels like it humanizes the man and asked the viewer to consider the effect on him of their potentially harmful or fatal driving decision.

A personal comment for the entrant, if you wish to pass it on: Using the CFS emergency light was a good save but a pair of speedlights might have been more controllable. In this situation, a speedlight with an umbrella to replace the CFS light would create a softer light on the subject’s face. A speedlight behind the subject at low power would create a rim light around his head to subtly separate him from the background. I only mention this because I noticed Murphy mention lighting difficulties in a couple of his entries and learning to control the light in set-up shots is key to a tog’s growth.