The theme for the October 2023 round of the Camera Jabber Photographer of the Year (CJPOTY) competition was ‘Animals’. Once again, we were impressed by the range of subjects and the high quality of the images submitted. It makes selecting our top ten for the month a tough, but very enjoyable task. We are happy to reveal that the following images will be added to our shortlist to be judged by our illustrious panel of judges at the end of the year.
One of these ten shortlisted images has also been selected as the round winner, with the photographer being awarded a voucher from MPB worth £500 – scroll down to find out who.
CJPOTY October 2023 ‘Animals’ shortlisted images
Abi Coop
Abi tells us that she I captured these beautiful flamingos at Edinburgh Zoo using her Canon EOS 5D IV. She says, ‘their pretty pink feathers glistened in the strong directional light, such that they really popped against the dark background. I love how the one stood in the foreground adds depth, along with the reflection adding balance.’
Ana Peiró Muñoz
There are lots of photographs of robins, but this image, captured by Ana with her Canon EOS 80D, is one of the best robin portraits we’ve seen to date. Ana tells us, ‘I met this friendly robin during a walk at Blashford Lakes Nature Reserve in Ringwood, Hampshire. The image is a composite photograph by combining two different photographs: one for the foreground with the robin and another for the background with the goldfinch.’
Linda Wride
Linda is no stranger to the shortlist and she’s made the grade once again with this strikingly alternative take on the white horses of the Camargue. It works brilliantly in black and white. Judging by the movement in the tail of the horse on the right, the horses were pretty flighty and didn’t hang around for the shot to be taken. It’s a well-spotted and captured image.
Marketa Zvelebil
Marketa captured a beautifully tender moment between these two lions, which, she tells us, later went on to have cubs. Marketa’s focus and choice of aperture are perfect and we love how the colours in the blurred background match those of the lions. Thanks to the Nikon D850, there’s also bags of detail.
Helen Trust
We’re more used to seeing minimalist landscapes from Helen, but this wonderful image shows that she can turn her hand (and style) to animal portraits as well. Helen captured the image using her Sony RX100 VII, showing just how versatile compact cameras can be. She says, ‘This little egret often frequents the canals of Venice fishing and hanging out. This one kept me company for over 10 minutes on a very misty and wet morning.’
Anne-Marie Smith
This beautiful image, captured using a Sony A7 III, shows Anne-Marie’s Irish Draught Horse meeting another horse for the first time, determining if it’s a friend or foe. We were drawn by the symmetry of the shot and the peaceful look of the two horses.
Helen Cherry
Helen says, ‘I have a long-standing love of hares and often photograph them. This is a favourite spot for me as the field has had many different crops in it over the years. This time it was the beautifully scented Chamomile. I think the hare appears to look a little “sheepish” at being found in the flowers.’ Helen used her Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II with the Olympus 300mm f/4 IS Pro lens and a 1.4x teleconverter to capture this frame-filling shot.
Michelle Yorke
This balletic image of two egrets is the result of Michelle’s first outing with the Sigma 150-600 f/5-6.3 on her Nikon D780. What a great result, it gets a big thumbs up from the Camera Jabber team!
Michelle Jackson
Michelle photographed this love-up pair of gannets with their chick at Bempton Cliffs using her Canon EOS 5D IV. We love how Michelle has put the most colourful part of the scene right at the centre of the frame, with the birds’ beaks crossing.
Olivia Moore
Every dog owner would love an image like this of their pet! Oliva has captured a sense of fun along with every detail of the dog’s fur and the twinkle in its eye. The framing and composition are perfect so the trees are straight and the dog is posing beautifully.
CJPOTY October 2023 winner: Helen Trust
Congratulations, Helen, a voucher worth £500 from MPB is heading your way!
Helen’s image joins the other 9 images selected this month and goes onto our shortlist for the overall prize. It will be decided by our panel of VIP judges at the end of the year.
CJPOTY November: The World in Black and White
The theme for the eleventh round of the 2023/24 Camera Jabber Photographer of the Year (CJPOTY) competition is ‘The World in Black and White’. It’s time to ditch colour and let shades of grey take centre stage as you capture life’s complexities in the most simplistic form. This is your opportunity to explore the power of monochrome, focusing on textures, shapes, emotions or stories – whatever takes your fancy in monochrome. The photographs can be taken anywhere and anytime.
This round of our monthly competition is open for submissions until 23:59 BST (00:59 CET and 15:59 PST) on 30th November 2023.
To submit your entry, follow the link to cjpoty or click on the CJPOTY button at the top of any of our website pages. You can submit up to three entries for £2.00 plus payment processing costs (£0.26). Images should be Jpegs at least 1920 pixels along their longest side but no larger than 2MB.
Camera Jabber Photographer of the Year prizes
At the end of the month, the Camera Jabber team will pick one winning image and nine runners-up from the November entries. The photographer of the winning image will receive a voucher from MPB.com to the value of £500 which can be spent on anything from a huge range of kit from the World’s biggest platform for used photographic gear.
All 10 of the selected images will go into our shortlist for the year.
We’ll do this each month in 2023 so that by the end of the year, there will be 120 shortlisted images. These will then go before our fantastic panel of judges who will decide the 1st, 2nd and 3rd-placed images.
The photographer of the first-placed image overall, as decided by the panel of judges , will receive a voucher to the value of £1000 from MPB.com as well as a trophy and the title ‘Camera Jabber Photographer of the Year 2023‘. The photographers who come second and third will receive vouchers worth £500 and £250, respectively.
About MPB
Founded by Matt Barker in 2011, MPB is the world’s largest platform for used photography and videography kit. MPB has transformed the way people buy, sell and trade equipment, making photography more accessible, affordable and sustainable.
Headquartered in the creative communities of Brighton, Brooklyn and Berlin, the MPB team includes trained camera experts and seasoned photographers and videographers who bring their passion to work every day to deliver outstanding service. Every piece of kit is inspected carefully by product specialists and comes with a six-month warranty to give customers peace of mind that buying used doesn’t mean sacrificing reliability.