The winner of the top prize – Trevor Shelley, wins £200 cash, plus royalties for the use of the photo. The image (top right) depicts the ribs of an old
wooden sailing boat on the shoreline at Teesmouth on England’s north-eastern shores. Teesmouth is in fact a National Nature Reserve, which is set againsta backdrop of heavy industry, illustrating how nature can adapt and thrive in the most unlikely situations.
Trevor said: “When taking the photograph I had in mind how the advent of Steam, then Steel contributed to the decline of wind-powered sailing ships,but
increased the pollution suffered by our planet.”
The runners-up, “Home Coming” by Debashis Mukherjee (bottom right) depicts fishermen returning to their village after a long day of fishing on Sankarpur
beach in West Bengal, India. And Linda Pryke’s image entitled “Treasure Chest” (middle right) shows the sea’s treasures left behind at low tide on
West Wittering beach on England’s south coast. Both runners-up will each receive £50.
This year the competition, which was entitled “Ocean’s Fifteen”, focused on the seas and oceans of the world, inspired by the work done by Thomson Ecology’s
marine team, Thomson Unicomarine.
The surface of the planet is approximately 71% ocean so, with this in mind, we hoped that we would receive plenty of images. And we weren’t disappointed!
In fact we received images depicting all five oceans – Arctic, Indian, Southern, Pacific, and Atlantic. Among them were many interesting landscapes,
pictures of marine creatures and people working in, or enjoying, the sea.
We had three judges on the panel. One was wildlife photographer Bill Doherty, the 2013 Thomson Ecology Photography Competition winner. Bill said of the
winning image: “Here the author cleverly leads us into the image using remains of our industrial heritage, which curve perfectly towards an industry
of today. A combination of the past and the present set on a foundation of sand and water, which all help to build a most creative image. Technically
the image is well framed, pin- sharp throughout and the colours natural. A most professional looking image.”
Gemma Balaam, the competition organiser said, “Thomson Ecology’s marine division, Thomson Unicomarine, works on a huge variety of projects, and the marine world is interesting to many people. We received many diverse and fascinating images, so compiling a shortlist was extremely hard, but we are very pleased with our final selection.”
We would like to thank all the entrants for submitting their photos and we look forward to opening the competition again next year!
To view the running-up images and a larger resolution format of our winning photo click here
