23 Competition
Photography News Issue 23 absolutephoto.com
each category, which in theory gave them three opportunities in each category and took the pressure off them to select just one image. As well as an internal jury and prestigious Masters Jury, the competition gives weight to a public vote. Does the competition benefit from popular opinion as opposed to just expert analysis? Yes, very much so. The public vote allows the photographic community to influence the result and engage with the competition, which in turn helps promote the competition within the industry. However, we are keen for the competition not to turn in to a popularity contest, so the public vote is anonymous to the majority of voters and votes are limited to just one per account on our website to avoid repeat votes. Also, whilst we have a Masters Jury consisting of some of the very best industry experts, it is great to also get the opinion of what can be a more general audience as anyone can evaluate an image for how they interpret it. Another change made for the 2016 competition is the way voting works. Can you explain those changes and why you’ve chosen to make them? Previously the public vote was just a simple vote for your favourite set of images in each category. This year we decided to give voters the option to select their top three with a first, second and third place ranking in each category, which helps provide a more even spread of results and gives voters the flexibility in not having to choose just one image. The public vote then carries a ‘seat’ on the Masters Jury, contributing to the main Masters Jury votes, which in turn gives us our winners.
Clockwise from left: 2014 Hasselblad Masters winners – Fashion, Bara Prasilova; Wildlife, Rafael Rojas; Fine Art, Rafal Maleszyk; Underwater, Chris Straley; and Editorial, Antonio Pedrosa.
We decided to up the stakes a little and have the competition judged as single images. This meant that the photographers had to try and showcase their talent in just one image
The Masters Jury always draws in some big names; can you share any with us? The jury hasn’t been announced yet, but it contains the usual mix of well- knownandrespectedphotographers and industry experts. The most challenging stage of voting surely must be the internal vote, in which thousands of entries are whittled down to 100. How does that process work and what’s it like to be involved in it? The internal jury is mainly made up of all Hasselblad employees, which provides a mix of both photographic and non-photographic minded people, depending on the position they hold within the company. Their votes provide us with a shortlist of entries in each category, and then there is a small committee that finalises the top ten in each category. The process of whittling down the many entries to just ten is a very hard and brutal process, but we are very happy with the finalists this process has produced. What does it take to be a Hasselblad Master? What are the juries looking for in an image? Photography can be viewed in many ways; whether it is for technical ability, its creativity or the story the image is telling. Our advice would probably be for photographers to demonstrate their compositional skills; conceptual
strength and technique – anything that contributes to the art of photography. For those looking to enter in the future, what is the most important consideration when selecting images for the competition? How can a photographer stand out from the rest? Each of the Hasselblad Masters winners is required to shoot aproject for the new Masters book following the competition; so submitted images should ideally demonstrate the sort of images the photographer can produce for the book in terms of style and quality. Where did the idea for a commemorative book come from? We have produced a book since 2008 and it has become a highly sought-after and collectable book. For Hasselblad, it is also a great way of showcasing the quality of images that can be produced with our cameras and it also gives the photographers involved some great worldwide exposure. Have you any examples of the competition having an affect on the career of a photographer? It is difficult to say exactly what affect the competition has had on the careers of the winners, as all the photographers are obviously very talented and their success could well have materialised regardless
of their Masters accolade, but it is definitely fair to say that becoming a Hasselblad Master certainly doesn’t harm a photographer’s career and can only be of benefit to their reputation within the industry and with their clients. Have you seen any big names come through the competition? While they might not have necessarily been regarded as big- name photographers at the time, the likes of Anton Corbijn, Michael Grecco, Charlie Waite, Beat Presser, Marco Grob, Peter Mathis, Chase Jarvis and Hans Strand are all listed as Hasselblad Masters, and this is a very impressive list of names. What about the future for the competition, what can we expect from it for the coming years? We hope that the Hasselblad Masters competition continues to go from strength to strength in the future, continuing to promote the Hasselblad brand with a high level of images and showcase the work of some very talented photographers. Is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers? The 2016 Hasselblad Masters competition culminates with the launch of the book and the awards ceremony in September 2016 at Photokina in Cologne, Germany.
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