Paul Heester wrote:I watched the last episode the other night (NO SPOILERS I PROMISE).
I quite liked the show in general but I believe the overall premise is somewhat flawed. Each week they cover different aspects of photography i.e. street, landscape, portraits, the body etc. This felt like they were searching for a "jack of all trades" photographer rather than a "master" of one. Each tog had their moments but equally some performed badly but if you've never photographed those subjects can you blame them?? There also appears to be a free for all when choosing equipment for your task, so you need to be knowledgeable in rangefinder, medium format, m3/4s plus DSLRs.
The other aspect that most of them struggled with is explaining your "vision" or whatever they choose to call it in choosing the final image(s). I felt that if you talked the talk your images had more sway with the judges.
I definitely think your last sentence is true. The judging comments felt entirely arbitrary at times and there was more than one occasion where, as you say, the ones who either argued or bantered did better. Indeed the winner did just that.
I'm going to rewatch the series again but this time focus on making a list of only the judges comments, see if we can glean some pearls of wisdom from them
