A couple of months ago, I saw a post on Charingworth Manor Facebook page about a photo contest they were holding.

Cool! Let’s learn some more about this!

I contacted the promoters, a PR firm from London, and got the rules. Essentially, I could enter a maximum of THREE total photos that addressed one of two categories: “Charingworth Manor scenes” or “Cotswolds Life“.

RIGHT!

OFF TO FIND PHOTOS!

Looking through my England 2015 photos, I realized that this was going to be even more difficult than I thought. It wasn’t going to be tough finding photos that I liked, but rather narrowing down my choices to “just three”!

England2015 travel journal

This was going to be a harder job than I originally thought. Ha!

So – I narrowed it down to a few dozen that I really liked and thought would be good. Then, with a critical eye, started tossing out ones that were either “just not good enough”, “essentially duplicates”, or (and this was probably the toughest part) “photos that weren’t unique”.

In other words, on that last criteria, I tossed from contention some good “head on” Charingworth Manor shots that I knew other people were going to submit, too! If I’m limited to three photos total, I want mine to stand out as unique from everyone else!

I narrowed it down to six that I really really liked… then started the opinion process! Kathy and LeAnn were fairly consistent on their inputs… John and Marianne had theirs!

In the end, these were the three that I submitted for the contest.

Hmmm… that’s kinda cool. I asked the PR rep if that meant that one of my photos was in the “top 12” (as they were making a calendar for charity based on the top 12 photos from the contest). He said that he was “not at liberty to tell me that”.

Heh. Right. Gotcha.

Since I was, of course, not going to be able to make the ceremony, I got permission to pass the invitation off to John and Marianne to attend in my place!

So the day of the contest rolls around (yesterday, September 17, 2015), and mid-day (my time here in the US), I start getting emails from John with various photos attached. The first one showed the list of photos at the final presentation (32 of ’em!) – ALL THREE OF MY PHOTOS made the cut!

Other photos showed my entries, nicely printed and mounted in mattes, along with some of the competition! There were definitely some nice shots out there!

The judges for this contest included the Head of Creative Arts at Stratford College, a couple of Creative Directors from local media firms, senior executives from Classic Lodges (parent company of Charingworth Manor), and the Charingworth Managing Director.

As the photos from John started showing more and more “entertainment”, I told him that he had to stay upright long enough to give my acceptance speech. 🙂

Suddenly… the email came.

I GOT THIRD PLACE!

That was really really really awesome to hear! There were some really nice photos entered into this contest, too!

I was honored to be selected *at all* in the top 12 (for the calendar), but to get third place was a nice and flattering surprise.

I haven’t heard yet who the other “top 12” photos are … so, I guess technically, I have a shot at one of those slots, too! 🙂

Now – to contact the PR firm and order a few calendars.

Do I go ahead and add International Award-Winning Photographer™ to my resume? (snicker)