This will not be news to those that follow my social media posts, so apologies if that applies to you. A reason that I delayed publishing last week’s blog on a Macro Night Walk was that I had used an image as a competition entry and had been sitting on the news that it had been selected as a finalist image for New Zealand Geographic Photographer of the Year. This is my fourth time as a finalist, second time with a wildlife image but first with a macro invertebrate image. My other two finalist images have been Black and White landscapes in 2016 and 2017. It gives me some pleasure and a little confidence to have had a range of images recognised over a period to time at this level. It is reassuring to balance the landscape finalist images with another wildlife image as I like to think of myself as primarily a wildlife photographer despite really just getting joy from any image making.

More exciting though, is that this is the second time that Edin and I have been finalists in the same year. It is always exciting when one of us is selected but more than twice as nice if both involved. As far as I know we are the only father/daughter pair to have achieved this and to reprise it 7 years later is nice. Our photography work is a combined happy place and precious time and experiences we share when working together or individually.

The Awards Night is always fun and a rare opportunity to catch up some fellow photographers. Sadly this year it has been moved from the planned Thursday to the Friday so we have to miss it as we are in Dunedin teaching our Wildlife Masterclass. Usually it is a great start to our trip to attend the evening and then fly South early the next morning so we are both very disappointed. This year there are number of fellow finalists that I know and would love to meet up with again but not to be.