The Society of the International Nature and Wildlife Photographers have recently announced the winners of the SINWP Bird Photographer of the Year 2019 competition. Organized in support of the RSPB, this competition helps to showcase some of the best wildlife photography from around the world.
With over 2,000 entries, the judges saw everything from bald eagles to peacocks - and everything in between. However, there could only be one winner. The wildlife photographer to scoop the top prize was Thomas Vijayan from Ontario, Canada. His image of a family of emperor penguins helped him win a collection of prizes worth over £1,145.
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Thomas shot his winning shot on a Nikon D5 and a 70-200mm lens at f/3.2, ISO 100 and 1/3200sec. Mike McNamee comments, "Our judges were presented with anonymized images and I left them to make their choices over a couple of weeks, without interference – they are after all specialists in their subject, having photographed birds all over the world for many years!
"I made my judge's choice independently. I liked the situation shows for we can be assured that we are looking at good fieldcraft rather than a visitation to a commercially set up hide and habituated birds."
The judges awarded second place to Michael John Erwin from Staffordshire, England and third place to Feargal Quinn from County Meath, Ireland.
You can discover more on the SINWP website, and in the meantime you can check out some of the best wildlife photography from the competition below.
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