APOY 2013 – Round Two – Life in Motion

Please visit the APOY 2013 home page to find all the rules for entry, terms and conditions, the APOY entry email address, and the disclaimers that must be copied and pasted into an email entry.

Entries must be received by 5pm on 29 March 2013





















Round 2 of this year’s Amateur Photographer of the Year competition, sponsored by Panasonic, is Life in Motion (long exposures/frozen action). Action shots utilise one of the most basic components of your camera: the shutter speed. The shutter opens, the action unfolds, the shutter closes. But is it quite as simple as that? For this round we want you to explore the ways that action can be represented in your images. You can either choose to freeze the action using a fast shutter speed or send in your shots of motion blur, achieved with a slow shutter speed. See AP dated 2 March 2013, page 27 for some advice and ideas on what to look out for.

We have thousands of pounds’ worth of fantastic camera equipment up for grabs, as well as the chance to be crowned Amateur Photographer of the Year 2013.. The closing date for round 2 is 29 March 2013. First prize is a Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3 plus Lumix G Vario HD 14-140mm f/4-5.8 Asph Mega OIS lens worth a total of £2,093.99. Second prize is a Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ30 worth £319.99. Third prize is a Panasonic 32GB SDHC Class 10 memory card worth £35.99. That’s a fantastic prize package worth £2,449.97! The top 30 photographs will be published in our 27 April issue 2013, while the scores from the top 50 images will be posted on our website




How to enter
Please visit the APOY 2013 home page for information explaining how to enter. Please use your full name as the file name and paste
the disclaimer into the body of your email if you are sending your entry to us
electronically. We also need to know where and how you took your image, plus
the camera and lens used with aperture and focal-length details. Remember to
include a telephone number and your postal address so we can contact you if you
win.






Photo by Heather Shuker

What is there to say about your camera’s shutter speed that hasn’t been said before? Short shutter speeds freeze the action and long shutter speeds blur the action. It’s as simple as that… or is it?

Gone are the days when motion blur was seen as a mistake. The fact is, motion blur, as long as it is deliberate, has become an acceptable creative tool for photographers. Take a look back through some of our previous APOY entries for some fine examples.

As the advances in digital technology surge ahead, motion blur and camera shake are no longer inevitable flaws dictated by ISO settings and camera capability. Now photographers are free to use their shutter speed consciously and creatively. It used to be the case that there was an agreed upon ‘right’ shutter speed to capture action. Now the boundaries and rules have been deconstructed. But that’s not to say we just want to see a lot of blurred images. We also want you to try freezing the image. Find the decisive moment and capture the action. You have plenty of tools at your disposal, such as flash. It doesn’t matter what the subject is, just so long as it is exciting and engaging.

Entries must be received by 5pm on 29 March 2013

1st prize
The first-prize winner will receive a Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3 plus a Lumix G Vario HD 14-140mm f/4-5.8 Asph Mega OIS lens worth a total of £2,093.99. The GH3 is a compact system camera with a 16.05-million-pixel, four thirds, Live MOS sensor. It has a weather-resistant magnesium-alloy body, an extended sensitivity range of ISO 125-25,600 and a 1.744-million-dot EVF.

Other features include a Venus 7 HD II engine so noise is well controlled even at high ISO sensitivities, plus a low-pass filter to suppress moiré while maintaining high resolution. The Lumix G Vario HD 14-140mm f/4-5.8 Asph Mega OIS lens offers a wide and long zoom range of 14-140mm zoom (28-280mm in 35mm equivalent) to suit a variety of shooting situations, from scenery to portraits, in a lightweight body. The lens also incorporates Mega OIS – Panasonic’s optical image stabilizer.


2nd prize
The second-prize winner will receive a Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ30 worth £319.99. This high-spec compact camera has a 14.1-million-pixel, high-sensitivity MOS sensor, 20x optical zoom Leica DC lens from 24mm ultra-wideangle (24-480mm in 35mm equivalent) and 50p full HD video recording. The TZ30 also features 10fps burst shooting in full resolution and GPS.

The Power OIS (Optical image Stabilizer) with Active Mode helps suppress blur, being particularly useful when shooting handheld or at night with a slow shutter speed.n a lightweight body. The lens also incorporates Mega OIS – Panasonic’s optical image stabilizer.

3rd prize
The third-prize winner will receive a Panasonic 32GB SDHC Class 10 memory card worth £35.99. The 32GB card is ideal for recording AVCHD high-definition video and high-resolution raw files. With a maximum data transfer speed of up to 20MB/s, the 32GB SDHC card allows high-speed burst shooting when taking still photos.

The card is also equipped with the ‘Proof 6′ feature to withstand severe conditions, making it water-proof, shock-proof, magnet-proof, static-proof, X-ray-proof and temperature-proof.






Here are some tips and suggestions to help you get started

Why not try…


Photo by Paul Broadbent

On the Streets
The most obvious place to start when you’re looking for good motion shots is right on
your own doorstep. Cities, towns and villages are full of people and traffic, all of which can be used as interesting focal points and lend themselves brilliantly to motion blur and frozen action. The shapes and colours that you’ll find on the street will give you not only context, but also a range of excellent framing and compositional opportunities. But with all that in mind, perhaps you don’t even need to go as far as through your front door. The interior of your own home could throw up some interesting spectacles. Remember, there are no rigid subject rules here – any location is acceptable.

Photo by Damien Demolder

In the Wild
Motion blur is a creative application that suggests two things that can often be difficult to capture in photography: drama and urgency. What this means is that just the simple act of increasing your shutter speed adds a dynamic level to your image. This is something that comes across strongly in the image of two running wildebeast taken by AP Editor Damien Demolder. Notice how the image conveys speed. While the picture is suggestive and abstract, there’s just enough information for us to know exactly what it is we’re seeing. But not only did Damien use a slow shutter speed, he also panned the camera. It’s a technique worth practising.

Photo by Simon Anderson

In the Home
There may not even be any need to leave the comfort of your own home to find great motion shots. As mentioned above, your own abode may throw up some great images so you don’t necessarily have to wait for a situation to develop. You can set something up in a similar way to the situation shown in this playful image. Simon Anderson took 17th place in our People at Home round in APOY 2011 with this shot. He had his camera set up ready when his daughter leaped on the bed and fired the shutter using a cable release. It’s a brilliantly uncomplicated and energetic image and one that can’t help but win you over. 

Please visit the APOY 2013 home page to find all the rules for entry, terms and conditions, the APOY entry email address, and the disclaimers that must be copied and pasted into an email entry.

Entries must be received by 5pm on 29 March 2013