|
CWAS Malin Awards
The CWAS David Malin awards have been judged for yet another year!
Once again it was a privilege to be on the judging panel for Australia's premier Astrophotographic prize. "The Malin's" are an open competition and does not require membership, product branding or an association for entrants to be eligible. It's simply a forum for the best images that Australian astrophotographers have to offer. Now in its 21st year, the subsequent exhibition has been seen by more visitors than any other Australian photographic exhibition, bar none.
It was great to see Deep Sky make a resurgence in 2024 with over 100 entries in that category alone. Overall entries fell along the "bellcurve" with many entries being good, some not so good and some that were truly excellent. There are definitely some new stars on the ascendant!
I'd also like to mention there were a handful of entries that, being composites, did not score well. In one instance there was 30 degree wide foreground object that magically had a 180 degree wide sky behind it. Want to impress the judges? Unlike Nike, we'd advise: "Just don't!".
Interestingly the judges, who score the entries being totally unaware of the other judges scores, had a remarkable congruence in scores when the results were pooled. This was confirmation the standout entries got there on their merits rather than through commercial promotion, bias, whimsy or being part of a social media clique.
I have no doubt the winning and finalist images will be extremely well received on the awards night and look forward meeting them in Parkes in September.
|
