Australian-Geographic-Magazine-September-Octobe..

September –October 2014 129

IN MARCH, Australian Geographic art

director, Mike Ellott (right), joined seasoned

photographers Esther Beaton and Nick Rains

to judge the Australian Geographic ANZANG

Nature Photographer of the Year competition

at the South Australian Museum in

Adelaide. For two days they pored over

hundreds of images to select winners and

runners-up across categories, the winner

of the best portfolio prize, and the overall

winner. Mike says that while Esther and

Nick considered things more in terms

of technical achievement, he saw his

role as judging each image purely on

its visual merit and impact. “One of

the most interesting things about the

process,” says Mike, “is that from the

judges’ perspective, all the entrants are

anonymous.” This means that great

images from photographers with little

experience and who have not entered

before have just as much chance at

winning as those from old hands.

Judgement day

BOLD, BR IGHT AND BEAUTIFUL

Croc capers

WILD CROCODILE RIVER

DESPITE WEAR ING a slightly diff erent

hue of khaki, AG’s editor-in-chief Chrissie

Goldrick (above, eighth from left) became a

guest member of the Australia Zoo crocodile

team for a day when she joined the Irwin

family at the Steve Irwin Wildlife Reserve

in Cape York. “From the moment the steel

trap opened, to the point this huge crocodile

slipped back into the water, everything went

like clockwork. I wasn’t allowed to be in the

jump crew but they did let me join them

immediately afterwards,” Chrissie says. “I was

holding the crocodile down and could examine

him at very close quarters. His colours and

markings were beautiful. I wasn’t nervous

because the handlers were so confi dent and

skilled, and you could tell that they had done

this hundreds of times before.” A couple of

days after Chrissie left, the team trapped a new

3.2m croc they christened Aus-Geo. He was

the 105th crocodile captured there since 2007.

He has been fi tted with a tag and we’ll be

RUSSELL SHAKESPEAR E; NATSUMI PENBERTHYfollowing his progress from now on.

FROM THE FIELD

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