My First Photo Competition and a Turkey Leg Dinner

Photoblog by @runrudy

Today, I want to share a photo of my daughter and I standing at a popular location called, the Shibuya Crossing in Tokyo. This is a giant intersection where hundreds of people cross from all directions at the same time. It is supposedly the busiest crosswalk in the world. It's almost like a game, you have to cross and dodge all the people before time is up. It is also sometimes called, "The Scramble" for good reason.

These animated GIFs below can give you an idea of how crazy it can be.

To create this effect, I setup my camera on a tripod and had my wife defend it while I fired via remote timer. I composed, focused, and set the camera to capture at long exposure times. The trick was to have my daughter and I stand very still like statues for about eight seconds at a time so we would be sharp and in focus, while the hundreds of people rushing towards us became blurry like flowing water. It was a very difficult shot because any slight movement from us would ruin the long exposure effect and we would have to repeat it. This was taken on a Friday night with business people, teenagers, drunks, and tourists running all about. She told me that she was scared but she held her ground over and over again to help make this shot happen. I kept reassuring her that I was right there with her and to just relax and watch all the people. My daughters continue to be champions in my photography. We appropriately named this image, "People Watching."

This past summer, I entered this image into the San Diego County Fair Photography Exhibition. It was my first submission ever to any photo competition. I didn't attend the award ceremony because I didn't think I would actually win anything. To my surprise, I ended up placing second place in my division. I called to figure out how to pick up my award and I spoke with the art director for the competition. She was surprised that it was my very first time entering the exhibition and that I had only one entry! She said that most photographers enter 5-8 photos every year. She continued to tell me that the San Diego County Fair is the 4th largest photo contest in the United States, with 30 professional judges, and this past year there were 4000 photo submissions from not just locals but from around the country. She said that, my division was one of the most competitive divisions. That I had beat out some serious heavy hitters/artists that actually have their own galleries, where they sell their work for bookoo bucks. She said, to just to have your photo hang at the fair is a big honor in itself, but the odds of actually winning something on your first try is just crazy. She was very excited for me. I guess it was a much bigger deal than I had thought. I entered the contest in hopes for it to be displayed at the fair and to show my girls that all their hard work paid off. We were all very happy to win and we celebrated by feasting on a giant smoked turkey leg and stuffing our faces with kettle corn.

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Rudy

@runrudy

All images © 2016 Rudy Gonzales. All rights reserved.
All Animated GIFs GIPHY