Our annual awards are based on our external judges’ rankings of all the images that placed 1st 2nd and 3rd or honourable mention in each category throughout this last year. We sincerely thank our judges listed below for their adjudication of our images. Participation in our competitions is a valuable learning opportunity and the Competition Committee sincerely thanks all those who have participated in this year’s competitions. This has been another year of great images.
Images and judges’ adjudication placements are available on the Victoria Camera Club website: https://www.
Mitch Stringer: Nature
Mitch is a freelance photographer and photography instructor in Victoria, British Columbia.
He truly enjoys the entire photographic process from capture, process to print and the constant quest of creating exciting images with each and every new assignment. As photography is his creative passion he has been constantly exploring and improving a diversity of skills, experience, and with each new assignment, creating a strong technical and creative photographic understanding.
Mitch has run many destination workshops to locations around the world. His passion and knowledge of photography have successfully driven over 30 years of teaching experience.
More information can be found on his website: https://www.mitchstringer.ca/
Robert Laramée: Open
Robert studied photography with the School of Modern Photography. He joined the RA Camera Club (Ottawa) in 1975 and was a member for nine years. During that time, he managed the club darkroom for several years. Moving to a new house to raise a family, he put photography on hold for nearly twenty years. Robert rejoined the RA Photo Club in 2002.
Retirement gave him more time to devote to photography and he started studying at the School of Photographic Arts Ottawa in 2006, where he completed a Part Time Studies Certificate in Analog Photography in 2009.
Robert has taught digital photography for the City of Ottawa and currently teaches at Académie des retraités de l’Outaouais. He also runs workshops and recently started private coaching and mentoring. As a photographer, he shoots landscapes and architecture; in the studio, he does tabletop photography and portraiture. He became a Canadian Association for Photographic Art (CAPA) Certified Judge in March 2016.
Richard Robesco: Theme
Born and raised in Montreal, Richard has been an avid photographer since he was a young teenager. He started his working career in the early 1970’s as a filmmaker and television program producer and worked on hundreds of documentary films mainly for the National Film Board. He moved to Ottawa in 1980 and continued his work as a TV producer. He was hired by the Government of Canada as Director of the Government Film and Video Centre in Ottawa, producing up to 800 new programs per year for federal government departments and agencies. This led to a 30-year career as a government executive, from which he retired in 2013.
After retirement, Richard then enrolled in the Diploma Program at the School of the Photographic Arts, Ottawa (SPAO), graduating in 2015. He started his full time photo-based art practice shortly after and has held several solo exhibitions in and around Ottawa and Gatineau. He has participated in many group exhibitions, receiving several awards, and has seen his work published in books and magazines.
Richard is also currently the Vice-President of the Management Board of the Daïmôn Production Centre which is an artist-run media production centre in Gatineau, Quebec. Richard became a CAPA Certified Judge in 2022.
More information about Richard can be found on his website: www.richardrobesco.com
You can also view his work at: https://www.instagram.com/
Gregg Eligh: People
(Gregg Eligh Portrait)
Gregg is a now retired commercial photographer, having worked in Vancouver, Toronto and Victoria since the 70s. His commercial work has been directed towards advertising, editorial, catalogue and corporate assignments.
Occasional teaching, coaching and workshops further developed Gregg’s skills and knowledge as well as contributing to his ‘community’. “Imagination is better than knowledge”.
More information about Gregg and his photography can be found on his website:
https://www.elighphoto.com/
Cheryl Bramble: Altered Reality
Cheryl joined the local Kelowna camera club in 2011 and that’s when photography became a Passion. For 5 years she was the club’s Canadian Association for Photographic Art (CAPA) Representative and also the Competition Chair, responsible for the club’s submissions to external competitions.
Commitment to continually improving her skills led Cheryl into joining CAPA in 2016. Cheryl received her Judge’s Certification in 2020. In February 2021, she was appointed the Assistant Director of Competitions, and she is also a member of CAPA’s Competitions Team. In January 2024, she was honoured to be appointed as a judge for the inaugural CAPA Digital Salon. Cheryl considers her involvement with CAPA and its members both an honour and a privilege.
Rick Shapka: All Print Categories
After a business career, Rick studied photography at Focal Point and art history at the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver. He creates photographs of landscapes, wildlife, action, people, macro and abstracted images which he often prints. Rick’s print skills have been honed with workshops in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Rick makes photographs wherever he travels, including Europe and western and southwestern USA.
Since Covid, Rick has taken his third Hummingbird workshop at Bull River BC, followed by a marine mammal trip from Port McNeil and grizzly bear trips to the Khutzeymateen.
Past service on the executive of the Canadian Association for Photographic Art (CAPA) has led to his initial interest and ongoing education as an active CAPA Certified Judge (since 2011). Rick judges for many photographic competitions.
Some of the images on Rick’s website have been printed for a recent group show at ArtSea in Sidney BC along with three other photographers. More information about Rick and his photography can be found on his website: http://rickshapka.smugmug.
