The Iris Awards are the annual measure of excellence for members of the New Zealand Institute of Professional Photographers. Over four days hundreds of images are graded and as a result the members of the NZIPP obtain the levels in their honours system.

When my image of the reflection did well in the Central Regional conference, Esther Bunning told me that she would nag me to enter into Iris, because she was convinced that it would do well. Although I am not a member of the NZIPP I could enter as they recognise my membership of the Photographic Society of New Zealand. It would just cost me more.

In the lead up to Iris a lot of the local sections of NZIPP arrange mock judging sessions where you can anoymously enter images and they are assessed by a panel of experienced members, some of who are the actual judges in the awards themselves.

So given the encouragement of Esther I decided to enter two images into the local mock judging to see how they would go, and I was really pleased with the result. Both images were received well by the judges and audience alike. They accessed that both could be in contention for a “High silver” which was awesome to hear. It was also great to hear the positive comments that were made as well.

While it would have been nice to have taken the images through into the actual judging life has intervened. There is real uncertainty about my job and I decided thati had better uses for the $410.00 that it would have cost to enter. Just knowing that they were of a high standard was reward enough.