Two Israeli photographers have soared to first place in two different categories at this year's prestigious international photography competition that seeks to document wildlife.
Moshe Cohen and Gad Shmila each won first place in their respective categories at the 2020 Bird Photographer of the Year. Shamila won first place in the "Birds in Flight" category for his capture of Israel's national bird, the Hoopoe, flying through the blackness of the Israeli night.
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Hoopoe's flight captured with low shutter speed
(Photo: Gadi Shmila/Bird Photographer of the Year)
"I love turning the image I see in my imagination into an image one can see on the computer screen," said Shmila, "to my delight, this challenge is endless. Every time a new idea arises, it becomes more and more difficult to realize."
According to Shmila, great-quality images do not always capture groundbreaking moments. "The second where I manage to connect the two, is a particularly sweet moment that dwarfs all the failed attempts that accompanied it."
Cohen, meanwhile, won first place in the "Attention to Detail" category, for his image of a scops owl napping in a tree, looking almost indistinguishable from the tree's rough bark.
"This owl is an old friend," said Cohen, "I used to hear it in the night. One day I ran into it while walking around the kibbutz where I live. I stood there with my camera taking pictures of it. People didn't understand what I was looking at."
The competition's judges have had their hands full, as they had to hand pick the winners of the various categories out of 15,000 pictures submitted.
In the "Best Portrait" category, Majed Alza’abi from Kuwait emerged victorious for his picture of two European shags.
The winners of the other categories are as follows:
The winner of the "Bird Behavior" category is Roelof Molenaar from the Netherlands.
The winner of the "Birds in the Environment" is Francesco Filippo Pellegrini from Italy.
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Birds in the Environment winner
(Photo:Francesco Filippo Pellegrini/Bird Photographer of the Year)
The winner of the "Black and White" category was Robert Sommer from Germany.
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Black and White category winner
(Photo: Francesco Filippo Pellegrini/Bird Photographer of the Year)
First place in the "Creative Imagery" category went to James Hudson from the United Kingdom
The winner of the "Garden and Urban Birds" category is Magdaléna Straková from the Czech Republic, for a picture of a loan bird soaring above a basketball field.
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Garden and Urban Birds category winner
(Magdalena Strakova/Bird Photographer of the Year)
The Bird Photographer of the Year competition is meant to celebrate all that is positive about wildlife and the relationship between humans and nature.
According to many photographers who submitted their pictures, the images represent a deep and meaningful connection to the world and to the nature that surrounds us.
Many pictures have been lauded by the judges for their creativity, subject matter, and indisputable attention to detail, which tends to show us a side of the natural world humans don't often see.