Burbank Public Library contest focuses on amateur photogs
Nick Green, of Burbank, holds his daughter Kiana, 2, at the awards show where he won top honors for his Still Life - Color image at the Annual Amateur Photo Contest sponsored by Friends of the Burbank Public Library at the Buena Vista Branch Library on Thursday.
In the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, on a Disney Cruise to Norway, Olivia Cremarosa, then 5, instructed her parents to pose for a photo in the golden light of a beautiful sunset — dad behind mom, with mom’s hands on her pregnant belly, thumbs and forefingers forming a familiar loving shape.
“I said, ‘Put a heart on mom’s belly,’ and my mom did it,” Olivia, now 6, said of her photographic process.
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This week, the resulting photo won the top award in the 12 and under category in the Friends of the Burbank Public Library’s 2016 Amateur Photography Contest.
The judges said, “The heart was at the heart of the photograph,” according to Louise Paziak, vice president of the nonprofit, who presented awards for winners in each of the 10 categories and 18 sub-categories during a reception at the Buena Vista Branch Library on Thursday night.
Burbank resident Renée Silverman won Best in Show for her black-and-white photo of Malaysian singer Yuna on stage at the Troubadour in Hollywood.
Renée Silverman, of Burbank, placed first in B&W Photojournalism, and Best in Show at the awards show at the Buena Vista Branch Library.
Silverman, a former musical performer, said she got the idea to start shooting concerts after attending a show at the Greek Theatre and noticing the photographers up in the front row.
“I thought, ‘that’s what I should be doing,’” Silverman said, adding that from then on, “it became an obsession.”
The Yuna photo, reminiscent of a classic image from the Jazz Age, is one of “the rare special ones [that] become art for me,” Silverman said.
This year, there were more than 110 entries in the contest, which has been held annually since shortly after the Friends nonprofit was founded in 1980 to support the library. Selected photos are on display at the Burbank Central Library, 110 N. Glenoaks Blvd., through Feb. 27.
Bonnie Burrow, a photography teacher at John Burroughs High School and former Burbank Leader staff photographer, has helped coordinate judging of the contest for several years. She said the low number of entries — about half as many as in recent years — was due to the earlier dates of the contest this year to accommodate anticipated construction at the Central Library.
One of the judges, professional photographer John Dlugolecki, said fewer entries made the judging somewhat easier, overall, though he said choosing Best in Show this year was tougher than he remembers it having ever been, because of the quality of the finalists’ entries.
Burrow surveyed the contest participants at the reception on their chosen format and gear — film vs. digital, cellphone vs. camera — and found most had used digital cameras. Roughly the same number had submitted photos taken on film as had submitted photos taken with cellphone cameras.
Debbie McBride’s photo of overlapping bluish curves, a detail of the ceiling in the cabin of a commercial airliner, took first place in the color architecture photography category. After awards were handed out, Dlugolecki excitedly showed off the original and similar shots, all stored on the smartphone with which McBride snapped them.
Judge and professional photographer André Murray said he’s often asked for recommendations about cameras, but he said that’s not what matters.
“It’s the person behind the lens,” Murray said. “The eye.”
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Chad Garland, chad.garland@latimes.com
Twitter: @chadgarland
