2022 Birth Photographer of the Year Competition

I both entered this competition and judged it (for the third year in a row) and every year so far, I’m blown away. This year there were OVER 400 ENTRIES!!!!! It is growing every year and I couldn’t be more excited for Lacey and Exposing Birth.

I was yet again blown away by not only the talent, but also by the sheer will power of literally everything it takes behind the scenes to make it run. AND this year, Lacey added a subsection to it for birth videography! How fucking cool is that!?

But I figured I would write about the 5 submissions that I entered, why I chose them, why I edited them the way I did if it pertains, and why they were named the titles I chose. People put so much effort into their submissions for any competition, it’s always nice to hear why they did things the way they did.

“A Birth Pool’s Written Narrative”

Surprisingly my “tester” was the one that did the best 🙃

I was super interested in how it would be received. I knew the original photo (which was in landscape) was beautiful by itself. because I knew the back story, I knew I needed to change exactly what the judges were looking at.

I needed their eyes to be specifically drawn in and focused on the foot and the story that was being told within the lines and automatically knew that an oval crop was way this image needed. It also made choosing the name of the image pretty easily. I wanted to try and convey that the lines were telling their own story. A story so often missed in a birth space.

I kept it colorized because I felt that switching it to black and white, you lost too much of the story. So many people just automatically switch to black and white when something doesn’t “fit into their cute little box” and I’m really trying to embrace the images as they are (with minor tweaking of course).

“Not Everyone Appreciates the Squeeze”

This has to be one of my all time favorite images I’ve taken.

It’s also far from technically correct, and it irritates the shit out of me 😂 But such is birth, things change rapidly in the birth space.

This was another intentional crop, of bringing your eyes exactly where I want you looking. Straight into baby’s face. I tried to crop off a good chunk of the blown out highlights in the back (can’t hide those and we all hate that damn spotlight). And because of those highlights I honestly didn’t expect this to score high at all. I had submitted it to a previous well known image competition, and they just brushed over it so I was really wanting some feedback on the image and if it could be “saved.”

“The Calm Before the Chaos”

This was one of those images where you just hope the judges see what you see. They see the exposed background and the foreground being lit up with flash with the lines being horizontal. The complete and utter relaxation and just giving in to the process.

I chose the name to try and bring focus to the ease of the birthing person’s body in the pool and the clouds in the background. The juxtaposition that appeared to possibly happening between inside and outside. That sometimes what we can’t see, is just as, if not more, intense as what we can see.

Also I was just really proud of the exposures on this image. They’re a pain in the ass to do when a subject is backlit but you want the background AND foreground to be visible.

“Just Blowin’ Some Bubbles”

This image is so freaking fun! I was SHOCKED when I realized I had actually captured the bubbles baby was blowing right after their birth. And again made choosing the image name really easy.

This was originally a landscape image that I cropped into portrait (honestly didn’t even dawn on me to circle crop it otherwise I would’ve). There was a lot of extra commotion happening around baby that I was trying to get rid of.

The judges picked up on a lot of the little nuggets in the image that I was excited about and I completely agreed with their feedback on how to elevate this image specifically to take it to the next level.

“Fuck Cervical Lips”

This image with the title was pretty self explanatory. It’s visceral. You can FEEL and HEAR what is happening in the image. The title was chosen because it explained the events that are unfolding in the image, it was also everyone’s thoughts during the event. Cervical lips can suck it.

And although it’s an image that’s not necessarily uncommon in a birth space, I felt the image being taken directly above the birther and so close was different enough that it warranted an entry.

I kept the original cropping even though I desperately wanted an oval crop. Whenever I tried the oval, too much was taken off the sides and the shoulders would get cut off, and then if I went too wide with the crop it just turned into a circle crop and wasn’t want I wanted. So the landscape crop had to suffice.

after all was said and done

I ended making it to the top 20 of the entire competition which was NOT expected. I was surprised as shit again and gratefully humbled.

My goal this year was more so in testing some ideas I had (images, crops, etc) and seeing if I could beat what I had accomplished last year (one silver and 4 bronze awards). It was a nice reminder that we are only in competition with ourselves. Comparison is the thief of joy. As long as you’re making progress in the direction that you desire, that is all that should matter.

This year I was able to beat my scores from last year, and increase my total points. One gold, two silvers, and two bronzes is pretty fucking rad. I’m not sure about next year since I’m due to have my own little one in just a few short months, but we’ll see what happens when we cross that bridge 💕