A nature-loving 11-year-old from Kearsley in Bolton has won the RSPCA’s ‘People’s Choice’ award after attracting the most online votes for her striking image of a sheep peering through a fence.
Ellie-Grace Braidwood had been walking on a local farm with her parents when she spotted the inquisitive sheep.
The RSPCA People’s Choice award features photographs from the Mobile Phone and Devices, Pet Personalities and Pet Portraits categories of the prestigious RSPCA Young Photographer Awards for entrants aged 18 years old or younger.
Ellie-Grace said: “I was feeding the fish and the ducks whilst out for a walk and this sheep kept on coming up to the fence and I thought he was really cute.
“I feel a mixture of shock, pride and excitement at winning. I still can’t believe people voted me to be the winner! I am thinking I might start saving up for a camera of my own and continue taking photos. I never thought I would win, but if you don’t have confidence and go for it and enter, you never will.”
Ellie-Grace’s wonderful image, comically entitled ‘Ewe looking at me?’, was among fourteen pictures of animals snapped by young people which were shortlisted for the animal charity’s People’s Choice award, from which the public got to choose their favourite animal pic.
Over a period of a week, a whopping 4,565 votes were cast online for the shortlisted photographs.
The winning photo was taken on a Samsung Galaxy S10.
Ellie-Grace will receive £100 worth of vouchers from Amazon.co.uk, an RSPCA Young Photographer Awards 2022 trophy and a certificate. The competition is supported by Nature’s Images, Camtraptions and Wildlifephoto.com.
In December 2022, an official judging panel – made up of wildlife experts including Chris Packham and several industry professionals – announced the overall winners of the RSPCA Young Photographer Awards.
In part two of the competition this March (2023), there was a special online poll for the public to pick one winning photo from the Mobile Phone and Devices categories, featuring three age groups of Under 12s, 12-15s and 16-18 year olds, as well as the Pet Personalities and Pet Portrait categories.
The Mobile Phone and Devices category was launched as part of the RSPCA Young Photographer Awards competition to reflect the fact that many young people capture great images on their mobile phones and devices. It provides a fresh challenge and opens up the photography competition to anyone with a mobile phone or device. It’s a category aimed at all skill levels, from beginners to professionals.
RSPCA photographer and awards judge, Andrew Forsyth, said: “The best thing about the RSPCA Young Photographer Awards is that we’re always seeing something new, and the People’s Choice award category is a great way of making the competition virtually accessible to everyone.
“Our young photographers are always bringing fresh ideas and trying different things; the creativity and talent is outstanding – and it’s a real joy to look through the entries every year.
“It was a tough choice this year for our online voters, there were some truly beautiful photos on the shortlist. Ellie-Grace’s image showed bags of character, originality and really captured the personality of the sheep. It’s a wonderful photo and we hope to see more from this budding photographer in the future.
“We hope Ellie-Grace’s success will encourage lots more young people to enter this year’s RSPCA Young Photographer Awards 2023, which launches in May.”
Entries for the main RSPCA Young Photographer Awards 2023 will open on Thursday 4th May 2023.
