Judge: Dave Cottridge

This year our visiting judge is Dave Cottridge (pictured below), one of the UK's leading wildlife photographer.

Dave was born in Cornwall.  He describes himself as a photographer with a fine arts degree who, in the 1970s’, made the transition from painting and printmaking to photography. The inspiration for all his images has always come from nature, and since 1986 he has made a very successful career as a wildlife photographer, with an international reputation. He always tries to reflect his artistic training in his photographs, and when digital capture came of age, his images began to bring abstract elements to the fore. Many of his photographs were published in wildlife magazines and books. In 1983 he won the Bird Photograph of the Year’ in the British Birds magazine, for his Red-necked Phalarope taken on the island of Fetlar in Shetland. 

From 1986 – 2006, Dave worked as a photographer and photographic editor on fourteen books.  Two books in particular were the highly acclaimed – Status and Distribution of the Birds of Israel and The Identification of Sylvia Warblers.  He also was a photographic consultant for ‘Birding World, Bird Watching and Birds Illustrated.

Dave travels very widely in order to increase his species range and usually manages several trips abroad each year.  Assignments have included Malaya, Thailand, Hong Kong, Turkey, Kenya, Israel, the Emirates, the Yemen, North America and most of Europe.