Love Your Coast Photography Competition winners announced!

Clean Coasts just announced the winners of the 14th edition of the annual Love Your Coast photography competition.

Clean Coasts proudly announced the winning photographers of the 14th edition of the Love Your Coast photography competition. This year the competition received a record number of over 1,300 entries.

In 2023, Clean Coasts celebrated its 20th anniversary. Since 2003, Clean Coasts has been working with communities to help protect and care for Ireland’s waterways, coastline, seas, ocean and marine life. Since 2010, the Love Your Coast photography competition has been a celebration of all the beauty and uniqueness of the Irish coast, that Clean Coasts volunteers work to protect.

Love Your Coast mission extends beyond a mere photography competition. Our coastal and marine environment form an integral part of Ireland’s identity. Through this competition, we invite the people in Ireland to appreciate, celebrate, and safeguard our coast, echoing the dedication of our over 2,000 volunteer groups working tirelessly to protect our marine environment.

Clean Coasts wants to congratulate all the winning and shortlisted photographers and thank them for being part of this year’s celebrations.

Watch the video announcement

 

 

 

Take a look at the shortlisted images

Love Your Coast 2023 Categories

This year, photographers are invited to enter the Love your Coast Photography Competition across six categories:

Coastal Heritage – Castles, shipwrecks, lighthouse, harbours and more…Ireland’s coast is full of treasures and the Love Your Coast competition helps us discover them and look at them from a different perspective.

Coastal Landscape – Breathtaking landscapes, cliffs, beaches, waterfalls, waves, islands, caves and everything else that makes Ireland’s coast so unique. Through our Love Your Coast competition, we get a look into all the beauty we work so hard to protect.

People and the Coast – From surfers, to swimmers, to people simply enjoying the beauty of the Irish coast, to those who are working by the sea: just as the landscape, coastal communities are full of character that we hope to see reflected in this year’s entries.

Wildlife and the Coast – Through the years, through the Love your Coast competition, Clean Coasts have been able to showcase the incredible wildlife that inhabits our coast, from sea birds, to seals, cetaceans, otters, hares, lizards, etc…

Underwater – This category has always been one of photographers and our audience’s favourite, but it was removed in 2020 due to restrictions around diving during Covid. This year, we are delighted to be able to reintroduce it and we are looking forward to seeing the amazing shots of underwater wildlife, plants, people, landscapes and more.

NEW! Protectors of Our Coast – To celebrate Clean Coasts’ 20th anniversary, this category has been added to showcase what volunteering on the coast and community spirit is all about.

Do you have a question about any of these categories? Get in touch at loveyourcoast@eeu.antaisce.org.

 

 

Love Your Coast 2023 Gallery

This year to honour all of our amazing Love Your Coast 2023 shortlisted and winning shots finalist, Clean Coast created a dedicated gallery.

There you will be able to find each photo, the name of the photographer, where the photo was taken and a few words from each of the finalists about their pictures and what compelled them to take the shot and enter our competition. 

Click the button below to check out what everyone had to say.

View the 2023 Gallery

Love Your Coast 2023 Judging Panel

 

Mark Carmondy has been interested in wildlife since he could crawl and started birdwatching with his uncle, Jim Wilson, when he was about 9 or 10 years old. He was interested in photography in a casual way as a kid in the 80s, but only took it up again with any intent in the mid-00s after he emigrated to Japan and digital was coming to the fore. He holds a degree and PhD in biochemistry. His day job is being a European Patent Attorney, but his dream job is just being immersed in our natural world and photographing it. Mark has published several books on the birdlife of Ireland, and work from time-to-time with Lindblad National Geographic on their expedition ships.  

 

Tina Claffey is an award-winning Irish nature photographer and author of ‘Tapestry of Light-Ireland’s bogs & wetlands as never seen before’ released in October 2017, and  ‘Portal-Otherworldly Wonders of Ireland’s Bogs, Wetlands and Eskers’ in 2022. 

Her observations and unique perspective through her macro lens of the flora and fauna of the raised bogs and wet woodlands of the Irish midlands are celebrated in her work.She has presented her work on many worldwide online platforms including the Wildlife Habitat Council Online Conference in the US and the UN Climate Change Conference (COP 26) to promote the importance of the Irish bog wilderness.  

 

Jim Coughlan is the Visual Media Manager for the Irish Examiner/The Echo. Having joined the Irish Examiner back in 2000, Mr. Coughlan took over as Picture Desk Editor in 2013 in a role that changed rapidly to incorporate sourcing, creating and managing graphics and video as well as pictures.  

 

Sinead McCoy is Clean Coasts’ Coastal Communities Manager. Sinead joined the Environmental Education Unit in 2010, initial working with Green Schools team before moving to Clean Coasts in 2014 as Clean Coasts Officer. In 2016, Sinead became Coastal Communities Manager, responsible for Clean Coasts programme and additional projects. Sinead has been heavily involved in Love Your Coast Photography Competition since joining the Clean Coasts team and has huge passion for the key role Love Your Coast plays within the Clean Coasts programme 

 

Conall O’Connor is an Assistant Principal in the Department of Housing Local Government and Heritage working in the area of Marine Environmental Policy.  A keen amateur photographer himself, he has  participated  as a judge in the Love Your Coast competitions for many years which  he describes one of the most enjoyable and rewarding aspects of his work. 

 

Jim Wilson is a wildlife writer, photographer, international wildlife tour leader and broadcaster. His wildlife photos have been featured in national and international publications, which include the best-selling The Birds of Ireland, A Field Guide (2013) and Ireland’s Garden Birds (2008). Jim also wrote the first field guide to the Whales and Dolphins of Ireland (IWDG 2006).. 

He established the BirdWatch Ireland Garden Bird Survey in 1987, one of the longest running citizen projects in the country.  For many years, Jim has been a regular contributor to The Mooney Goes Wild Show on RTE Radio 1 and has been a key figure in the production and presentation of the international live broadcast of the Mooney Goes Wild Dawn Chorus for over 20 years, based in Birdwatch Ireland Cuskinny Marsh Nature Reserve near his home town of Cobh in Cork Harbour. 

 

 

Naoise Culhane is a commercial photographer based in Dublin, Ireland. With vast experience working in Press, Public Relations, Corporate and Commercial photography he has built a reputation for quality, style and delivery.He works closely with clients to deliver unique images for national and international campaigns and his work has been published across all mediums. Driven to creating lasting imagery he is always looking for something different to help his clients convey their message.

 

WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE YOUR 2023 SUBMISSIONS

Before entering this year’s competition, remember to read our Checklist and the Terms and Conditions 2023 before submitting your entry.

It is critical photographers adhere to all the points within the Term & Condition, especially around nesting birds and edits to their submission, failure to do so will result in disqualification. 

  

Checklist

Before submitting, follow our checklist!

Checklist

FAQs

Got questions? Find the answers here!

FAQs

Terms & Conditions

Check out our T&Cs

Terms and conditions

If you are unsure about any of the items in our Terms and Conditions or have any other questions, please contact us at loveyourcoast@eeu.antaisce.org. Clean Coasts would like to wish all photographers the best of luck with your submission!

SUBMIT YOUR LOVE YOUR COAST IMAGE HERE

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