Hay-on-Wye photographer ‘thrilled’ by awards success

A photographer who won the consumer awards at a national photography competition is seeking out more dog and horse owners as he prepares to enter again this year.

Chris Norton, who lives just outside Hay-on-Wye, can usually be caught snapping amazing photos of equine and furry friends - with some chickens too - for his company Tails of Wales Photography.

The 49-year-old particularly loves to capture the bond between owners and their four-legged-companions - something which boosted him to success in the recent Xperience Awards 2021 finals.

While Chris didn’t win over the panel of photography judges, he did win the public panel over meaning he took home four out of five consumer awards.

He told The Brecon & Radnor Express: “I did not win any of those overall competitions, but what I did win was the consumer awards.

“The finalists are put forward to a panel of consumers - or the public - before being judged again by a panel of the public and they will choose up to five images from each category if they feel it’s worthy of an image to be a winning image.

“Out of those consumer awards, I won four consumer awards - three of them were in the category of me and my horse, and one was in the category of me and my dog.”

The experienced photographer is even making his own special prizes for those who helped him to create the magical snaps for the competition.

Chris has framed the winning photos on a sanded woodblock with a special burned-in inscription which is unique to each photo’s participant.

He said:”Because I wasn’t in the competition awards and because I wasn’t the overall winner, my customers didn’t get a prize unfortunately from the competition. But because I was still nominated by the consumer awards panel of judges, they nominated me as producing winning pictures - I can now call myself a national ‘me and my horse’ photography winner because I was judged to be a winner.

“As a gift from me to my customers who have won - I have made what I call Natural Wood Block which is a Fine Art Print mounted on a wooden block, shaped, sanded, waxed and hand inscribed pyrography by me, and have delivered these to the winners of the competition.

“They were thrilled with having been chosen to be a winner in the category of “Me + My Dog” and “Me + My Horse”, and also delighted to have the “Natural Wood Block” presented to them by me, each worth £225.”

Chris said he was especially thrilled to have won the consumer awards at the competition which had hundreds of entrants with more than 6,000 photographs.

He has already firmly set his sites on entering again this year with more photos of animals and their companions.

Chris said: “It’s fantastic news really, I just wanted to say I’ve won these and that I’d competed against hundreds of photographers and thousands of other images so yeah, I’m thrilled to bits.

“And, because I’ve won these, I’m going to re-enter this year - it’s driven me to carry on even more by entering even more competitions.

“I’m thrilled to have achieved this as there were over 6,000 images entered and the standard of work was incredible.”

Chris’s customers loved their prize from the experience. Bethanie Casey, mother of Archie who is pictured with Jessie- part of the winning Me and My Dog photo, said: “Chris was great through the whole photoshoot, gave us great instructions to get the best results. He was so welcoming us, our children and dog. He was so accommodating and we are so pleased to have had this opportunity, Thank You.”

Meanwhile fellow winning entrant Rosie, who is pictured with her horse Maverick as part of one of the winning Me and My Horse photos, said: “I enjoyed my photoshoot experience with Chris. He beautifully captured my lifelong friendship with my horse Maverick. To find out we had been placed was just an added bonus! Thank you Chris!”

Pam appeared with her horses Red and Will in one of the winning Me and My Horse photos.

Her mother, Diane Beardsall, said: “So thrilled to have our picture chosen to win a National Photography Competition”

Dawn McAllister, mother of Iris who is pictured with her horse Mystery as part of the Me and My Horse photo, added: “Feel extremely proud and lucky to have had this experience. Chris was excellent, very relaxed and patient.”

Much like for the 2021 awards, Chris will find out how his photos have done with the judges through the year and whether they have become finalists before the final judging takes place at the end of this year.

Chris is again appealing to dog and horse owners to come forward to help him create more photos to be entered into this year’s competition.

This year Chris will be running his own “Golden Ticket” prize of a large framed image worth £599 as he re-enters the competition.

He said there will also be runner up prizes of a photo shoot and Desk Framed Print which are each worth £175 as well as being entered into the National Photography Competition 

To enter go to https://www.tailsofwalesdogphotography.com/winagoldenticketphotoshoot - terms and conditions apply.

Outside of the competition, Chris said he is hoping to incorporate more unusual animals and that, unlike a lot of people, he is not held back by the idea of photographing pets like spiders and snakes.

He said: “I do want to try to incorporate more animals - other pets like rabbits or guinea pigs or just something a bit different. There are lots of different things really that I could photograph.

“Speaking to somebody recently and he’s got a tarantula and a snake - I don’t know specifics of breeds or types - I said I would love to photograph both, although he said he was unsure because the tarantula is really, really shy and doesn’t come out of his home and the snake just looks like a snake really.

“I’m sure I’d give it a go - it’s a bit of a challenge and change to what I normally do but I would love to photograph something a bit unusual.”

When asked if he was fearful of photographing the less-loved creatures, he said: “Well I wouldn’t want to pick up a tarantula, snakes - as long as they’re not venomous, I’ll pick up a snake.”

Visit the Tails of Wales website by clicking here and social media pages to follow Chris and to catch a glimpse of his latest photos and products.