But what the heck is it? Abstract image wins CEWE Student Photography Award

The winner of the first-ever CEWE Student Photography Award has been announced live at the The Photography & Videography Show. More than 700 images were submitted by students from all across the UK, but there could only be one winner, and that was Flora Tomlinson-Pilley with her beautiful monochrome abstract of a dolphin just about to break the surface of the ocean.

The award was presented by professional music photographer Christie Goodwin, one of the panel of judges for the competition, at CEWE's stand on the final day of the show. The winning image forms part of a gallery of ten shortlisted images, each of which is displayed on CEWE's stand (location A90 – come and have a look if you're at the show!) in a specialist photo mount specifically chosen to bring out the best of each individual shot. In Flora's case, it was mounted on aluminum dibond, its metallic finish complementing the monochromatic tones of the photograph.

The CEWE Student Photography Award is a free-to-enter competition that is open to all UK students with a love of photography. It was launched in 2024, inviting students aged 16-plus in full-time education to enter photos that celebrate the earth’s beauty, and has a prize pool worth more than £5,000 on offer.

Flora explained that she entered the competition after seeing posters up at Falmouth University, where she is in her third year studying Marine and Natural History Photography. Her image, The Perfect Moment, is of a dolphin she photographed just below the surface of the water while on a boat trip as part of her course. "The sea was glass-flat and there were dolphins everywhere," she explained. "They were all along the side of the boat and I just kept shooting and shooting until I got one just about to break the water tension."

For her first prize-placed image, Flora was awarded a Fujifilm X-T30 II camera with accessories and her images will also be featured in a solo exhibition, with full support and mentoring from leading photo printing company CEWE, a CEWE PHOTOBOOK, and exclusive work experience with the CEWE Photo Team in Oldenburg, Germany.

The second prize went to Kayla Merkus for her image Searching for the Oldies, juxtaposing a classic car with its bonnet open on a busy high street, while third prize went to Hannah Mittelstaedt for her street portrait Boyish Gaze, depicting a raincoat-clad family outing and capturing the attention of a young boy.

Prizes for second and third place offer a limited edition print run of the shortlisted photographers' images, signed and numbered by the artists, as well as inclusion in the CEWE Student Photography Award 2025 exhibition and catalogue, and more.

The CEWE Student Photography Award competition forms part of the world’s largest free photography competition, the CEWE Photo Award, a worldwide competition that received more than half-a-million entries.