Sony World Photography Awards 2012: Students Shortlist in Pictures

The shortlist for the 2012 Sony World Photography Awards Student Focus competition was announced on Feb. 7.

Student Focus has established itself as the world's most high-profile student photography award and is open to universities worldwide that run a photography programme. 

This year's student competition brief was based on the philosophy of the "haiku" - which is a Japanese poem of seventeen syllables.

The photographers were asked to take on a role similar to that of a haiku poet and create and submit one image that depicts a "fleeting moment" or the "decisive moment".

This resulted in some impressive and very professional-looking student-shot images... of a perfectly captured brief moment in time. 

Ten photographers from each of the shortlisted institutions have been chosen to take part in the final competition. The winner will be announced at the Sony World Photography Awards ceremony at London's Park Lane Hilton Hotel, on April 26.

Check out the shortlisted pictures...

The photograph shows a salt desert in the south of Bolivia. The desert was flooded due to a heavy rain storm which happened a few days earlier. This is a rare phenomenon as a desert has a vey dry climate. The rain in such places only happens once every few years. It was a very special and unique spectacle. Once the salt was dry the translucent mirror that surrounded us was gone. However thanks to a photographic register we can share and be amazed by such beauty again and again.

The ‘ethnic cleansing’ of Hazara people in the city of Quetta, Pakistan

The protagonists of the celebrations of Menorca are, without a doubt,
the elegant Minorcan horses that dance trotting with magnificent
pirouettes and realising traditional “bot” between the people who
encourage them excited and the band who plays for them the popular
melodies of the island.

The hottest day of the year in Copenhagen, Denmark. At the Islandsbrygge Harbor Swimming a young man just jumped of the five meter tilt to cool down.

This photo was taken in Yalta (Ukraine) on the pier at the famous restaurant "Argo" on August 27 in the daytime, just a day after the earthquake a magnitude of 4 points occurred 100 miles away at the
bottom of the Black Sea, which led to this violent storm. In this situation, I drew attention to this guy who bravely went to the edge of the pier to photograph the waves, and then I noticed that the approaching wave is very large, so quickly ran to the edge of the pier and promptly took up a position for shooting, and then bang, the flow of the wave hits peasant in the face and nearly washed away ... But since he stay on his feet and returned unharmed, except for its compact camera, which had been ruthlessly broken sea water.

Planking is an activity of lying face down in an incongruous location. Participants engage in such extreme behavior to pursuit momentary excitement. The scene is set up at a peaceful location, instead of a vulnerable one, where the planker is fully enveloped by nature. At this moment of fleeting life, one would immerse in the instinct to make a difference in life.

"Final photograph of the series entitled "Linger". Created during a two week photographic study in Cape Cod Massachusetts in the Summer of 2011."

ENTER
Only a moment is able
to stop the magic of time
in which it is immersed
mind and soul of the sailor
living in each one of us

This image forms part of a body of over 25 photographic images. In the work I looked at how people engaged with one another in social environments such as night clubs or parties where normal ways of behaviour are altered. I was looking for the crucial moment where something vulnerable or insecure was revealed in the people - a moment which allowed for an unfolding narrative to develop beyond that specific frame

We try forget painful memories but when faced with a photograph we are forced to face our feelings. In this photo I used natural light source to stage ordinary object and make it more intense. I have tried to capture emotional, intimate and special moments together and also to show the traditional and modern photography transformation.