The winners of the latest Travel Photographer of the Year (TPOTY) competition have been announced, with the overall winner named as Piper Mackay with a beautiful portfolio of infrared images from Kenya’s Maasai Mara, which includes portraits and landscapes. 14-year-old Raymond Zhang has won the title of Young Travel Photographer of the Year 2024 for his portfolio of an old steam train and its drivers. An exhibition of winning images will be on display at The Banbury Museum and Galleries, UK from 29th March to 7th July, before being exhibited internationally.
Travel Photographer of the Year 2024, Piper Mackay
From Travel Photographer of the Year: The winning images from the 2024 international Travel Photographer of the Year awards (TPOTY) have been unveiled. The high standard and diversity of the latest winners shines through in imagery which ranges from intimate portraits to atmospheric landscapes and shots which capture our changing planet and its inhabitants. The result is an incredible visual journey around the world, capturing its breathtaking moods and colours, alongside some fabulously strong black and white imagery.
For the second year in a row, the overall honours have gone to a talented female photographer – this time from the USA. The Travel Photographer of the Year 2024, Piper Mackay, takes the unusual approach of shooting in infrared (IR). Her portraits of African women are simply beautiful and exquisite in their detail, whilst her shots of giraffes in Kenya’s Maasai Mara are tremendously atmospheric.
TPOTY founder Chris Coe said: “So many images seen today are over-saturated, over-processed and even AI-generated. A ‘less is more’ approach is often far more effective. It is therefore refreshing to judge images which demonstrate good camera craft and in-camera creativity – shot full-frame, or close to it, and with very little retouching.”
“Piper Mackay’s distinctive winning images illustrate this ‘less is more’ ideal well. They are beautifully composed, celebrating both indigenous women and wildlife on the African savanna. The use of black and white, with a camera converted to shoot infrared (IR), allows us to absorb the details and atmosphere which good monochrome conveys so well. Her images have an immediate impact, but the intricate detail and atmosphere captured is also eye-catching and highly engaging.”
Piper, who now lives in Kenya, said: “My philosophy has always been ‘Never let the photo dictate your experience, always let the experience dictate the photo.’ This award completes my life’s passion and work across Africa for more than two decades. There is no higher honour!”
Young Travel Photographer of the Year
Travel Photographer of the Year celebrates the potential stars of the future through the Young TPOTY awards. This year the winners and placed photographers come from six different countries, with the awards’ first overall winner from China – 14-year-old Raymond Zhang – receiving the title of Young Travel Photographer of the Year 2024 for his portfolio of an old steam train and its drivers, photographed right in the heart of the action.
17-year-old Polish photographer Maksymilian Paczkowski first entered TPOTY when he was very young. He has now taken the top honours in the Young TPOTY 15-18 years category. His wonderful series of birdlife shots use colour cleverly and were all shot in his own country. The Young TPOTY 14 years & Under category was won by 12-year-old Australian Leonardo Murray for his glorious images of dunes in the Namib Desert. Runner-up Jamie Smart deserves a special mention in this age group for her series of gannets shot at Bempton Cliffs in England. These images are much harder to shoot than they appear, and this young British photographer has achieved this at the age of nine!
Piper Mackay’s prize includes a £2000 cash bursary from TPOTY, Radiant Photo imaging software and a portfolio review from top New York agent Frank Meo. Young TPOTY winner Raymond Zhang receives £500 from TPOTY, plus Radiant Photo imaging software. Leonardo Murray and Maksymilian Paczkowski, receive £250 each. All three young winners will also win a place on an Eye for the Light photography workshop or a photo critique.
The 2024 international Travel Photographer of the Year awards showcase the talent of photographers from all around the globe and the organisers say it is both heartening and exciting to see so many talented female photographers amongst the winners this year, including the awards’ first-ever winner from Mexico.
Amateur and professional photographers from more than 150 countries submitted more than 20,000 images in TPOTY 2024. The winning and placed entries combine to form a truly outstanding collection of contemporary travel photography. The winning shots – which can all be viewed in the Winners’ Gallery on tpoty.com – will first go on display at The Banbury Museum and Galleries, Banbury, UK from 29th March to 7th July. TPOTY will also be showcased at Xposure in the UAE. Another exhibition will follow in Changsha, Hunan Province, China in mid-June.
Individual categories and awards
Mexican photographer Maricruz Sainz de Aja won the Faces, People, Cultures portfolio category with a subtly atmospheric series of low-lit images of Papua New Guinean Wauga tribespeople in the Central Highlands. Indian photographer Partha Pratim Roy’s dramatic image of an Indonesian horseman trying to control his steed won the Best Single Image award in this category.
Roie Galitz’s striking landscapes of the Bråsvellbreen ice cap in Svalbard, shot from different viewpoints and perspectives, illustrate both the climate and water elements of the category theme and secured top honours for the Israeli photographer in the Planet Earth Landscape, Climate and Water portfolio category. Belgian photographer and former overall TPOTY winner, Alain Schroeder, won the Best Single Image award with a poignant image which reminds us that climate change is here right now, and blighting people’s lives.
The Travel in Monochrome portfolio winners form a diverse and atmospheric collection. The winner is Aleš Krivec from Slovenia for his portfolio of shepherds’ cottages in the Italian Dolomites, while the Best Single Image award was won by Linda Wride (UK) with a beautiful shot of a Turkish potter from her runner-up portfolio.
Another British photographer, Jenny Stock, was the judges’ choice to win the Wildlife, Nature & Underwater category, with her fascinating and intimate portfolio of American crocodiles in Cuba, while Australia’s Joshua Holko received the Best Single Image award for his beautiful image of a Mongolian Pallas Cat covered in hoar frost.
Portfolio category prizes included TPOTY cash bursaries, Genesis Imaging exhibition prints, Radiant Photo imaging software and membership of the Royal Photographic Society.
There were four One Shot categories in 2024, challenging photographers to capture each category theme in just a single image – which is a lot harder than it might seem! The winner of One Shot: Cities, Towns, Streets was Matthew DeSantis (USA) for his misty image of a baseball game in front of a giant Buddha in Bhutan. Hong Kong photographer Ngar Shun Victor Wong’s serene image of a snow-covered landscape and church is beautiful in its own right, but even more so when you spot the tiny human figure giving it the context, scale and perspective which made it the winner of the One Shot: Escape category. British photographer Jo Kearney’s joyous image capturing a group of colourfully-dressed women celebrating during ‘Chilam Joshi,’ – the Kalash Spring Festival – is a worthy winner of the One Shot: Festivals & Celebrations category. It just makes you smile. And another mesmerising photograph won the One Shot: Women in World Culture category: Turkish photographer Erhan Coral’s image of an elderly woman deep in thought during Mexico’s Day of the Dead warrants a close look to discover just how detailed and enchanting it is.
The winners of Cities, Towns, Street; Escape; and Festivals & Celebration all receive TPOTY cash bursaries. The winner of Women in World Culture will receive a Lensbaby Velvet 28 plus Lensbaby Twist 60 & Double Glass II Optic Swap Kit courtesy of SheClicks. All four One Shot winners will also receive Radiant Photo imaging software.
New Rising Talent category
New in 2024 was the Rising Talent category for amateur photographers, semi-pros and professionals who have turned pro within the last two years. The ten winners, from eight different countries, will receive mentoring from TPOTY judges and Eye for the Light. The winners are: Sofia Brogi (Italy); Gilberto Costa (Portugal); Thibault Gerbaldi (France); Dmytro Geshengorin (Germany); Kevin Hoare (USA); Florian Kriechbaumer (Germany); Jo Martindale (UK); Kaz Rollison (UK); Khaichuin Sim (Malaysia) and Agnieszka Wieczorek (Poland).
In this award, three of the winners – Thibault, Agnieszka and Kevin – will receive an unusual opportunity to have their work reviewed by top New York photographers’ agent, Frank Meo from The PhotoCloser. Last year’s winners of these reviews found them to be hugely beneficial to their photography. Turkish photographer F. Dilek Yurdakul enthused “The meeting with Frank Meo was very important for my career. It gave me the key to doors I could not reach and was absolutely priceless. It was a great opportunity that I think was much more valuable than any cash prize.”
People’s Choice
The winner in one category was not chosen by the judges. The People’s Choice award was decided by members of the public voting on the TPOTY website. The winning image, chosen from 19,895 public votes, was by Mauro de Bettio (Italy). It captures the wonderfully close relationship between an endangered pangolin, and its devoted protector, who rescued it from a wildlife market in Nigeria.
The awards are judged anonymously by a 15-strong international panel of imaging experts, who give their time and expertise freely to judge the awards. This year TPOTY welcomed a new judge to the panel: British wildlife and nature photographer, Ellie Rothnie. All judging is completed ‘blind’ – the judges do not know the identity or nationality of any entrants – and finalists must provide the RAW/original image files for the final judging stage to confirm the validity of their entries and demonstrate that AI did not play a part in their creation.
See more images at tpoty.com
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