DMBLGIT April 2011 Winners!

What a great month it has been, hosting the prestigious food photography event DMBLGIT ( Does My Blog Look Good In This) the brain child of Andrew of Spitoon extra, and claimed by food photography lovers around the world! Gorgeous pictures greeted me in my inbox every day and left me gasping in rapture. I am so inspired now to learn more about photography and improve my skills so thank you all for that! 

I would also like to thank the wonderful judges this month: Zoe Francois, Shaheen Peerbhai, Ria Mathew, Dario Milano as well as honorary Judge Helene Dujardin who also generously shared their favourite food photography tips in my previous post.

After careful evaluation of all the 43 stunning entries we received this month, the judges scored each photo according to edibility, originality, and aesthetics. The entries with the 3 highest scores when all categories were combined were chosen as the overall winners.

First Place: Ghoriba- Moroccan Almond Cookies by Soma Rathore. This picture was taken with a Konica Minolta Dimage A200. I love the textured back ground of the picture, as well as the almond slivers which almost look like scattered petals! 

Second Place: Apple Butter Pots de Creme by Asha Pagdiwalla. This was taken with a Nikon D5000, 50mm Lens

Judge Shaheen fell in love with this incredible photograph and this is what she had to say:

"The one photo that still comes back to my mind after going through the whole bunch is Asha's. It's gorgeous."

Third Place: Apple cake by Pamela Rodríguez. This was taken with a Canon EOS 350D, 50 mm f/1.8 Lens Is it just me or are you suddenly craving apples too? 

Asha and Pamela both were overall winners last month too! Well done!

Category Winners: These are the highest scoring photos for each category, after excluding the overall winners,

Originality Category winner: Butter Paneer Curry Naan Pizza 

taken with a Canon EOS Digital Rebel XS with EF 50mm f/1.8 II Lens by 

Xiaolu Hou who was the previous host at her wonderful blog 

6Bittersweets 

I am personally thrilled that Xiaolu also received the fourth highest scores from the judges, not only because of her gorgeous photographs, but because she is an amazingly sweet and generous person, with ready tips on everything from photography to macarons to woks! 

These are some of Judge Dario's comments on it when it was submitted to him for critique on his awesome photography blog:

"Commend you for doing something different... The food is great looking, rustic and country, I love it!"

Edibility Category winner: Yeasted meringue coffee cake by Pavithra Elangovan Taken with a Canon Rebel Xsi / 18-55 mm. Love the shiny glaze and browned tops! Wish I could pick one up right from the photograph! 

Incidentally Pavithra is also one of the top 5 selected Daring Bakers selected for the best edible container contest, so do go vote for her over at the Daring Kitchen! 

Aesthetics Category Winner (Tie): Fruit fusion by Nisha, Taken with a Canon EOS 500D, Tamron 17-55mm. Perfectly lovely summery shot!

Aesthetics Category Winner (Tie): Navy bean stew by Harini Taken with a Canon EOS 350D with 50mm1.4F lens. So hearty those beans look in that lovely rustic bowl and it does sit well on that board that her son brought back for her on his way back from school- how sweet! 

Apart from the winning entries, one of these wonderful entries which did not make it to the winning list, but also deserves mention, was personally picked by honorary judge Helene Dujardin, author of the Food Photography bestseller Plate to Pixel: Digital Food Photography & Styling for the Host's choice award: 

Host's award selected by Helene: Gule Kambing Kacang Hijau (Surabaya-Style Goat Mung Bean Curry) by Pepy Nasution. Taken with a Canon Digital rebel XTi and Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM


Helene's comments: "They took a very difficult subject and not only made it look appetizing but they made it their own. The color scheme is good, the composition has movement. It draws the viewer in different steps. The only thing I would suggest is to maybe to be aware of the highlights/blown outs on the whites in the background. I also would suggest to reduce the visibility of the cutlery which takes away a bit from the main subject. Maybe off to the side to hide some of the silver reflections or wood."


Thanks once again to all the wonderful Judges for sharing their time and insight to support us aspiring photographers, and to all the wonderful participants for so much beauty and such a feast for the eyes! 

Do feel free to comment on these gorgeous pictures here or in the DMBLGIT Gallery, I would love to hear your thoughts, and I am sure the photographers would love to hear from you too!

I would also like to apologize once again to  Patricia Scarpin of one of my favourite baking blogs Technicolor Kitchen  and Vania Samperuru of the lovely Our Family's Favourite Recipes  whose gorgeous entries I missed because they somehow went into my spam folder :( I am so glad that this month's host the wonderful Prerna of one of my favourite blogs Indian Simmer, has generously agreed to include them in this month's entries. Do send in your entries for this month to her. Also Indian Simmer has recently been selected as finalist in SAVEUR magazine's Best Food Blog Awards in the Best Regional cuisine category so please do go and vote for her, if you haven't already!