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About this Page

This web page is part of the archive of Hidden Earth events that used to be online at hidden-earth.org.uk. That web site has now been decommissioned and so, at present (October 2023), the archived lists of Competition Winners and Staff Credits are not available online, apart from the present year 2023 and the previous event in 2019. Some of the links on this page will be broken.

Competition Results 2023

Prize Winners

Merits and Distinctions

For the four 'Salon' competitions – Art, Video Media, Photography and Surveying – we award Merits and Distinctions (or sometimes a 'highly commended') as well as an outright winner.

Sponsors

There were many donations of bed-nights by caving clubs this year. We thank them all for their support, which provides opportunities for cavers to meet other cavers across the country. This year the bednight winners got to choose from the range of donations, enabling them to visit a club hut in the caving region of their choice. Bednights were donated by ...

• Bradford Pothole Club
• Bristol Exploration Club
• Chelsea Spelaeological Society
• Craven Pothole Club
• Nenthead Mines Conservation Society
• Orpheus Caving Club
• Red Rose Pothole Club
• Shepton Mallet Caving Club
• South Wales Caving club
• Technical Speleological Group
• Wessex Cave Club
• Yorkshire Subterranean Society

This is a list of the sponsors and the number of prizes they donated. (This list is automatically extracted from the data source for the above table).

BCRA (2)
Ceris Jones (4)
Grampian Speleology Group (2)
Hand Knitted Pottery (1)
Inglesport (1)
Jerry and Julie Wooldridge (2)
Leica (1)
Mendip Cave Rescue (2)
Mike Moore Books (1)
National Centre for Showcaves (1)
Robin Gray (2)
Starless River (2)
Warmbac (5)
Wild Places Publishing (2)
caving club bednights (10)

Ad-hoc Competitions

Cave Diving Group 'How long is Martyn Farr's dive reel?'

Prizes donated by the CDG. The second closest guess was 450 mm over, won by Max Fisher, who wins a calendar donated by CDG and a choice of bednights at a caving club. The closest guess was just 273 mm over, so first prize goes to David Hardwick who wins a publication donated by CDG and a choice of bednights at a caving club.

Descent Magazine

The Descent stall had been giving out raffle tickets for every purchase over the weekend, to win a bundle of prizes, including a binder, a snood and an exclusive water bottle. The winner, drawn out of a hat is Lizzie Kinge.

Badge Draw

We ask everyone to return their badges, so we can re-use them next year. The winner, drawn out of the box, was Rhys Williams who wins free entry to the next Hidden Earth.

Comments on Some of the Competitions

Art Salon

The judges commented that 'It was wonderful to see a variety of the media displayed and very exciting to see the range of materials used'.

Photo Salon

David Gibson writes... The Photo salon was made a lot simpler this year. We awarded the Premier Trophy for the best portfolio of five images, and one winner in each of the print and projection classes; as well as merits and distinctions. The two monochrome and colour print classes were merged into one this year. Next year, we will probably re-introduce the Newcomer Award, but there will only be a Cave Life (or Cave Science?) award if somebody steps forward to run this category. As always, the standard was very high, but please remember that this is a salon – the concept is that the photographer will benefit from showing thier work to others and seeing how other photographers handle the subject matter.

Survey Salon

Wookey writes... We had a great set of entries in various styles and it was genuinely hard to pick a winner. We had to be quite strict in the end. Thanks to everyone that entered and the unfortunates I nobbled to be judges. Ultimately the deciding factor was what was missing as much as what was included. The judges really liked the details and use of colour on Phil Ryder's Fairyholes and Western Hope surveys but it did not have any information on the vertical or lack of it. The Matienzo Vailline survey was very impressive too but ultimately we couldn't give 1st place to a survey you can't read even with the supplied magnifying glass (a novel touch). So the winner is actually the most 'classical' style survey there, which looks like it could have been drawn in 1962: Hammer Pot, but it really did let you understand what the cave was like.

Video Media Salon

It was decided, before the event, that there would be was no judged competition this year.

Best Club Stand

Won by Matienzo Cave Project. The judges liked the interactive displays with up-to-date information and the achievements of their expeditions with an international dimension.

Fraser Simpson Award for innovation in video

This annual award is given by the Hidden Earth Team for recognition of excellence in underground video creation. Nominations, with reasons and examples of work are welcomed by the Hidden Earth conference manager in advance of the event. The work does not have to feature in the Video Salon. The award consists of a prize of £100, donated by Hidden Earth, and a returnable engraved stone. Further information is at hidden.earth/salons/video/.

Fraser Simpson died in 2017. He was an audio-visual technical expert at Fife College, an accomplished caver and a key member of Grampian Speleological Group. Fraser was also a valued member of the Hidden Earth team, due to his extensive AV knowledge and expertise. His film-making skills were considerable and the Hidden Earth Team and BCRA Council have agreed to set up an annual award to commemorate him and his contributions.

Video is rapidly becoming the recording medium of choice for many people. Taking underground video, although challenging and complex, is more possible than ever before and (judging from the number of TV-based underground documentaries) of great public interest. The pace of innovation has become bewildering in amateur film making too and there are opportunities to involve new ideas, equipment, concepts, projects and audiences, to harness the potential of ‘filming’ underground. Thus, the Award can acknowledge any aspect of excellence in video, but focussing on the artistic, technical and aesthetic qualities, and particularly on innovation in those fields. It is hoped that the award will be an incentive for people to experiment in this most exciting and flexible creative art.

For 2023 the Frazer Simpson award is given to Paul Taylor for excellence and innovation in his Otter hole video.

Citation by Footleg...

Paul spent over a year working on a camera carriage which could be run along wires across the Hall of 30 to get drone style flying shots of the chamber which showed a unique viewpoint of this famous room without stepping off the narrow trail which runs up alongside one wall. There were many trips to Old Ham mine to test different motor driven carriages supported on kevlar lines. Several trips into Otter Hole just to try and film this one shot were organised by Paul, each involving finding 10 or so volunteers to carry all the lighting gear into the cave on each occasion. Each trip improved on the quality of the footage until Paul had the shot he had envisaged. Paul's unique talent in putting together large teams for long difficult trips was evident throughout. He was always very open to ideas and opinions of others on this project, so it never felt like a one man project that just needed porters. Paul directed others, often allowing them to do much of the camera work while he took on the role of director. It was always a pleasure to work under his direction, having freedom to suggest ways to tackle shots in the cave but having a clear brief and set of goals for the trip. This approach of being the director, and using multiple camera and lighting people to do those jobs on shoots was something I've never experienced before in the caving world. The film features many multi-camera shot scenes and looks much better for it.

Another aspect of Paul's innovative approach was always refining, sourcing and testing new equipment. We went through 3 or 4 generations of lighting tech, several cameras and gimbals over the course of 8 years working on the project. Many shots we ended up capturing would not have been possible with the original kit we started out with. Paul's ideas for unique sequences in the film were always shared with the team to be discussed and feedback from others incorporated into the plans. Paul never looks for the lime light or personal glory, but instead uses teamwork very effectively to get a better result than any one person would come up with. An example I was very closely involved with was the editing, where Paul put in many, many hours of hard work, but then was always receptive to input from other members of the team on suggestions to further improve what he had produced. He organised screenings to cavers both with filming or photography experience and with none. Also showing the edits to non-cavers to see how they responded to the film and refining it based on their feedback.

BCRA's Arthur Butcher Award

BCRA's Tratman Award for 2021

Giles Barker Award

Conference Team Credits

Conference Manager — LES WILLIAMS

Technical Team: Manager — FRANK TULLY

Reception Team: Managers — CHERYL LINGARD and LOU BIFFIN

Events Team: Lecture Secretary — GARY DOUTHWAITE

Competitions Team: Secretary — DAVID GIBSON

Publicity and Sponsorship Team: Prizes Manager — Martell Baines

Bar Team: Manager — DAVE KING

and special thanks to

Thanks also to the lecturers and the session chairs, and also to the traders, sponsors, and to all delegates from the UK and overseas, who all contributed to making the event a success

Staff: tab-separated data This is the data file that is used to generate the competitions tables above. Please note that it might contain unused columns or strange notes that do not appear to make sense; or strange delimiters for some of the data. It might not be any more use the you can get by pasting the HTML tables ito Textpad (or similar) to cleanse them of markup.

British Cave Research Association (UK registered charity 267828) and British Caving Association.
The Old Methodist Chapel, Great Hucklow, BUXTON, SK17 8RG
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