A Launceston resident and member of the local camera club has beaten more than 850 entries to claim a gold medal for his portrait photography.

Chris Robbins, 65, is one of Launceston Camera Club’s longest standing members, being part of the club for more than 35 years. However, this year marked a particular achievement, as Chris was announced as the winner of a gold medal at the Western Counties Photographic Federation’s annual Interclub Digitally Projected Image Competition.

Chris entered the competition with his family portrait entitled “Looking into the Future” and despite facing some 860 other images entered into the competition, he came out with gold.

Speaking to the Post about his win, Chris said: “I’ve been interested in photography for 40 years. When I started it was mainly wildlife that I photographed but in more recent years I have been concentrating on portraiture but not exclusively.”

Speaking about his inspirations for the portrait, Chris explained: “After doing a standard family portrait I asked if I could try something a bit more creative and they didn’t mind.”

And despite the tremendous outcome of the portrait, Chris added that the process of taking the image was actually quite quick.

“It was quite quickly really. The key is to just use one light in a totally dark room making sure no light falls on the background,” he said.

When asked if he ever expected if he might win the competition, he said: “No! I never expected to have the best out of 860 images!”

And his reaction to winning? Chris described himself, quite simply as “Chuffed!”