The Great British Photography Challenge Winners!

For four weeks, avid photography fans have sat down at 9pm and tuned into BBC Four or BBC iPlayer to watch The Great British Photography Challenge and tweet using each challenge hashtag. Tonight (Friday 11 June), we saw the final episode and the winner crowned.

Episode one introduced our six amazing photographers competing to be the new name in British photography, mentored by portrait and fashion photographer, Rankin.

The six contestants - Ali Lewis, 43; Chelsea Nawanga, 25; Georgie Peel, 41; Jackson Moyles, 21; Paul Williams, 60; and Tyrone Williams, 28 - had a rocky start after being sent to Brighton beach with their phones and leaving Rankin disappointed from a lack of creativity, they all make up for it in both the nature and celebrity portrait shoots.

Jackson Moyles did particularly well in the nature assignment with Chris Packham, and Ali Lewis had Rankin’s favourite photo of the week with her celebrity portrait of Anna Friel.

Episode two gave the six contestants another phone challenge, this time in a boxing gym.

Then the students travelled to Birmingham‘s wholesale market to try their hand at documentary photography alongside award-winning artist and photographer Maryam Wahid.

The third challenge of episode two was a high-end fashion shoot, with guidance from Rankin himself and the creative reaction of international stylist and fashion editor Cheryl Konteh.

Even with Rankin openly admitting to the group that he felt they hadn’t done as well as they had hoped this week, his top three were Ali’s gym photo, Paul’s fashion portrait, and Chelsea’s fashion photo was Rankin’s favourite of the week.

Episode three showed that the pressure is on with three new challenges.

The phone challenge asked the photographers to capture the character of flowers in rural Herefordshire before moving onto a difficult sport photography challenge guided by Lamarr Golding.

The final challenge provided the pressure with the need to impress not only Rankin but win over a company with a brand advertising agency.

Fortunately for Ali and Tyrone the brands loved their commercial photos.

Rankin’s top shots of the week were Georgie’s flower photo, Paul’s sport photo, and Ali’s commercial photo. Tyrone also was named top of the week for selling his commercial photos for £500.

The final episode aired today (June 14) and the rest of the article contains major spoilers.

The episode took place in Rankin’s home nation of Scotland as they completed the three challenges: dramatic landscape photography in Glencoe, A photo shoot with two up-and-coming Scottish music acts, and a chance to show off their own creative flair with the Wildcard task.

Finally, the six contestants created their exhibitions to be judged by Rankin and experts from the art and fashion world.

Now for the big spoilers: the winner of the Great British Photography Challenge.

An unexpected twist led to not one but two of the photographers to be crowned the title in the new series.

Jackson Moyles from Dunfermline and Tyrone Williams from Northampton were announced the joint winners in tonight’s finale episode.

BBC/Storyboard Studios

“Picking a winner for the show was really hard,” Rankin says.

“It prompted some heated debate between me and the other judges. Tyrone and Jackson are completely different photographers, with two very different styles and career paths.

“Tyrone is an art photographer, with a really clear voice. His work grabbed my attention from the beginning. Jackson’s work, on the other hand, grew as h found himself over the competition. They were both clear winners in their own right.”

Not only were there two winners of the show, but Chelsea was also offered a once-in-a-lifetime internship opportunity with Rankin.

As of 10pm tonight (June 11), watchers of the show can see the winners brand new works in the winners exhibition.

On his win, Jackson says: “It came as a bit of a surprise considering my ups and downs in the series, but it really felt like an affirmation that Rankin and the team understand what I was striving to achieve. The journey was class: an exceptional time for a relatively new photographer like me. The biggest thing I took away was the importance of communicating – when I communicated poorly, my final work suffered. Once I understood this element was vital, I produced some of my best work. I was lucky to have worked with some incredibly talented photographers from all genres and I'm truly thankful.”

On his win, Tyrone says: “I feel honoured to have had the opportunity to work with and meet such passionate photographers and creatives. Winning the series has been such a great feeling and an amazing validation for my photography portfolio but I feel all of us have achieved so much in the series. To all execute the challenges as we did and to all exhibit our work in the final, helping each other with every step, you can call us all winners.”

The entire four-episode series are available now on BBC iPlayer

The series was commissioned by BBC Arts commissioning editor Emma Cahusac and produced by Storyboard Studios founder and managing director Natalie Humphreys.