The Royal Academy of Arts has announced the five winners of its Eyewitness photography competition, which was organised to celebrate its Eyewitness Hungarian photography show and judged by: Colin Ford, CBE and the Eyewitness curator; Laurence Earle, executive editor of the Independent on Sunday; Steve Macleod, creative director of Metro Imaging; and BJP's Diane Smyth.

David Gould has took the overall prize with his evocative shot of a boy wading across the Yumana River in India. "I was standing on a railway bridge and noticed below a boy in the water," said Gould of the shot. "He was standing, then started to move. I leant over the railings of the bridge, scrambling with the camera to get the shot, as the look of the rippling water was amazing, like the rings of a tree. Almost the circle of life, emitting out from this little boy and surreal."

Gould was picked out from 5560 images submitted online, and his work will be published in The Independent on Sunday's New Review magazine on 18 September. He also wins a supersize print of the image from Metroprint, a year's subscription to BJP, an Olympus Pen Mini E-PM1 and a £250 voucher from Calumet.

The four category winners were won by: Adrian Murphy, in the abstract category; James William Murray in the portrait category; Aaron Levi Simic in the fashion category; and Sefton Samuels in the street photography category with a shot taken 20 years ago in Madeira. They win portfolios of 12 black-and-white resin coated or colour C-type photographic prints from Metroprint plus an Olympus SZ-30MR.

"It has been a delight to be involved wiht the RA Eyewitness competition," said Colin Ford. "With such a high quality of submissions and with more than 5500 entries, it has been a tough decision. However, the panel feels the winning images best represent their categories and are contemporary pictures that remain true to the styles of the Hungarian photographers."

Eyewitness: Hungarian Photography in the 20th Century - Brassai, Capa, Kertesz, Moholy-Nagy, Munkacsi is on show at the Royal Academy until 02 October, and presents over 200 photographs taken from 1914-1989.