• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

• 
• 
• 
• 

 

Winners Announced!

The theme this year is "Magical Moments" and included three categories: Portrait, Black & White, and General. Prizes were awarded in each category: $250 for 1st Prize, $150 for 2nd Prize, and $100 for 3rd Prize. Entries were judged on general appeal, photographic skill, and content by a panel of three judges.

General Category Winners:

1st Place: Jessica Velasco
Jessica said,"It's an HDR image taken at Joshua Tree National Park during the summer of 09. I saw the tree and used that as my foreground with the great view behind it..what can I say? I just saw it and thought it would be a great shot!

The glowing effect behind the tree was a result of the HDR processing and it made the photo look magical. Camera used was a Canon EOS 30D with a wide angle lens."

 

2nd Place: Yelena Virkh
Her photo was taken for a photo class assignment. It is a nicely backlit shot of a friend at a park in Norco. She used a Canon 50D.

 

 

3rd Place: Brittanie Froesch
"I took this picture of my little brother, Marc, while my family was camping at Bolsa Chica Beach in California. We usually go every year, and I always bring my camera. For this particular shot, I was trying to get a picture of his face but he was very insistent on showing me the yellow balloon he had found. Being the ornery 3 year old that he is, he tried to push the balloon towards my camera, while I was taking his picture from up above. At first, I was getting frustrated with him, but as soon as I saw the shot through the LCD screen on the back of the camera, I fell in the love with the point of view. His chubby little fingers holding onto the string of the balloon that he found, and his bright green sandals below come together with the bright yellow balloon. Every time I see it, it makes me smile - and that's why I decided to enter this picture into the competition, so I could share a smile with everyone else. For this picture, I used my Nikon D5000."

 

Portrait Category Winners:

1st Place: Judy Harper
"This picture was taken when I went to Temecula to baby sit my Granddaughter and I took her to the community swimming pool.She found a praying mantas and she was so enthralled with it and not the least bit afraid of it. I grabbed my camera (Canon Rebel XT) and captured the look of her pure joy with it."

 

 

 

2nd Place: Brandi Berry
"This photo was taken of my best friend's son, Steven, on his first Easter. I used a Nikon D5000 and Steven is quite in love with the camera already!"

 

 

 

3rd Place: Edwin Doucette
Men in a Nova Scotia general store. Mr. Doucette took this picture many years ago during his travels. He was a photographer for the U.S. Air Force and took many pictures in that capacity with a 35 mm film camera. This shot is one of them taken as a 35mm negative and printed in B&W as you see here. His grandchildren want to know why they can't see the "picture" immediately in a little screen on his old 35mm film camera and so he has now recently begun shooting with a digital camera in addition.

 

Black & White Category Winners:

1st Place: Thanh Lam
Titled: "Two Generations" Mr. Lam said, "I took this picture of a Lotus flower, two generations at Echo Park, Los Angeles in 2006. The camera that I used was a Fujifilm S3 Pro ISO 100 f 5.6 1/250s, Lens 80-200mm @200. I really enjoyed taking this photo of the lotus flower, I found it to be very beautiful. I love photographing the wonders of the world and this lotus flower happened to be one of the wonders that I came across and I am happy that I was given the opportunity to share it with you."

 

2nd Place: Anand Sheth
"This is a picture of my niece that my wife, Jana, setup. My niece was totally taken by the dandelion and started playing with it to create this magical photo. I simply clicked the shutter!"

Anand used a Nikon D300s camera with a 70-200/2.8 lens and post processed it in Lightroom. He was "talked into" submitting this photo for the contest by his wife.

 

 

3rd Place: Mark Disney
Titled "Three Giraffes & An Elephant" this shot is a graphic abstraction of the skins in a black and white pattern, tightly cropped so the viewer is not immediately aware of the animal subjects.