Wow! There may not have been that many pages of entries, but those that posted images did a phenomenal job! In fact, I would say that every single person posted at least one image that I would rank among the best, if not more than one, and that made judging extremely difficult. I had to wield the editing knife and at least try to trim down to what I thought were the very finest, but please know that I congratulate EVERYONE on such a fine collection of entries! Even so, there are a lot of HM's and 5 top finishers, so let's get going:
HONORABLE MENTIONS (in no particular order, as all were great!)
A powerfully beautiful and unusual image with terrific composition and tone. Outstanding work, Chris!
Another powerful beauty, perfectly timed and presented! Great job, Marcel.
What can I say? A totally phenomenal image that was actually my second choice for 1st Place, but I put it here as so many had multiple amazing entries, I wanted to spread the honors around. Congratulations Matthias on a double whammy entry!!!
Mystical, magical, moody, unusual, beautiful... Way to go, Sandi!
Wonderfully seen and rendered for a dynamic graphic image! Excellent, Juan!
Fantastic image, Markus! All three of your entries fit the category perfectly. Really fine work...
Amazing shot, perfect for the topic, as was your Playground Bubble image, William. Composition, detail, tone, this one has it all.
One of my very favorites, Peter, and all three of your shots were great. My tiniest nit here would be to straighten the horizon just a tad. I actually tried it, and it works, while still retaining all of your great impact in this shot. Just my two cents...
I love everything about this one. Color, character, a multi-layered street story - doing hair and selling art... Love it!
Another one of my very favorites, a real work of unusual art, both in capture and presentation. All three of your images are top-notch, Mike!
Absolutely beautiful, Gill!
This is pure magic, Dennis, and actually a tie with your Floating Leaf shot, in my eye. Totally different, totally beautiful!
So artistically beautiful, like a Monet painting, and so special for creating this vision in camera. Outstanding, magical work! All three of your images were terrific.
Such a powerful image, with such depth, tone, and beautiful light. All three of your images are winners, in my book, Terry!
Wow! Unusually beautiful indeed! All three of your images perfectly fit the bill as well, Really fine work!
So simple, yet so effective... Outstanding work, Sergey.
And finally we have this lovable character! Great capture, Paulo.
THE TOP 5:
5TH PLACE: OK, we have a tie! :~) What can I say, both so beautiful, both so appropriate, both so different...
What an image, so perfectly executed! Congratulations on such fine work, Daniel!
Another totally amazing image, with perfect point of view, and so beautifully rendered. Way to go, Mike!
4TH PLACE:
Such a classic, timeless, beautiful, unusual image. Great work, Dennis, great work.
3RD PLACE:
Truly a phenomenal image, Terry. Superb mastery of light and tone and atmosphere and story-telling. Pure inspiration!
2ND PLACE:
What a portrait! Such incredible depth of beauty captured, perhaps unusual to Western eyes, but boundless in human spirit, character, color, and culture... Congratulations, Jojie, on such truly special work!
AND THE WINNER IS:
What can I say, but WOW!!! I knew the bar was set when I saw this image (and your other one) early on, and it held up in my eye the entire time. Talk about unusual beauty! How you discovered this creature I will never know (unless perhaps his tail was visible out of frame). But it just doesn't matter because this is one phenomenal capture, perfectly presented! Subject matter, depth of field, composition, color, clarity, the works... A hearty congratulations to you, Matthias! I now turn the next competition over to you!
And again, congrats to each and every one of you. The submissions were a real joy to view...
Aloha,
GP