2023 Photograph of the Year Awards
On May 2, 2023, Stamford Photography Club held its annual Photograph of the Year competition as the culmination of our 2022-2023 season. Members were asked to submit 3 images across the 3 categories: Black & White Print, Color Print and Digital Image with no more than 2 images into any single category, for a chance to be crowned our 2022-2023 Photograph of the Year. The images members submitted into this competition were shown throughout this competition season and could be from the open subject or assigned subject categories. Our judges were tasked with selecting one image per category to represent the Stamford Photography Club as the Photograph of the Year, not an easy task for sure with many great images to select from.
Below are the Images of the Year, along with a story behind the image from the makers.
You can see the results of our competition here.
You can see the gallery of the award-winning images from our competition here.
BLACK & WHITE PRINT OF THE YEAR
This shot of this iguana was made in February 2023 in San Juan, Puerto Rico near Fort San Cristabol in Old San Juan. This chap was sitting on the green looking around for lunch and a bee flew by. He’s obviously interested – but he might know that there’s no such thing as a free lunch…. Shot on my Olympus OM1 with my 12-200mm M.Ziuko zoom lens on a bright, sunny day. 1/800th, F6.3, 200mm FL, ISO 400. The images was processed in Photoshop and Topaz Sharpen AI. This shot also won Photo of the Year for the Connecticut Chapter of Professional Photographers of America as well as BW Photo of the Year for Stamford Photography Club. It also received a merit from the Professional Photographers of America. ~Steven Labkoff
COLOR PRINT OF THE YEAR
This image was taken at DIA Beacon, a contemporary art museum on the Hudson River. I stationed myself by this Richard Serra sculpture and waited for just the right person to walk through where the sun shining through windows creates light, shadows and reflections. ~Sally Harris
DIGITAL IMAGE OF THE YEAR
This image was captured in September 2021 on a group outing with Steven Labkoff and Christopher Wisker. We had an idea that the moon might be rising behind the memorial lights, so we utilized The Photographer’s Epheremis to determine a location to attempt the capture of the moon crossing the lights. WNBC Transmitter Park in Greenpoint, Brooklyn was that position to setup. Once we had found our location then it was nervous pacing as we double checked ourselves that we were in the right spot and check again…and again. Finally, the moonrise appeared, and we did happen upon the correct spot for the event. The timeframe to capture the moon between the lights was very short, which meant we had to have our exposures down pat for a very few snaps at getting it in the proper position.
This is a single exposure, mask blended in photoshop to enhance the skyline, and keep the moon’s highlights in check. Planning, preparation, execution, all in a photographer’s day’s work. ~David Henkel
