Award-winning prints are subject to any number of objective criteria, such as composition and color balance, but there is often a subtle and subjective emotional element that resonates with the judges, even if they can’t quite put their finger on the story behind that emotional element. For the Sunset Print Award winner at the Professional Photographers Association of Massachusetts (PPAM) convention, Cathy Broderick, her award-winning print, entitled A Slow Decline, had great emotional significance. Broderick, who owns Cathleen Broderick Photography in Whitman, Mass., captured this wilting flower in her studio while her mother was in the hospital with a terminal illness. “I had been fooling around with flowers in the studio before my mother went into the hospital, trying to come up with something apart from my usual portraiture. When she got sick I left the studio and forgot about them,” recalls Broderick. “A few days later I came back to the studio to take care of some details in...

An expert portrait photographer – primarily weddings and seniors – Amy Feick won a Sunset Print Award at the PPA Northeast District competition for an image outside her expertise.

Each year the Antonelli Institute of Graphic Design & Photography holds a huge student photography competition. This year, second-year student Lauren Driscoll walked away with a Sunset Print Award for her lemony-fresh commercial product shot entitled, well, Lemon Fresh.

Fonthill Castle in Doylestown, Pa., lends itself to photography because it’s a piece of artwork in and of itself. Built by Henry Chapman Mercer between 1908 and 1912, Fonthill Castle is built almost entirely of stone, cement and tiles, including artistic tiles with intricate designs and font work (thus Fonthill).

One of the great things about photography is the Eureka! moment when all the pieces fall into place for the perfect scene. Modern digital photography allows us to manipulate and create that moment in the processing stage, but when it happens naturally, there’s something special about it.

Kristi Elias’ fine art portrait photography transports her subjects through space and time to capture the essence of their personality or to emphasize their vocation or passion. The five-year-old subject of this Sunset Print Award winner is competitive in martial arts, so Elias sent him underground and created an image that exudes toughness. Entitled You Won’t Bully Me, the print scored a 91 at the Professional Photographers of California annual state competition. It’s a show-stopping image that grabbed the judges’ attention. “It has impact because it’s shocking. You don’t expect to see a kid looking that tough at that age in what is clearly a rough urban underground area,” says Elias. “I cropped into the top of his head to give it more of a forced perspective, which makes him look tougher. The overall color palette I used also portrays aggression and toughness, which is what I was going for.” Photographed in Kristi Sutton Elias Photography’s waterfront studio in Long Beach,...

Jeff Gulle has found photogenic locations to demonstrate photography techniques to his students at North Georgia Technical College in Clarksville, Ga. The garage featured in this Sunset Print Award winner at the Georgia Professional Photographers Association competition, The Mechanic, is one of those favored spots.

Melissa Thompson, owner of Pistachio Alley Photography in Cody, Wyo., is known far and wide for her stellar baby photography. Though it’s not all she does, it’s her specialty. Each year she highlights her specialty at competition. This image, She’s a Dream, was entered in both the Wyoming and Montana Professional Photographer competitions. At the Montana competition, She’s a Dream wowed the judges and she picked up a Sunset Print Award. Printed at Pistachio Alley on Sunset Bright Velvet Rag 315g with a Canon iPF8300, Thompson says, “The judges for both state competitions liked the presentation, the paper it was printed on and the print quality. The general consensus was how the image worked well with the Sunset Velvet paper and how the tones were muted, not showing a true black, giving it a dreamlike quality.” To create the image, Thompson started with a concept she came up with last year for competition, but says she shelved it because “it just wasn’t working out right.”...

Misunderstandings sometimes pay off. David Hyttsten, owner of David’s Photography in Monticello, Minn., thought that he needed to print on LexJet Sunset inkjet media to be eligible for the Sunset Print Award at the recent Northern Light PPA print competition.

If you’re familiar with DockDogs, you might be a dog lover, and particularly a lover of dog-oriented sporting events. DockDogs is a canine aquatics competition with a number of events including Big Air, Speed Retrieve, Extreme Vertical and Iron Dog.