Pictures of the Year

Xenia Shih

I enjoyed browsing through the pictures of the year because they were all so creative and compelling. I was blown away by the first place winner for Magazine Multiple Page Feature Story, "Autumn in Arcadia." All of the photos from that feature story were absolutely stunning. I noticed that the photographers of "Autumn in Arcadia" also won second place in the same category, so I took a look at their other feature story, "Spirit of the Wild," and I was just as awed by the photographs that they captured for that story. There is no question in my mind that those photographers deserved both first and second place in that category.

Another particular photo that caught my eye was "Pollution in the Czech Republic" by Tamas Dezso. I thought it was really interesting how Dezso captured the cooling towers and power station chimneys in the background to illustrate pollution while at the same time capturing the beautiful landscape in the foreground. The juxtaposition of nature and man-made pollution was really unexpected. Also, by taking the photo in black-and-white, Dezso gave it a much darker mood than it would have had if it had been in color. The severity of the black-and-white contrast on top of the nature/pollution contrast gave the photo a tragic feel.