Apogee Photo Magazine

The Photo Contest: Patterns of Nature

This was a tough one to judge. There were almost no bad photos! Patterns are particularly fun. They are easy to do; because they are all around us, we do not have to travel farther than the room we are in. To photograph them requires that you have trained your eye to see them. What is amazing is that many, many people do not see the beauty around them until someone shows them a photograph of a simple pattern of a common object that they had taken for granted. Sometimes they still do not see the beauty because they cannot see the beauty in simple things.

We chose Nick Kurzenko's, "Frosted Window," as the Grand Prize winner. While there were others that had sent in similar images, it was Nick's that stood out for the detail and the rich color. This is an example of both the common and uncommon. For those of us that live in the north, ice crystals on a window are a common sight. While we marvel at them on our bedroom windows seen at first light, they quickly disappear as our breath or body heat makes them melt away. For those of us in warmer climes it is something we may never see, and such a photograph may make us exclaim that such a sight can't be real but the product of some computer program.

As first runner up we chose Hugh Jervis's "Fragility." It was beautifully photographed and lighted, and shows us that there is even beauty in decay.

Second runner up is "Grand Canyon Sunset" by Paramita Basu. Here is an excellent portrayal of atmospheric prospective, the effect that atmosphere and light have to create a sense of distance.