Announcing "Rivers and Fjords" - Our June 2018 Photo Contest

Win prizes in our contest for June 2018

By PF Staff in Photo Contests on Jun 3, 2018

We're herewith announcing our monthly photo contest for June. The theme for this month is "Rivers and Fjords".

The topic this month is "Rivers and Fjords", so show us some landscape or city photos with rivers or fjords. Good luck!

First prize is a $50 gift card to B&H Photo, second prize is a one year forum account upgrade, and third prize is a box of photo paper form Red River.

The official contest rules are found here.

Click here to submit a photo for the contest.

If you haven't done so already we invite you to browse our special gallery of last month's photo contest submissions and nominate your favorites.

"Boats" Contest Winners

Announcing the winners of our April, 2018 contest

By PF Staff in Photo Contests on May 25, 2018

"Lake Kilstivatnet" by candid

Voting has ended for our April, 2018 "Boats" photo contest with the following result:

In first place was forum member candid from Germany who captured "Lake Kilstivatnet" (pictured above). This photo was shot with a Pentax K-5 and an smc Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 lens.

Our runners-up were forum member Ryan Tischer from USA in second place with "American Integrity" and Cobbs from USA in third place with "Under the Falls". Click on either thumbnail for a larger version.

"American Integrity" by Ryan Tischer	"Under the Falls" by Cobbs

We'd like to congratulate the winners and also thank everyone who participated or voted! Also, be sure not to miss our current photo contest. Read all about it in the monthly contest forum.

April "Boats" Contest Finalists Announced

Vote for the overall winner!

By PF Staff in Photo Contests on May 15, 2018

After the end of the nomination phase of last month's official "Boats" photo contest, we're now ready to announce our top 15 finalists!  Click on the link below to view the photos in full size and cast your vote in the poll:

Vote for your favorite photo in the poll

As usual for our monthly photo contests, voting closes in a week, and then we'll announce the winners.

Don't miss our May "People - Candid or Street Photography" photo contest, which closes to submissions at the end of the month.

The Making of "Great Horned Owlets"

How the winning photo of the "Birds" contest was made

By bulloughphotography in Photo Contests on May 6, 2018

Thanks so much to everyone for your support of this image. It certainly is one of my favorites, and I’m pleased you like it too. The images in this particular contest were lovely, and given the quality of all of them, I’m especially happy you enjoyed these owls staring back at you!

As noted in my submittal, I was fishing along the Weber River, in Utah, USA, when I observed an adult Great Horned Owl flying to and from a nest in the distance. Upon closer inspection, I saw the nest was occupied by these three owlets. The next day, I returned with my camera gear. Despite trying to not alert them as I approached, they noticed my movement, which led to this wide-eyed image. Not wanting to disturb them, I took a few images and quickly retreated.

I’ve been a Pentax shooter since the 1970s and will continue to be for a long time. This particular image was made using the Pentax-D FA 150-450mm lens (a real gem!) with a Pentax 1.4x DA converter, hand-held on a Pentax K-3 body. As you can see from the EXIF data, the lens was fully extended to 630mm with converter, giving a 35mm equivalent of 945mm, and wide open at F8. For those who have questioned or debated the ability of this combination to capture sharp images, perhaps looking at this image will answer those questions. ISO was 1250, exposure was 1/1600s, white balance set to auto, and the image was shot in RAW.

The only editing done to the image was cleaning up a bit of noise, sharpening the image a bit, and adding a very slight vignette to draw the attention to the birds themselves, all done in Adobe Lightroom. Exposure was, as is almost always the case with my K-3, spot on and the focus was exceptional.

Thanks again for your support and I’m looking forward to seeing more of your incredible work in future contests.

- bulloughphotography

Announcing "People" - Our May 2018 Photo Contest

Win prizes in our contest for May 2018

By PF Staff in Photo Contests on May 1, 2018

We're herewith announcing our monthly photo contest for May. The theme for this month is "People - Candid or Street Photography".

The topic this month is "People", narrowed down to people shot in candid or on the street. Good luck!

First prize is a $50 gift card to B&H Photo, second prize is a one year forum account upgrade, and third prize is a box of photo paper form Red River.

The official contest rules are found here.

Click here to submit a photo for the contest.

If you haven't done so already we invite you to browse our special gallery of last month's photo contest submissions and nominate your favorites.