Isolate And Simplify Photo Contest Winners Announced

Thank you to all the photographers that participated in the Isolate And Simplify Photo Contest, sharing their best photos composed of a main single element. Congratulations to the winners and finalists, and a special round of applause for the Grand Jury Winner who wins an Amazon Echo.

A special thanks to our friend and professional photographer Tony Sweet for his collaboration as a guest judge. Tony Sweet has become an in-demand speaker throughout the United States and Canada in imaging software, specializing in plugins. As a charter Nik Team member, Tony teaches and lectures throughout the United States and Canada on the creative use of plugins. Tony is an author of five books and is a Nikon Legend Behind the Lens and a GuraGear Pro.

Congratulations Grand Jury Winner "Brown Eyed Girl" by SteeleBirdie

"As I repeatedly went through this tremendous set of images, I always would stop at this image and view it for a while. The visual impact is visceral. It pulled me in every time I viewed it. Focusing at a wide aperture can be a bit tricky, even with auto focus. The entire area of the eye is sharp, with everything around it being soft. This is the essence of the topic, “Isolate and Simplify.”" - Tony Sweet

Congratulations Runner Up "Solitary " by Nishant-101

"The smoothness of the long exposure effect on the clouds and water pushes the rock subject to the front, effectively simplifying the image, and isolating it from the rest of the frame, except for the small patch of wet sand at the bottom right, which is an excellent and complimentary repeating element." - Tony Sweet

Congratulations Runner Up "African Elephant Portrait" by CathyWithers-Clarke

"Hard silhouette portraits like this are striking and not easy to pull off. This is a tremendous example of such a technique, which quite dramatically isolates and simplifies the subject." - Tony Sweet

Congratulations Runner Up "~Springtime ~" by Henrik_Spranz

"This image is perfectly executed in terms of isolating and separating the subject. Getting low, with a long lens at a wide aperture works perfectly to blur the foreground and to remove all detail from the pastel background, creating a small slice of sharpness for the subject." - Tony Sweet

Congratulations Runner Up "birds-9" by Pegertler

"This is a small clinic on bird photography and composition, in terms of isolating and simplifying the subject. Shot with a long and probably fast super telephoto at a wide aperture completely blurs the background creating perfect separation. Placing the twig at the bottom 1/3 of the frame and a perfectly sharp eye enhances the creation of this striking image." - Tony Sweet

Congratulations Runner Up "Island_Daybreak" by vanshell

"The strong color contrast is what isolates and separates the chair. It immediately grabs the eye, following a short visual trip back and forth in the shadow. After viewing the pleasing color contrasts in the scene, the eye always softly returns to the red chair." - Tony Sweet

Congratulations Amateur Winner "The Boats" by estercastillo08