One of my goals for 2012 was to push myself to think visually in non-work environments. I wanted to do this to keep my vision sharp and fresh. The daily grind at a newspaper can sometimes become a wall that is hard to break through, leaving you feeling as though you work at some sort of building-mug-producing picture factory. I experienced this before and was determined to increase my personal and self-assigned work in 2012 to stay creative and continue to find a sense of fulfillment in my work. My subjects ranged from lighthearted things such as family, friends, vacations and my girlfriend to more serious assignments such as the NATO Summit protests in Chicago. The results of this goal turned out to be some of, if not my best pictures of the year.
Year in Review
2011 Pictures of the Year
For the most part, 2011 was a pretty good year for me. I got my first staff photographer gig, survived a Wyoming winter, shot a rodeo, dressed like a cowboy for two weeks straight and got the opportunity to work on a long-term picture story. Can’t wait to see what 2012 has in store for me. I put together a complete “2011 Year in Pictures” gallery that includes 100 shots in chronological order. But if you don’t feel like spending 30 minutes looking at photos, here are my 10 favorite frames from this year:


2011 Year in Sports Pictures
One thing that I noticed in my sports pictures this year in comparison to years past was how tight I shot everything. Through college and my internships, I usually shot sports with a 300 mm lens on a full-frame camera, and now I’m shooting sports with a 400 mm lens on a crop-body camera. For example, the second image below is not cropped. Equipment along with the fact that our paper encourages us to shoot large faces contributed to the change in my sports pictures. Here are my 10 favorite sports pictures from this year:


2010 Year in Sports Pictures
Just like most photographers, I shoot a ton of sports. This year was no exception. Compared to the past few years, it seems like I shot a wider variety of sports this year than usual. I shot a few sports I had never photographed before including hockey, golf and soccer. So continuing with the year in review posts, here are my 15 favorite sports shots from this year.


2010 Pictures of the Year
It’s been a pretty good year for me. I graduated college, completed three internships and got a job. I also made a few good pictures along the way. Going through my archive recently, I compiled a gallery of the year in pictures that includes 75 photos. It’s a chronological gallery that shows what I’ve been up to this year. Figuring most people wouldn’t want to look at 75 photos, I edited down to my 15 favorites from this year. It’s been a fun year, but I’m very excited to get started in Wyoming in 2011.

