Well holy crap was this hard!!! I'm so thankful to all the deviants who submitted close to 400 images to this contest. Throughout he whole month I kept an eye on the gallery picking out the ones I thought were really wonderful examples of conceptual photography.

A brief explanation on how I picked what I picked:

First: I looked at all the thumbnails in the gallery. Without words or titles conceptual images (true conceptual images) stand out like sore thumbs. Words and descriptions are fine, but a true conceptual image shows feeling without words. Heck, when you hand an image in a gallery you get a small space for a title and that's it. Most of the time people don't even read them. They want to feel the image, not read it.

Second: Once I whittled it down to about 20 I read the descriptions and looked at the technical aspects of the shots. I was interested to see if I felt what the artists was trying to achieve. I wanted to know if she/he and I were on the same page. Believe me, technical excellence was only about 25% of the total on this but it still was a factor. I've come to the conclusion recently that technical perfection isn't that important to the art loving public. It's just not. We as photographers focus on it all the time but to the general public (or even curators) it's not. If an image is a little soft they really don't care as long as they feel it.

Third: I let Davemo have a peak and if he didn't give me a migraine I knew I did ok.

So I'll stop the babbling know and just let ya have em...

First Place and winner of $250



To me this image by ~GVA had alll the criteria met and then some. Emotional, moody, conceptual and fraught with emotion. IMO this is one of the best shots I've seen on dA in a long, long time. Talk about a feeling of being isolated and alone! The title even interjects more emotion into the image. It suggests a feeling of helplessness and giving up. Congratulations man, this is one amazing image.

Second Place and the winner of $100



This image by ~TchaikovskyCF worked on me for a long while. Yeah, some of the highlights are a bit hot and some of the chess board looks a little soft but in the end I said "who gives a f#$k, that is one emotional image!!" It's very easy to show hurt and pain with human subjects. You make them cry, you make them bleed and we can all immediately identify with it. Try getting that same feeling with a chess board!! The idea of watching someone you love die is a powerful concept and wonderfully portrayed in this piece. I just love it.

Third Place and winner of $50 (Tie)



`designgeek has created a wonderful image. The expression on her face is really what makes this piece for me. I didn't even need to read a word and got this one immediately. And even though it wasn't her intention (well it might have been, I don't really know) I couldn't help but also think of a baby being born and the wonderment and fear of that event. An emotionally stirring image that is complimented by a photographers concern of expression....




this image by *TheJader really touched me. I find it to be very honest and ridiculously moving. The beauty and frailty of the subject just comes flowing out in this piece. No matter what our personal issues are (and we all have them, weight, height, hair, nose, whatever) we have all felt this way at one time or another.



Well that's it. I promised myself I wouldn't go over the $400 mark but I couldn't decide 3rd place so I gave it to both of them...


I hope you enjoyed the contest as much as I did...

Thanks again to all who entered...

Dave