Last week the Utah News Photographers Association announced the winners of the 2009 Photojournalism Competition. The quality of work coming out of the Utah photojournalism community is at the highest level I’ve ever seen. So many talented people and so many amazing photographs.

Oh, I know. You’re wondering what the photo above is, right? It’s a photo I took from my car while driving through a blizzard. I liked the colors and it was clearly a different photograph so I entered it in the Pictorial category which is all about light and color and art. The photo took third place, with judge Damon Winter (a Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer with the New York Times) saying, “Just an interesting image, minimal and clean, a happy accident with wonderful mood.”

It’s also one of those photos that, when announced as a winner, results in silence from the audience. You can almost hear everyone thinking, That photo won? Sure enough, at least one other winning entry also silenced the room. Thankfully, it wasn’t mine.

One year I took first place in feature photo and when the photo came up on the screen a colleague yelled out, “What the hell is that?”

Other winners for me from the UNPA this year:
Illustration Second place, “The School Play”
Photo Essay Honorable Mention, “Raid on Polygamy”

You can see all the winners (from this year all the way back to 2001) at the Utah News Photographers Association’s new site, by clicking here: http://utahnewsphotos.com/