Top 10 of 2006

As my last post of the year, I decided to select my Top 10 photos of the year. To quote Bluejake, "There are three major skills in photography: shooting, editing, and processing. Editing is by far the most difficult. " To determine which photos to select, I first sorted through the nearly 7000 shots I took this year, and uploaded over 600 of them on Flickr. (200+ new ones were added today. Phew.) Then I winnowed it down to a set called "Best of 2006", and deselected any photos I used in the 2007 calendar. That still left me with over 60 images, so I then made my choices for those which could best show the growth of my skills or my interests, or were once-in-a-lifetime shots. I also alternated the selections so half were urban and half were rural/nature. Interestingly, I had to rethink several choices in order to get some flower shots in there; in looking at the entire year's worth of photos, I realized I didn't have many flowers shots and the ones I did have weren't the standouts I'd hoped they'd be. Part of that is due to the fact I took a photography class in the late fall, and so I had a greater proportion of better photos later in the year, but I also think I simply took more pictures at the end of the year. I am still very interested in flower photography, but this year I definitely found some new areas to shoot.

I hope you enjoy the look back, and feel free to go to the Best of 2006 set and comment if you think I should have selected something else!