Went through the Macro Nominees today. Several times. There is a RIDICULOUS amount of talent in there…like nothing I have ever seen. The degree of skill has taken a huge leap in this division since last year.

Seriously great, great work and I do not say that lightly. Of the 750+ entered, I could only narrow them down to 283, and I could only do that after being really nit picky. There were several images that it broke my heart not to include, but because they we so similar to other images, I had to take the better of the two.

A few notes, there were an awful lot of flowers, droplets, and insects entered. Once again, there were 6 sunflower shots (all similar). I think a really good tip, not just for Macro but any category, is to try to be as original as possible. Find a very unique and interesting subject matter.

There were many, many flower shots I had to disconsider today not because they were bad (nearly all of them were very good and most would have placed in the top 10 of my first contest), it was that so many other people had submitted flower images that were a little better. It is interesting to me to see sometimes how similar 2 shots from 2 different photographers are.

If you want to really stand out, pick a very unique subject matter.

I also had to get really nit picky on other things, if the focus was off even just a little compared to others, I had to select the stronger images.

Should try to narrow them down to 200 tomorrow afternoon and will try to have them up in the evening. Some seriously phenomenal work in the Macro Category.