My Top Ten Favorite Images Of 2012

By Mike Moats

Even though 2012 has not come to a close yet, I couldn't wait any longer to post my top ten favorites of 2012. Well actually I lied about the number I'm posting, I just couldn't narrow it down to ten, so I came up with twelve images. There is a nice variety of images, many that I shot when I was out on the road doing my Macro Boot Camps. Images were shot using either the, Tamron SP 90mm macro, Tamron SP 70-300mm VC, or the Tamron 18-270mm VC PZD.

I will start with this image shot in the winter of 2012, and work through the spring into the fall. This was shot in a small frozen puddle in a park near my home. I liked the design of the leaf on the right and the bubbles. The thousands of tiny bubbles add a nice texture to the black background.

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In March I was in Raleigh, North Carolina for a workshop, and one of the local photographers and friend Susan Bailey asked if I would like to visit the Duke Universities Arboretum as the flowers were starting to bloom. I like the flow of the petals in this flower, and the soft pastel color.

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While I was at the Duke Gardens the tulips were just starting to bloom, I like how this budding tulip was being cradled in this leaf.

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Now moving into April, I was presenting at the Bird and Photo Festival in St Augustine, Florida, and I visited a small park. It was early morning and I found this pair of Bird of Paradise leaves that were backlit by the sun. Nice abstract pattern.

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While still in St Augustine, I strolled down to the beaches in search of feathers or shells. I found lots of nice shells composed in the sand and this was one of my favorites.

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Back in the spring I started playing with different subjects outside of nature photography. Its been lots of fun and I've produced some very cool stuff with all kinds of subjects. I had a blast photographing water and oil. This was my fav of the oil and water shots.

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Now we're heading into the fall, and I'm in the Boston area doing a workshop and had a day off to shoot, so headed up to Rockport, MA. Stopped by a small harbor of boats and saw this nice reflection in the water of the boat and ropes.

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I heard about this very cool place called Old Car City. As I was on my way from Savannah, GA to Cincinnati, OH, I stopped in at Old Car City, which is 50 miles north of Atlanta, and 2 miles off I-75. There are over 4,000 classic cars scattered over 6 miles of trails through out woods and fields. Had a blast and got tons of great images. I scheduled a 2013 spring workshop there that sold out within days. People love shooting rusty junk cars.

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When I made it to Cincinnati after Old Car City, I stopped at a small Arboretum and found this unusual looking succulent. I used the Solorization filter in Nik Software to get this really cool look.

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I had two weekends of workshops in the twin city area in Minnesota. Jillian Bell who is a Tamron Tech Rep lives in that area and went with me to the Minnesota Arboretum, which is run by the University of Minnesota. The indoor area was just a small building with some tropical plants, but I found this nice succulent that turned out very nice.

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While at home and in between traveling to workshops, I started visiting some of the local Detroit area museums. This one was shot at the Henry Ford Museum.

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We have another nice car museum called the Walter P Chrysler Museum. Too bad attendance over the years wasn't strong enough, so the museum is closing as of January 1st. This is a cool abstract of reflection in the fender of one of the cars.

That's my 12 favorite images of 2012, thank you for stopping by and viewing them.

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Comments

[joey]

I can see why, Mike. Good stuff! Happy 'shooting' New Year :)

[Randall Hull]

Beautiful shots. Looking forward to your 2013 work.

[Burt Segelin]

Jillian - Love your work especially the abstracts. Any chance you can let me in on how you did the oil and water ones? I've been trying to come up with some interesting ones but no success so far. Any help is appreciated.
I have a Canon T2i with a Tamron 18-270 sp. Thanks. Burt -