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Happy New Year to all my friends, near and far!

“Twelve significant photographs in any one year is a good crop.” – Ansel Adams

It is that time of the year for me to share with you my Top Twelve Photographs of the Year 2023. This is the 11th edition of a tradition that began in 2013, inspired by the Ansel Adams’ quote above. Ansel Easton Adams (February 20, 1902 – April 22, 1984), is one of the most recognizable names in American landscape photography. His black-and-white landscape photographs of the American West, especially Yosemite National Park, have been widely reproduced on calendars, posters, books and prints.

As in previous years, I determine my Top Twelve, and the order of the selections by the amount of unsolicited responses (Likes) each of the images shown below received on my social media Facebook page. Hardly a foolproof or scientific way to do this, but I use it so I don’t have to sift through hundreds of images by myself choose, making a subjective, and arbitrary guess.

So, let’s begin with Number 12, its title, some background about each image, and some basic EXIF data.

#12. ‘Against All Odds’ – this is an image that I shot in Negombo, Sri Lanka, one early morning, which was the time that the fisherman who operate these vessels were leaving their home beach where the vessles are stored. I was trying to capture the difficulties these men have getting these catamarans launched past the shore breaks, propelled only by the sails of the catamarans.

***July 29, Negombo, Sri Lanka; expo. 1/500sec @ f/9; lens 24-240mm @ 88mm; ISO 2000.***

#11 ‘Deeper Into the Mystic’ – I went into the snow in the foothills close to my home in early winter, and came back with this colorful abstract. I made this image by blending several in camera multiple images of snow covered trees. The unexpected, colorful result surprised and thrilled me, as I walk deeper into the mystery of digital creativity.

*January 17, Pollock Pines, CA; expo. 1/5 sec @ f/18; lens 24-105mm @ 94mm; ISO 50.*

#10 ‘Country Roads’ – I’m very fortunate to live in an area that has miles of trails like this, that I use every day. They look especially beautiful after a heavy downpour, when the colors of the trees are saturated, pools of water form on the trails, which themselves glisten with the the wetness of the rain.

*February 27, Gold River, CA; expo. 1/60 sec @ f/1.8; lens 6.9mm @ f/1.78; ISO 250.*

#9 ‘Hope Springs Eternal’ – California had an exceptionally wet winter, 2022 through 2023. So we were blessed with a beautiful spring, and this was an image I captured just when the ground cover had just turned green and the trees were beginning to blossom with leaves.

"It's an illusion that photos are made with the camera...they are made with the eye, heart, and head." – Henri Cartier-Bresson

*March 30, Gold River, CA; expo. 1/150 sec @ f/2.2; lens 2.22mm; ISO 50.*

#8 ‘Entanglement’ – an early morning shot, when Clamatis meets a Virgina Creeper Vine, in Ouray, Colorado. This was our first stop on a 14 day road trip, three photography friends finally meet again to create images, absent from doing so since November 2019! Lots of fun being together again after such a long absence.

*March 30, Ouray, CO; expo. 1/150 sec @ f/2.2; lens 2.22mm; ISO 50.*

#7 ‘Rocky Mountain High’ – one of the main goals of our 14 day road trip was to try and capture fall colors in Colorado, including the Rocky Mountains. It turned out we were about one week early for the fall colors, and this is an image that I captured that showed these magnificent mountains, and the fall colors that we were given.

*September 26, Red Mountain Pass, CO; expo. 1/80 sec @ f/11; lens 24-104mm @ 50mm; ISO 250.*

#6 ‘Remembering George’ – my cousin George Beven, passed away aged 93 earlier this year in London, England. He was one of Sri Lanka’s leading contemporary artists. This is a digital painting that I did to honor George, using a photo of mine of the many magnificent oak trees that grow in abundance in and close to my home. Here is one of many obituaries written in his honor: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2023/apr/02/george-beven-obituary

#5 ‘Dreamland’ – a pool of rain water, winterized, bare oak trees, on a walking trail, captured a few days after a rainfall. In my humble opinion it epitomizes one of my favorites quotes below.

"All pictures are already there, the photographer just has to find them." - Robert Capa

#4 ‘She Comes In Colors’ – this was a lot of fun to create, simple but ingenious I thought when I first stumbled upon how to do this. It all begins with an iPad, open to one of my colorful images, where I then placed two glass finials on top of the glass surface, and then placed a glass, colorful vase in the background.

*January 27, Gold River, CA; expo. 1/100 sec @ f/6.3; lens 70-200 @ 180mm; ISO 800.*

#3 ‘Can’t You See’ – I was given permission to photograph the Marshall Tucker Band’s performance at the Harris Center for the Arts, Folsom CA. They have been performing for 50 plus years, and one of their biggest hit songs, ‘Can’t You See’, has been streamed on Spotify over 207 million times!

*January 27, Harris Center for the Arts, Folsom, CA; expo. 1/200 sec @ f/6.3; 24-240mm @ 129mm; ISO 4000.*

#2 ‘California Rain’ – On the day I shot this image I got absolutely drenched in a downpour while out walking. When the rain finally let up, I was still quite a ways from my home, which gave me the opportunity to capture several reflections in the resulting puddles of rain water on my way home. This is an abstract blend of a couple of those images.

*March 30, Gold River, CA; expo. 1/150 sec @ f/2.2; lens @ 2.2mm; ISO 50.*

#1 ‘When The Rain Comes’ – and finally, the most liked image of 2023 is another rain drenched reflections in a puddle of water. This made me fondly remember having so much fun playing in rain puddles when I was a child growing up in Sri Lanka, a tropical paradise where torrential rains are frequent. Some seven plus decades later not much has changed, now living here in California.

*March 28, Gold River, CA; expo. 1/45 sec @ f/2.2; lens f/2.22; ISO 1250.*

And there you have it, my Top Twelve Photographs for the 2023 year. I always have fun, during the annual process of gathering these images, looking back at the past year, as it gives me an idea of what I created, where and when, and the advances that I have made to my craft. Deep gratitude to what I was given by Mother Nature, what I managed to do with these gifts, and now look forward to the coming New Year with measured anticipation and hope for a fruitful 2024!

I’d also like to say a big Thank You to all those who expressed their support of my photography on my Facebook page, and for taking the time to do so – it is greatly appreciated! As always, I also owe a great deal of gratitude to the many people who support my art by purchasing my images in various print formats, and especially those attending my private workshops. To one and all, THANK YOU!

I am looking forward to next year, with optimism and hope for us as Mankind. Lots of work to be done in various parts of the world, and my hope is that we can stop the numerous and senseless wars in our world, work together to look after the environment, and leave it a better place for the next generations, so that they can enjoy and marvel at what we have been given on this beautiful Blue Planet, Earth, which we all call Home!

Once again, Happy New Year!

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2023 Top Twelve Photographs