I haven’t made a post for quite a while (June of 2022 to be specific). I realize that my last post asked for your pick of my pano submission. In reality the grain bin pano was already submitted, and I’m happy to say it was chosen for display.

While not winning an award, it is an honor to be selected for display. It was among 23 (37% of submissions) in the panoramic category that were displayed, with only seven receiving an award.

In addition to this photo, I entered three additional photos, rounding out the maximum allowed submissions of four. I typically enter the Themed category. “The Open Road” was the 2022 focus. It was my only submission that was not selected for display. Only 12 of 32 entries in the Black and White class were displayed.

I submitted another black and white in the People class. I took this picture of four of my grands a few years back at Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin. It was partially chosen for entry because I won the People – Color class in 2021 with my “Bubble Girl” photo, featuring my oldest granddaughter. That precipitated requests from her siblings to have a submission as well. While it was not a winner, it was displayed, and they proudly posed with it when they came up for the State Fair. 38% or the 81 entries were exhibited. A small feature that I loved about this capture is the small rivulet of water that connects in middle foot to the foot in the reflection.

My last submission was in the Animal (Color) class. I felt it was the least likely to go through to exhibition, but it made it! A farm family in my church let me know of a Great Horned Owl nest on their acreage. I went out on a few occasions and caught this photo in the late nestling stage. It was among 74 or 251 entries that were exhibited.

So with three out of four submissions making it to exhibition, I was very pleased. Only 10% of photographers had three entries progress through the judging process. There is a merit award for those who have all four entries exhibited. Curiously, no one received that honor in 2022.

There is a Youth Division in which the top age is 17. My grandson captured a picture of his dog that I thought would be a worthy entry. He was six at the time he took the picture with an iPhone. His photo was also exhibited, making him the youngest photographer exhibited at the Photography Salon!

A total of 2,191 photos were entered by 394 photographers with 29% of entries exhibited. The numbers of submissions have been down post-pandemic. It will be interesting to see if numbers rebound this year. So that’s the update of 2022 Iowa State Fair Photography Salon. Entry information for 2023 will be released in April on the Iowa State Fair website. Out of state and international entries are welcomed. The special Theme Class for 2023 is Sunrise/Sunset. It should be a highly competitive class. I’ll drop a few of my potential 2023 entries as the June deadline approaches.