Photographers are always on a journey to improve their skills and take better photos. The goal of this page is to inspire youth to carefully think about what makes a photograph worthy of extended and repeated views. Jon Pugmire is a local respected photographer and volunteers his knowledge of photography by mentoring youth in Vancouver Audubon’s Cameraderie youth nature photography group. He generously takes the time to comment about what he likes about photos and what he thinks might take them to the next level. He will be at our awards ceremony on June 24, 2026 at Cascade Park Library Community Room. Here are Jon’s thoughts from the 2025 awards ceremony, edited by Ken Pitts.
What Judges Liked: This photo is a great example of just getting great opportunities and not messing them up. “Sometimes I do get to places just when God’s ready to have somebody click the shutter” –Ansel Adams. There are times when you get to break all of the wildlife rules and it works (Usually shooting up at birds with sky backlighting doesn’t work. Usually shooting from below the bird rather than eye level doesn’t work.). Point camera up, birds looking away, who cares? Symmetry of head angles, “heart shapes” repeated multiple times–very subtle. Strong background blues with orange beaks and feet–always a great combination (complimentary colors). Nice control of sky versus subject, can still make out distinct white feathers.
Next Level Edits: Maybe cut some from left and bring the transition from dark to light right from the corner.
What Judges Liked: Another immediately eye-catching image. Great management of contrast. Very easy to blow the highlights here. Seeing one in the low light is quite stunning. Darkening along the bottom edge is exactly right to minimize the contrast distractions.
Next Level Edits: Maybe open up the shadows on the right, darken on the left. Crop off 1/6 from the left (to not have the subject so much in the center, more room on bottom right would also work), remove distracting grass bottom right and bright spots.
What the Judges Liked: One more great moment taken advantage of! I’ve never seen a coyote out there, even less likely to get anywhere near this close to one. Great detail and attention goes right to the eyes. Orange with some subtle blues really works.
Next Level Edits: Maybe bring out the orange tones a bit, more space to the bottom since eyes are directed that way. Remove horizontal background element from right ear, distracting. My eye sometimes wants to rotate clockwise a bit.
What Judges Liked: Mirror Image and High contrast really grabs the eye. Bright sun hard to control on cell phone, but the high contrast (lots of dark tones) balances it nicely. Horizon not on the center and lower saturation on the bottom 3rd pushes the eye to the fish and the sky. Balance is maintained with larger/closer fish on the right.
Next Level Edits: Might be served well to remove the object on the left horizon line.
What Judges Liked: This is a very unique image, drops are stunning. Really like the orbs of dew on top of the diagonal pattern background, especially nice to have the one line perpendicular to the others
What the Judges Liked: A great example of taking advantage of a moment. Love the cloud iridescence, and way to get low. It’s hard to control the sun on a cell phone, but it’s not too distracting because of the colors surrounding it.
What Judges Liked: Great to get the mountain with clean snow and sharp edges. Love the purples and blues. Love the rolling clouds with both light and dark tones. Flying geese are sometimes hard to get without lots of wing intersection, these are nicely spaced.
Next Level Edits: Consider cloning out the two geese that intersect with the right edge. Spot removal and noise reduction would take it even higher. Possibly just slight more local sharpening on the mountain too.
What Judges Liked: Another favorite spot that immediately says Steigerwald. Leading lines are perfect, shore line, tree line, horizon, all pull the eye to the gap. Sky is lovely. Blue and orange tones compliment one another. Reflection in the still water is fantastic and shows the perfect leveling of the image–special kudos from me.
Next Level Edits: Maybe feature more sky so branches on the right have a little more room above them. A subtle darkening along the bottom edge also can help.
What the Judges Liked: Another well balanced image with the bright cloud fringes on the left balanced by the stand of trees on the right. Love the muted oranges. Bottom of the image is great to leave without texture except at the intersection with the sky, really lets the sky be the star. Nicely processed.
Next Level Edits: Maybe add some deep blue to the shadowy areas to compliment the orange (see the slide background).
What the Judges Liked: Immediate, “that’s the winner” without looking at other images. Perfect concept to win over all of the photographer judges. Pose is perfect. Love the far foot visible up in the air. Right on the lower 3rd line, bridge fading out in the distance. The bluish/green hoodie against the light strawberry blonde hair–and the blue socks. And of course the camera. Love, love, love.
Next Level Edits: To the trained eye, shows the limitations of the current portrait mode of cell phone cameras (notice “portrait mode” of smartphone has blurred the metal mesh on the left, but just suddenly doesn’t). The mesh that is closest could be blurred a bit to help the transition from out of focus to blurry be less jarring.
What the Judges Like: Love the sky! Deep blues are great. Great decision to feature the sky. Subject perfect in bottom/right 3rd intersection.
Next Level Edits: Needs counter-clockwise rotation. Very tricky with wide angle images. Consider a lower perspective so the focal point of the clouds and subject are just a bit closer.
What the Judges Liked: Love the small in the frame motif. Perfect uniform pattern on the bottom edge, fog/clouds on the top. Love the bright yellow shirt versus the slightly more muted orange foliage. Focus is right where is should be and the depth of field is very pleasant for the scene. Love the subtle S shape of the hill and just a hint of the path to be followed.
Next Level Edits: Subject is too close to the center, probably better framed with the jogger a little more on the left side showing more of destination remaining versus path already travelled.