A solid line of support honoring military personnel–current and veteran–from bikers in the Valley of the Sun was on parade for all to see last April 12. Too bad local TV couldn’t provide a glimpse of the patriotic proceedings. You’d think a gathering of 1100 scoots and 1800 people, feted by a flyover of two Apache AH-64 helicopters (built in Mesa by Boeing), would be enough to warrant a televised view. Nah. Focus On The Military Family was the day’s theme, but clearly the message was: Bikers care about our country and those who serve it. So does event organizer Barry Caraway, his cyclerides.com crew, and the Patriot Guard Riders.

The results are in from the 2008 Layang Layang Underwater Photo Shootout in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. The winners, whose photographs were judged by well-known underwater photographers Settimio Ciprianni, Stephen Wong, and Rod Klein, received prizes including trips to Palau, Truk, Malaysia, Thailand, and the Philippines, dive computers and watches, and Nikon and Sony dSLR’s and video cameras. Contestants were from 11 countries around the world, only one from the USA.

Continue HERE for the full press release with the list of winners, or visit FiNS Blog for the winning photographs.

Located 300 kilometres off the northeast coast of Sabah, Layang Layang is a 14 sq km atoll rising 2,000 metres from the depths of the South China Sea. Its coral reefs are home to a variety of marine inhabitants, from pelagic life such as schooling hammerheads, barracuda and fusiliers to tiny critters such as nudibranchs, flatworms and crustaceans. Layang Layang is an ideal location for a photo shootout contest.

Participants stand a chance to win more than US$30,000 prizes from world class sponsors such as Nikon, Nautica and Oceanic, as well as dive trips to exotic locations. Plus you’ll get a chance to meet and chat with world-renowned underwater photographers and competition judges Settimio Ciprianni, Stephen Wong, Kurt Svrcula and Rod Klein. These leading underwater photographers will also give tips on underwater photography throughout the event.

Winning pictures will be published in FiNS Magazine and the FiNS Online Blog. There are two categories of entry: wide and macro. See you there!

Cafepress is the place to order all your Main Event stuff, get the goods HERE.

58 participants competed in four still categories and a single video category, and winners won a variety of prizes from the generous sponsors, including dive travel, underwater camera housings, and more. Here are my four award winning entries (two were first place awards):

Cara featured many of my underwater images in the making of this slideshow YouTube movie. She says “I love to interpret music through videos, and all of my videos start with a song that I want find a visual expression for. I use a MacBook and either iMovie or Final Cut for all my videos.”

Photographing art can be tricky, just getting the correct white balance is enough to pull your hair out. This is the Elizabeth Cheche Collection that I have been photographing for years, HERE. And a video interview of her career HERE. And a slide show uploaded to YouTube:

I have photographed Jerry Riopelle since the early 70’s, for a collection of these concert shots dating back to 1979, go HERE. Like Jerry says: “I will dance like a fool, won’t be afraid to laugh, I’ll make everything matter and I’ll believe that everything lasts, I’ll see love, breathe, and I’ll never wake up, and I’ll change everyday and I’ll taste every drop; I’m so young.”

This album cover and many images in the inside book came from these early concerts. There are also some images featured on his website, HERE. Jerry invented the beamz, check this out HERE. I am a proud investor in this project so. . .”play the light.”

Here are some examples of my passion for photography combined with my learning curve of becoming an young entrepreneur. Juggling 18 semester hours with trying to make money from photography proved to be quite a challenge, but nothing ventured nothing gained, right?