2002 Military Photographer of the Year Judging
by Ken Hackman, MILPHOG Coordinator

     Great images and presentation, that was the consensus of the judges at the Military Photographer of the Year competition held recently at Defense Information School (DINFOS), Ft. Meade, MD. 
     The still judges, Nanine Hartzenbusch staff photographer with the Baltimore Sun, David Valdez, former Presidential (George H.W. Bush) photographer and currently with Blue Pixel, a digital photography enterprise and Mary Calvert, staff photographer with the Washington Times, were very impressed with caliber of the imagery they saw in this year contest.  Their consensus was that the best imagery would be competitive in other contests such as Pictures of the Year, etc. 
     What also impressed the judges was the method used to present the images for judging.  DINFOS is using a contest program developed by former Presidential (Ronald Reagan) photographer, Michael Evans.  For the 2001 contest, Mr. Evans was in attendance for the inaugural of the first digital MILPHOG judging.  He commented about Lt. Greg Kuntz's DINFOS staff and particularly TSgt Jason White on his knowledge of the program, "He (Jason) knows this program better then I do!"  This year Jason and MSgt Mark Suban repeated the success of last year, the beauty of the program is that it allows the judges and all in attendance to view, on a large screen in a darkened room, each and every still entry submitted. 
     The procedure involves showing all the entries in a category in groupings of twelve to give the judges a sense of the quality level of the submissions. Then every image is shown one at a time with the judges voting "In" or "Out".  Majority rules, two votes keeps or discards an image.  However if the minority judge feels

strongly about a specific image they can keep it "In" for further consideration.  After that the editing continues until winners are selected. 
     This year a number of DINFOS students attended parts of the judging as well as Combat Camera photographers from all the services.  The judging is open and military photographers who can are encouraged to attend. 
     This year the entries were very competitive and after many years of Navy domination the top award went to SSgt Jeremy Lock from 1st Combat Camera Squadron, Charleston AFB, SC.  Military photographers are encouraged to submit their work to this contest which is held annually. They can check out the MILPHOG website at
http://www.dinfos.osd.mil/milphog/default.htm for the rules and submission criteria.

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