Park City resident David Winegar says firefighters’ heroic efforts to control last year’s Parleys Canyon fire helped him win the 2022 Intermountain Professional Photographers Association’s Photographer of the Year Award.
“Final Pass,” the title of his photo of a DC-10 tanker dropping bright red retardant on the blaze, was one of four images by Winegar that impressed the judges of this year’s competition.
“After the fire kicked off, I managed to find a safe spot on a ridgeline along the opposite side of the valley where I wouldn’t interfere with the firefighters,” Winegar said. “It was starting to get late, and this was one of the final drops as the DC-10 came over.”
The other photographs that caught the judges’ eyes were “When the Leaves Are Gone,” an image of leafless aspens that was taken at first light in East Canyon, “God’s Paintbrush,” depicting a first snow on fall leaves in the La Sal Mountain Range in Moab and “Lonely Bristlecone,” a black and white photo of a bristlecone pine that was also taken in Moab.
Winegar is honored to be named Photographer of the Year by the Intermountain Professional Photographers Association (IPPA), a subset of the Professional Photographers of America.
The IPPA includes photographers from Utah, Idaho, Colorado, Arizona and Wyoming, said Winegar, who sells his work as Park City Photography LLC (ParkCityPhotography.NET).
“I’ve been a member for 18 years, and they do quarterly workshops and an annual photography competition,” he said. “I’ve entered in previous years, and this year’s judging took place back in March.”
Pictureline Photography hosted the convention and awards ceremony on Nov. 7 and 8 at its new event center, 305 W. 700 South in Salt Lake City, according to Winegar.
All entries were reviewed by a panel of five judges, all award-winning photographers, who based their scores on what the Professional Photographers association calls the 12 Elements of a Merit Image.
Those elements include:
- Impact
- Technical Excellence
- Creativity
- Style
- Composition
- Presentation
- Color Balance
- Center of Interest
- Lighting
- Subject Matter
- Technique
- Story Telling
One of the greatest learning aspects of the competition is being able to watch the judges score the images as they come up, Winegar said.
“The judges don’t know which photographers took the images, so it’s fair and unbiased,” he said. “They electronically score your images, so you can see what they are. Oftentimes it’s super humbling, but with each competition, you get better and better, so there’s less heartbreak.”
Winning the award hits Winegar on another personal level.
“My dad was a professional photographer,” he said. “My dad died when I was 12, and my mother, who is still alive at 87, said ‘You’re dad would be so proud of you.’”
In addition to the Photographer of the Year award, judges honored Winegar with a Court of Honor award, which is given to the top three photographers who accumulate the highest competition scores, and the Reportage Award for the DC-10 image.
That particular photo has a special place in Winegar’s heart, because he flew DC-10s while in the U.S. Air Force.
“I have a huge appreciation of how incredible the pilots’ skills are, because they work through tremendous turbulence, updrafts and smoke, which can inhibit your vision,” he said. “It was a pretty impressive airshow, and a heroic response before the fire migrated over the ridge into Parleys Summit and Pinebrook.”
Winning the award came to Winegar, whose works can also be seen mounted on museum acrylic, metal, and giclee canvas at Elevated Interiors, 6541 N Landmark Drive, near Walmart at Kimball Junction, as a surprise.
“I never imagined I would ever capture that award over all the other competitors, because there are so many talented people,” he said. “This will probably never happen again, so I’m going to roll with it right now.”