The winner of the GoPro HD Hero2 video camera for the 2012 Summer Sailstice Sunset photo contest is: Charlotte McConnell of the Pelican Yacht Club with the photo shown above and here:
Charlotte wrote in to give us the details, 'The sailboat pictured is a Hunter 26.5 named 'Amazing Grace'. Skipper is Kevin Dawley, and he is pictured here with a few guests, fellow club members of the Pelican Yacht Club, that he had taken out for a sail. This picture was taken by me at sunset on Saturday June 23, 2012 during our club’s Sunset Sail that I had organized as part of our Summer Sailstice celebrations! It was an amazingly fun day!'
'We are Pelican Yacht Club in Ninette, MB, Canada. Our website is www.pycmb.ca and our racing website is www.3sheetstothewinds.ca.'
Like all contests of this nature it's was incredibly hard to judge from the great collection of entries we received. While there's no definitive answer why this is the best it does capture a perfect sunset, end of day feeling after a perfect day of Summer Sailstice sailing. Of course, not everyone is blessed with such a perfect evening making it difficult to capture an ideal shot but, like Charlotte, if you organize a sunset sail on Summer Sailstice your odds of catching that perfect shot certainly go up.
We did pick some runner's up which also captured perfect sunset sailing moments. Have a look at this 2nd place photo from Mark McGinley sailing his 1979 Pacific Seacraft PS-25 with the Chequamegon lighthouse on Lake Superior in the background:
Mark wrote in to tell us more about his shot: 'Thanks for choosing my photo as a finalist for the GoPro camera! I've been really jonesing after one to shoot more action shots from my boat. I saw some under water shots taken while sailing that were awesome.'
'I had one shift off from my job as a Paramedic that weekend and it was super cloudy all day and luckily enough the sun came through the clouds towards the evening :) I was sailing my boat solo on Lake Superior (Chequamegon Bay in the Apostle Islands) that night. The lighthouse is called the Chequamegon Light I believe (We checked for photos of the light in Google Images and it doesn't appear this is Chequamegon - can anyone identify it? - ed). It was interesting trying to get all of the elements I wanted in the shot by positioning the boat and sailing/steering while taking the picture but I really liked what I got. It felt right and the photo captures the feel of sunset sails on Superior I've experienced over the years. My boat is a 1979 Pacific Seacraft PS-25 and the sails are UK Halsey sails.
Photo info:
Pentax *ist DS Camera w/ Pentax DA 18-55 lens
ISO 200
18 MM
f8
1/180
shot @ 6/23/12 6:44:20
I've included the original shot but my photo submitted was adjusted in iPhoto to show the colors present - It is tough getting accurate color shooting into a sunset. I included the full size version of my submission as well.
Thanks again - I love the Sailstice event and wear my shirt and hat all the time.'
And our final runner up is Richard Vilvens with this shot:
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Richard wrote in about this shot, 'This picture is from June 23 rd just before sunset. I took this photo at Woodward Reservoir in Oakdale California. This was at the Hobie Fleet 20 Summer Sailstice Funsail. We had 21 sail boats and 3 power boats to celebrate the longest weekend of the year. This particular boat is a 1980 Hobie 16 with the original sails.'
'Our group is a mix of young and old. We had kids in their teens to older people in their 70's. Some are hard core racers and some are purely recreational sailors.'
There is a write up of the weekend in more detail here: http://www.sailblogs.com/member/f-185150sailing/
To see all the photo contest submissions join BlooSee and their page of all the sunset shots here.
Thanks to everyone for sailing and submitting your Summer Sailstice sunset photos. Enjoy the 2012 summer sailing season. If you've captured a perfect summer sunset shot since the Sailstice feel free to add it now to the collection - there's some great shots that capture many perfect summer sailing evenings.