1st Place
Sean D. ElliotThe Day
2nd Place
Michael G. SeamansPulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting
3rd Place
Marc VasconcellosBrockton Enterprise
Judges:
Vernon Bryan/The Dallas Morning News, Lynda Gonzalez/The Dallas Morning News, Smiley Pool/The Dallas Morning News
Judges Comments
OK. We have a sneaking suspicion that the Swabs story is one of those situations where regionally the photographers know "somebody does this every year -- and every year some far away judges place it in the clips." Well, here in Texas we shrug and think the same thing about rodeo photos that always get the attention of judges in another part of the country. So it goes. But, this was far and away the best storytelling in the category. And we also suspect that like many annual events we all cover in our own communities, sometime the repetition (either of our own coverage, or from seeing how someone else shot it before) helps us see things a little differently. Second place isn't a story, per se, but it a collection of some really, really, good youth baseball photos. As with the general news category, third place was the best of the funeral entries (this time from same funeral as general news third place) and wound up in third due to editing struggles, despite having a few really strong moments.