2012 was one heck of a year for me.  I lost my desk job in January which was the best thing to ever happen to me.  I worked on a television show for PBS which I both filmed for and was in.  I lost 45 pounds.  I went full time with my photography business.  We moved from North Kingstown to Jamestown RI.  I got a new job in the industry.  A few of my reviews were featured on B&H’s blog.  I shot 38,514 images.  I shot 8 weddings!  I kept my ongoing (since 2008!) photo a day project going (even though I haven’t posted them all with the move).  I’ve narrowed all that down to 12 images, let’s take a look.  Keep in mind these are NOT necessarily my 12 best images, but the 12 most important images to me. 

First up is nothing special photographically, but because of my PAD project here’s one of my son on one of the best skiing days of my ski season and career.  This is Elias’ first day where skiing really “clicked” and he skied the entire (bunny hill) run top to bottom w/o any help from me:

Next up is one of my personal all time favorite lighthouse images (but one of two in this very post!).  It’s point Judith taken early in the year on a cold morning.  I had never shot from the top of the hill at camp Cronin but for some reason I checked it out this morning and it worked out quite well:

This image is part luck (all?).  I was shooting the quonset point air show on a beach closer to the runway than I should have been…  The jets snuck up on me and I shot a sequence as they flew right over my head.  This one shot is of one of the Blue Angles as he flew directly between me and the sun making a perfect silhouette ..  I boosted the contrast in this image a bit but it’s not as manipulated as you’d think:

On one of our NSOP group trips to NH to shoot the lupines we stopped at Sabbaday falls on the way home and I got one of my favorite waterfall images to date:

Then the America’s Cup came to town and I spent three days shooting the cats all day each day at Fort Adams.  This was an amazing learning experience for me.  These boats are really amazing and they’d done a lot of things right in terms of making sailing a spectator sport:

I managed to upgrade my DSRL to a 5Diii and my EVIL to an OMD and reviewed both for B&H’s blog.  This shot of Elias with the OMD ran as their cover photo for the day:

I had a weeklong stretch in late July with some of the most amazing sunrises I’ve seen, I enjoyed 4 sunrises in a row with epic light like this:

I also shot every single lighthouse in Rhode Island (all 21!) for a new site I’m still working on, LighthousesofRI.com.  This is one of my favorites and it happens to be of Beavertail which sits on the southern tip of the Island we moved to in November:

All the while I kept working on my PAD, here’s my favorite shot of the year of my daughter Isabella!

I also had the opportunity to go to lake of the clouds hut overnight in the fall.  A good friend of mine had a reservation but couldn’t make the trip.  The self portrait of me at the top is from this trip as is the next image.  This might not be my best image of the year technically but it means a lot to me because of the effort involved and how amazing it was sitting on Mount Monroe watching the sun rise over Mount Washington and Tuckerman’s Ravine:

I also made my annual pilgrimage to NYC for photoexpo.  It’s always fun to meet with my affiliates and see all the new gear, but this year I took the time to setup a sunrise shoot with Dan Carr.  It was great meeting Dan IRL and we had a great morning in Brooklyn:

and the final image of 2012 for me is this one from my cousin’s wedding:

I shot a lot of weddings this year but for Lindsey’s wedding I shot a lot less and concentrated on just getting some amazing shots of only the Bride and Groom (since I was shooting as a guest).

I’ve learned a lot this year.  I hope you’ve enjoyed the blog this year and I look forward to another great year in 2013!