How would you photograph space if you had to take the photo in a park? 24 Hour Houston Photomarathon Winners Hermann Park Photomarathon Winners Charles' Discussion of Some of the Photomarathon Images Rice Village Photomarathon Winners! Downtown Photomarathon Picture of Success Discussion of the Hermann Park Photomarathon sponsors event newsletter links	Discussion of the Hermann Park Photomarathon Having announced the winners, it is now time for me to explain my choices, to the extent that explanations are possible or wanted. I want to start with a general thought about the judging. As with the downtown event, I started my judging knowing that for each category there were two themes. Of course, there was the category theme (i.e. Abstract) and there was the overall theme of Hermann Park. So the first step in the judging was to put all of the photos into a folder and select the images that I liked, irrespective of themes. For this event, the folder contained almost half of the images submitted. Then, I began looking at the images in relation to the themes. Finally, I just had to pick. The Abstract category was the deepest. There are so many good entries in this category that any of 10 images could have been selected as the winner. Of course, that three of the images from this category received awards does not surprise me. I selected the abstract image of the koi pond because it was both abstract and yet was an image of something that is a big part of Hermann park--the Japanese Gardens. The overall winning image also came from the Abstract category. Like 5 from the downtown competition, this image caught me immediately. I not sure what I can say about it. It is an abstract image of people enjoying a part of the park that also looks like a painting. It really is a great image. The Competitor's Choice image was also a really nice abstract image. The sky in the image with the dark framing was really well composed. The winner in the Shadow category was the image that I felt best captured the category while remembering the Hermann Park theme. The Color category was another that contained some images that were fantastic. I selected the child playing in the water with the rainbow hat for a couple of reasons. First, it appears to be a candid shot, capturing a child simply playing. Then, with the water spray and the white dress, there is an almost complete white canvas with the bright rainbow colors. That this takes place in the Hermann Water Park again makes it the ideal image for this category at this location. Last, but not least, my favorite category--creative self portraits. I can tell you right now that the photo book will be fun with these images. I loved the ideas and images. I selected the mask image. The colors, the cropping, and the angle of the image were really impressive to me. And, I really liked the image. Well, there it is, for better or worse, my reasons for my selections. If you check out the photo gallery at photomarathon.org, soon you will be able to post comments about the photos. We hope that this will be a great place for people to get encouraging comments about their photos.