Best Photo/Art Blog of 2008

As selected by Canadian Blog Award voters, here are the rankings for:

Best Photo/Art Blog

Thats a uniquely bloggy way to present an award, because I can think of few other hobbies were it’s acceptable to dress that way and fit in.

1. Casi en Serio 475    56.41%

2. Blog Guelph 126    14.96%

3. Slap Upside The Head 92    10.93%

4. Watawa Life 59    7.01%
5. Animal Effigy 46    5.46%
6. Windsor Visuals 44    5.23%

Total votes 842

Gabriel from the blog Live From Waterloo presents this year’s Best Photo/Art Blog winner Casi en Serio with the golden beaver button. And he did it with the support of his family who directed the video clip, and added sound effects. Great job everyone!

There was an interesting assortment of blogs in this category for 2008. I encountered quite a few here that I’d never seen before, and am glad I have now.

And a different Gabriel, this time from Salted Lithium provided this summary of the top three:

Me mudé de Venezuela a Canadá con Marianne, Valeria y Lau. También me traje a Harry, el gato. Jacqueline, her profile says in Spanish, came to Canada from Venezuela with her two children and her cat Harry. I think. Everything I know of Spanish I learned from Google as I was writing this. Thankfully Jackie’s photography has a language of its own. She has a classic style combining shapes with colours, and is still able to capture drama in a simple black and white shot of a parked police car and a person leaning against a wall. She is a very good photographer with a blog that is well maintained, updated regularly, clean and she interacts with her many visitors. As much as her obvious skill with the camera, it was this work, effort, attention and dedication which earned her first place.

If there can be such a thing, Blog Guelph is very serious about having fun. The blog is run by Sue Richards, a local-to-Guelph artist, and showcases photographers from around the region. Of the photos currently on the blog the common thread is people enjoying themselves, bright colourful landscapes, and the bright downtown lights of Guelph at night. Definitely a well earned second place.

There’s a case to be made for Slap Upside The Head to have been nominated in several of the other categories (and he certainly was, winning Best GLBT Blog). But it’s through his art Mark draws readers in with humour, and intelligent observations using a world of characters drawn with consistent quality. Sometimes when bloggers write a post we try to include a relevant photo. Which can be hard. What Mark does is much harder, and he does it with an obvious mix of skill and talent.