Top 10 Photos of 2023
2023 was not the year I planned.
Between opening The Ranch for dog boarding and daycare, taking nearly four months off to recover from a total hysterectomy, and squeezing in as many Emerge challenge sessions as I could manage from the couch — I photographed fewer clients than usual.
But some of the images that came out of that year are among my favorites I've ever made.
Here, in no particular order, are my top 10.
Glitter Girl - The Sparkliest Horse
My very first session of the year required an almost three-hour drive each way.
Worth every mile.
Glitter Girl and Kappy's mom had the idea to photograph her horses with actual cosmetic glitter — applied carefully with vaseline, then enhanced just a touch in post. The name practically demanded it.
I love when a client brings a concept. This one was genuinely one of the more joyful mornings I've had behind a camera.
Callie - In the Golden Sun
I have a thing for backlit photographs.
There's something about a dog washed in low golden light that feels like a memory even while you're making it. It's how I see dogs in my mind's eye when I'm not photographing them.
Callie came in March for her second session — we were building out a full year of seasons for her album. We met at the cultural center in downtown Madison, Georgia during the azalea bloom. This image was made near the very end of our time together, when Callie was finally tired enough to sit still and just be.
The soft round bokeh in the background feels like fairy lights. Three of my top 10 images from 2023 are backlit. It's clearly a theme.
Spaced Out - Maple the Pharoah Hound for Emerge
Maple is one of my favorite dogs to photograph. She also makes two appearances on this list, which tells you something about both her and her mom Hannah's patience with my creative experiments.
For this Emerge challenge the brief was about negative space — using what's not in the frame to make the subject stronger. The antique brick in downtown Rutledge, Georgia and the warmth of Maple's coat felt like they were made for each other.
I love this monochrome all golden warm because negative space always feels a little quiet to me. A little still.
I did miss a small editing error in the submitted version — a duplicated edge on Maple's ear — and it cost me a placement in the challenge. I corrected it. It's still one of my favorites.
Photographing Black Dogs - Lizzie in the Forest
Getting black dogs right is one of the reasons clients hire a professional photographer.
It's not just about exposure. It's about light direction, background separation, and making sure those gorgeous dark eyes don't disappear into the coat.
This image was made at Rainbow Forest in Athens, Georgia. We were there for an Emerge session when I spotted two trees just down the hill that would frame her face perfectly. The sun had just dropped below the horizon, giving us the softest, most even light of the day.
That's my favorite kind of timing.
Mikey at the Graduate Hotel — Athens, GA
The only photo of one of my own dogs to make the list.
The Emerge challenge was "Under Cover" — all images had to be taken inside. I wanted somewhere with interesting bones. The Graduate Hotel in Athens is dog-friendly, beautifully designed, and gracious enough to let me set up lights in the lobby.
Mikey is doing his "head down" in this image — one of my favorite tricks to photograph because it turns a dog into pure expression. He's focused, his ears are actually up for a photo, and he looks entirely like himself.
Betty the Therapy Horse at Oconee Therapeutic Riding
Getting to photograph the horses at Oconee Therapeutic Riding was one of the highlights of the year.
The work those horses do alongside their trainers — for children and adults — is extraordinary. I photographed several horses that morning, but this image of Betty walking out of shadow and into light is the one I keep coming back to.
Photography is, at its core, about light. This image is simply about that.
Delilah - In the Wild Flowers
Six weeks post-surgery. A firm goal to finish my Emerge images before the deadline.
My friend Michelle brought her dog Delilah and we headed to Indian Creek Park — one of my favorite places to photograph dogs in Georgia. On the way to our planned spot, I noticed something I had never seen in ten years of photographing here.
The meadow was completely overtaken by wildflowers.
Weeks of heavy rain had kept the mowers out. What's usually a beautiful green field had become something out of a fairytale. We set Delilah up, I made one image before hiking back up the hill absolutely exhausted, and it became one of my favorites of the year.
I kept driving back to walk through the flowers until they were finally cut. It felt like a small, temporary Narnia.
Feather — Golden Retriever at the Farm
The Bokehlicious challenge in Emerge was about those little circles of light — soft, round bokeh from shooting at wide apertures in the right kind of ambient light.
My vision required a golden dog to play into golden sunset colors. My friend Marilyn's young Golden Retriever Feather was exactly right. This image is what I had in my head before we arrived. That almost never happens.
Double Trouble - Double Pharoah Hounds for Emerge
Two Pharaoh Hounds. Same mom. As perfectly matched as dogs come.
I gave Hannah a very technical concept drawing — I say that with affection and full sarcasm — and asked her to practice having the girls face each other.
Hannah delivered. This image finished as the number one image in the Double Trouble challenge for Emerge 2023.
Maple: two appearances. Two earned.
Be sure to click over to Facebook the see the before & after.
Twyla the Chocolate Lab — Shake!
This one is just for fun.
Action and shake photography isn't my usual style. I tend toward stillness, quiet expression, soft light. But the Emerge challenges push me to work outside what's comfortable.
Twyla is mid-shake, one tooth showing, ears flying. Browns and greens — the colors I reach for instinctively in dog photography. A little ridiculous, a lot joyful.
A good way to end the year.
2023 wasn't the year I planned.
But looking back at these images — a sparkly horse, a dog in wildflowers I nearly missed, my own dog practicing his best trick in a hotel lobby — I think it was exactly the year I needed.
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