Top 25 of 2012
Another year is almost in the books and with it comes another year in review or "best of 2012" post. It was another busy year, filled with many opportunities to photograph things, both places and people. The year also brought a new camera which has started to and will continue to provide me with new capabilities that I can't wait to use further. As we leave this holiday season and return to the "normal" pace of life, I look back to an amazing year that has been more than I imagined it could be. God has a tendency to do that, making more than we could believe with less than we think there is to work with.Below are, in my opinion, my best images of 2012. Not all of them because of technical or artistic reasons, but for the meaning they have to me. Below each I'll tell a short story or give a brief description. So read on and enjoy these photos and reflections, and hopefully they encourage you to also look back on this year and marvel at the ways you have been blessed by the Lord, and to look ahead at what's to come...it promises to be more than any of us can imagine. 
One night this year I got to go on an adventure to the middle of no-where IL and photographed the Milky Way as best as I could. Though the light maps I found online indicated this was one of the darkest parts of Illinois, it was still fairly bright, upon opening the shutter for 30 seconds I was able to see through the camera the beauty of the galaxy like I hadn't before.
Before the colors of fall hit campus I went out to capture the campus through an infared B&W filter. I returned to a favorite spot over on the engineering quad and captured this photo down the creek. This generally quiet area is one of my favorite places to read in good weather.
On the same trek to take infared images I captured this of the bell tower on the south quad. The sheer height of the tower is impressive to me, and I've always loved it's architecture. 
This fall I got to photograph Jon and Taylor Stef's wedding. It is always great fun and a blessing photographing friends' weddings. This was no different, seeing godly couples getting married never, ever gets old. 
After the wedding mentioned above I hit up Chicago with a few of my closest friends. Playing/singing music on the coast of the lake was a great way to escape the busy hustle of campus even though we were in Chicago. 
As the leaves started to change, I got the opportunity to photograph the daughter of some of my friends from church. Though baby photography is not my usual forte, it was fun to interact with her and work to get her to smile, though her dad was the clear winner in getting her to do that :)
On a cool weekend in October I made my way over to Allerton park. I was there a couple falls ago but it was nice to go back with my new camera and capture the detail at a slightly different time. The beauty God put on earth is incredible.
Right about the middle of the fall semester, I was able to make my way down to St. Louis a couple of times and on the second experience was able to photograph the arch. Though I've photographed it before, this was my first time with my high resolution D800 and also the first time with a full-frame body, good for the wide angles. As you'll see in the image above and the ones below, it is beautiful during both day and night. 
My first of many concert pics to make the top images this year. A lot of my photography this year came from concerts. If you haven't been following my blog I went to both Agapefest and Cornerstone this year, as well as couple of regular shows. All were extremely fun. The shot above was of Mike Main and The Branches performing at Cornerstone festival, the most energetic live show I've ever seen. The crowd is on stage with the band for their closing song. 
Also at Cornerstone festival was a band called The Violet Burning. They were a band filled with passion. Above is the group praying together on stage before the show started. It was a very moving moment as I had never seen this done on stage before. 
At Agapefest I got to see Toby Mac and his gang perform. It weirds me out when I listen to or watch Toby Mac that he is as old as my dad...he's still got it though. His drummer is pictured above. I just love the way this image turned out. 
At the beginning of the year I got the chance to visit my friend Jon Adam in his home town of Cincinnati. We got to do a lot of awesome things together and I saw some pretty amazing views of the city. Jon was a great guide and is an even better friend. Above is a shot of the city as the sun sets on the cool January evening. 
Also while in Cincinnati I got photograph the above bridge late at night. Bridges are fun things to take pictures of, and especially ones that are as pretty as this one.
Back to the concert photos. Early in the year I got to see Remedy Drive perform at a local church. It was a great concert, pretty small and mostly families at the church but it was still great fun. The lead singer loved the piano, and was always either playing it, sitting on it, or standing on it. 
Also at Agapefest was a band called Reilly. The band had a husband and wife duo that is pictured above. The wife was on the violin constantly while the husband switched between the violin and an electric guitar. At one point they had a duel with the violins which is when I caught this moment.
In the spring I made a trip up to Chicago to see The City Harmonic and the Newsboys perform at a large church in a far out suburb. I'd seen the Newsboys many times and they are one of my favorite bands, but it was cool to see The City Harmonic perform. They have some really well written pieces both lyrically and on the piano. 
Alma Mater took a leave of absence from the University this year as she is being restored by a professional company up in Chicago. She will return in time for graduation this spring, but who knows what she'll look like all brand new and shiny. Luckily I made sure to photograph her before she left.
I took a year off on the marathon this year and photographed it like I did two years ago. The race was great even though it was overcast and a bit chilly. The cloud cover allowed me to open the shutter for a fairly long period of time and capture the astounding amount of runners as they came out of the gate. 
Back we are at Agapefest, Toby Mac's bassist was pretty into the music. Not that anyone in the band wasn't, he just expressed it. I love when musicians get out close to the crowd. 
Last concert photo to make the cut, and arguably my all time concert fav of 2012 was the lead singer Jon Foreman of Switchfoot jumping off the drumset. Here he is in the peak of his jump as he finishes off a song. This concert was by far my favorite to photograph, I just really like Switchfoot music. 
Another pano makes it in this year. Click on it to make it a little bigger and you'll be able to get a bit more appreciation for its size. The image originally was over 100 megapixels, my most detailed panoramic to date. Good 'ole city of Chicago.
My overall top image of the year is right here. Now technically I didn't take it (photo cred. to my sister Laura), I set the camera settings, but she did click the shutter. Regardless, the content of the photo is what makes it the best. Many of the pictures you see above, especially the concert ones were photographed with Hil at my side (or somewhere in the crowd close by). As I look back on this year, I realize how blessed I am to have her in my life. For a girl who isn't into photography, she sure puts up with me taking a lot of pictures.Hope you all have had a great 2012, look forward to sharing more images with you in 2013.- J.D.
This work by JD Maloney is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
