Homocon

1. A Walk Through Durham Township: Kathleen Connally's subject matter isn't always up my alley, and there are times when I think she borders on being overly sentimental, but she nonetheless has a sharp eye for color and texture, and the sense of captured motion in her photographs is at times extraordinary.

2. Brown Glasses: Rachel James is an American designer/photographer working out of the Netherlands. Her composition and subject matter are entirely Dutch, and each photograph is a painstaking detail of James' life in the Netherlands. It's like watching a documentary unfurl, frame by frame. Dutch Realism in its contemporary form.

3. Chromasia: A true find. David Nightingale's photographs are uncanny, for lack of a better word. He's all angles and colors and juxtapositions. Chromasia was listed as one of TIME magazine's 50 Coolest Websites in 2005, and there are over a thousand damn good reason why.

4. Gut Feeling: Precision crafted photos of signage, lettering, graffiti and random images on walls. The human-free compositions set this photo blog apart from its peers. It's as if the photographer is closely shadowing society, yet is only interested in documenting the evidence of its aftermath.

5. Japan Window: Andy Gray lays claim to one of my favorites of the finalists -- the photographs are casual, clean and personal. There's a sense of emotional involvement with the subject matter that I don't often experience when looking through photo blogs, and there's always a companion text to go along with each daily photo, offering clarity for the viewer while surmounting the overt detachment that often plagues professional photography.

***Tomorrow -- A Thousand Words: Part Two***