SkyPixel, the aerial photography and videography community, has announced the winners of its 10th annual contest. The contest this year drew thousands of participants, who submitted over 140,000 entries from around the world. While the contest has traditionally been exclusively open to aerial photos and videos, a handheld video category was added this year, opening submissions to more than just aerial shots.

The contest features both photo and video categories, with two Best Video Prize winners –one for aerial and one for handheld – and one Best Photo Prize winner. Additionally, the SkyPixel contest selects the top 10 video and photo winners. There is also a “Nominated Entries” category (a people’s choice award) with five video and five photo winners.

You can learn more about the contest and see all of the winning images and videos on the SkyPixel Contest website.

2025 Annual Best Video Prize (Aerial): The War – My Transformation Journey by Bashir Abu Shakra

Directed by Bashir Abu Shakra, The War – My Transformation Journey uses stunning aerial shots to tell his story of battling loneliness, leading to self-discovery. The project was filmed over the course of five years across eight countries, including China, Venezuela, Italy and more. Shakra purposefully chose each landscape to fit with the song’s lyrics, aiming to use the contrast between the song and visuals to show how nature helped him overcome his struggles.

Judge comments: “The opening shot is truly captivating, marked by its elongated duration, graceful camera movements, and the serene beauty of the time of day. The composition stands out as particularly noteworthy. It’s one of my favorites, and the overall quality is exceptional,” said Claudio Miranda.

“The War is an admirable film. Landscape photography is never a simple record, and every shot taken by this cinematographer is refined, precise, and captivating. The angles, the light all show his persistence and perseverance. It is a film where technique and the creator’s inner vision are highly aligned. I really liked the ending,” said Chenyu Jin.

2025 Annual Best Video Prize (Handheld): Japan Travel Cinematic by Henry Yue

Image: Henry Yue

The new handheld category of the SkyPixel contest celebrates videography created with handheld or stabilized cameras. The inaugural winner, Henry Yue, showcased popular and iconic destinations across Japan in Travel Cinematic. The video uses cinematic camera angles and transitions with creative compositions. You can view the video on the SkyPixel website.

Judge comments: “The sound design and use of movement in this film were second to none, absolutely capturing the essence of Japan in the most stunning way. This was one of my favorites, and I felt immersed from the moment I hit play. Keep up the incredible work—this was truly something else,” said Sam Newton.

“Japan Travel is a work rich in visual elements, combining both motion and stillness without causing any sense of chaos. Henry expertly controlled the pace of the film, with clean tones and precise, appropriate exposure control that perfectly integrates all elements. It is a highly refined and cohesive piece,” said Chenyu Jin.

2025 Annual Best Photo Prize: Gangerqia

Photo: Gangerqia

Photographer: Gangerqia

Caption (machine translated): A red-crowned crane accidentally fell down when it landed, leaving a phoenix-like shadow on the snow-covered ice. The photographer used the dark spring as a guide point to capture this beautiful moment.

Judge comments: “This aerial photo works beautifully because it almost tricks you at first glance—like you’re looking at a drawing rather than a real landscape. There’s a frozen pond shaped like an eye that immediately grabs your attention, and the neat line of footprints from the bird adds a playful sense of movement. It’s simple, clean, and has a bit of mystery to it. The minimal colors and subtle textures make the whole thing feel calming but intriguing at the same time,” said Luke Stackpoole.

Selection of Annual Top 10 Photo Winners

Photographer: AB Gusai

Image title: Mud bath bliss

Caption: In the heart of the Indian countryside, a buffalo finds its own unique way to beat the heat. This aerial view captures the animal fully immersed in a vibrant pond, reveling in a luxurious mud bath. The deep, rich mud clings to its skin, providing a natural sunscreen and a soothing relief from the scorching sun. The buffalo seems to sigh contentedly, its eyes half-closed as it luxuriates in the cool, wet embrace of the mud. This image is a reminder of the simple pleasures in life, the joy of a good mud bath, and the resilience of nature’s creatures in adapting to their environment.

Photographer: Fadah

Image title: Sailing through the ice

Caption: None

Photographer: hanifi

Image title: bulgurcu

Caption: Wheat harvested in the Gaziantep province of Turkey is turned into bulgur after various processes. The resulting bulgur is laid out in the sun to dry. Bulgur needs to be stirred frequently to ensure it dries quickly. The different geometric shapes that emerge during this process are preserved.

Photographer: Joanna Steidle

Image title: Another World

Caption: This is a top-down drone capture of a fever of cownose rays mixing their way through a school of menhaden fish. Taken just off the coast of the Hamptons, Southampton, New York , USA . On this day the sky was clear, and the sea was calm, allowing the sunlight to enhance the depth and bursting sand clouds.

Photographer: qb.pixels

Image title: Alien made symbol

Caption: The crest of Buri in Sicily is likely a rocky ridge with Mediterranean vegetation, offering scenic views and possibly historical ruins from Sicily’s rich past.

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SkyPixel, the aerial photography and videography community, has announced the winners of its 10th annual contest. The contest this year drew thousands of participants, who submitted over 140,000 entries from around the world. While the contest has traditionally been exclusively open to aerial photos and videos, a handheld video category was added this year, opening submissions to more than just aerial shots.

The contest features both photo and video categories, with two Best Video Prize winners –one for aerial and one for handheld – and one Best Photo Prize winner. Additionally, the SkyPixel contest selects the top 10 video and photo winners. There is also a “Nominated Entries” category (a people’s choice award) with five video and five photo winners.

You can learn more about the contest and see all of the winning images and videos on the SkyPixel Contest website.

2025 Annual Best Video Prize (Aerial): The War – My Transformation Journey by Bashir Abu Shakra

Directed by Bashir Abu Shakra, The War – My Transformation Journey uses stunning aerial shots to tell his story of battling loneliness, leading to self-discovery. The project was filmed over the course of five years across eight countries, including China, Venezuela, Italy and more. Shakra purposefully chose each landscape to fit with the song’s lyrics, aiming to use the contrast between the song and visuals to show how nature helped him overcome his struggles.

Judge comments: “The opening shot is truly captivating, marked by its elongated duration, graceful camera movements, and the serene beauty of the time of day. The composition stands out as particularly noteworthy. It’s one of my favorites, and the overall quality is exceptional,” said Claudio Miranda.

“The War is an admirable film. Landscape photography is never a simple record, and every shot taken by this cinematographer is refined, precise, and captivating. The angles, the light all show his persistence and perseverance. It is a film where technique and the creator’s inner vision are highly aligned. I really liked the ending,” said Chenyu Jin.

2025 Annual Best Video Prize (Handheld): Japan Travel Cinematic by Henry Yue

Image: Henry Yue

The new handheld category of the SkyPixel contest celebrates videography created with handheld or stabilized cameras. The inaugural winner, Henry Yue, showcased popular and iconic destinations across Japan in Travel Cinematic. The video uses cinematic camera angles and transitions with creative compositions. You can view the video on the SkyPixel website.

Judge comments: “The sound design and use of movement in this film were second to none, absolutely capturing the essence of Japan in the most stunning way. This was one of my favorites, and I felt immersed from the moment I hit play. Keep up the incredible work—this was truly something else,” said Sam Newton.

“Japan Travel is a work rich in visual elements, combining both motion and stillness without causing any sense of chaos. Henry expertly controlled the pace of the film, with clean tones and precise, appropriate exposure control that perfectly integrates all elements. It is a highly refined and cohesive piece,” said Chenyu Jin.

2025 Annual Best Photo Prize: Gangerqia

Photo: Gangerqia

Photographer: Gangerqia

Caption (machine translated): A red-crowned crane accidentally fell down when it landed, leaving a phoenix-like shadow on the snow-covered ice. The photographer used the dark spring as a guide point to capture this beautiful moment.

Judge comments: “This aerial photo works beautifully because it almost tricks you at first glance—like you’re looking at a drawing rather than a real landscape. There’s a frozen pond shaped like an eye that immediately grabs your attention, and the neat line of footprints from the bird adds a playful sense of movement. It’s simple, clean, and has a bit of mystery to it. The minimal colors and subtle textures make the whole thing feel calming but intriguing at the same time,” said Luke Stackpoole.

Selection of Annual Top 10 Photo Winners

Photographer: AB Gusai

Image title: Mud bath bliss

Caption: In the heart of the Indian countryside, a buffalo finds its own unique way to beat the heat. This aerial view captures the animal fully immersed in a vibrant pond, reveling in a luxurious mud bath. The deep, rich mud clings to its skin, providing a natural sunscreen and a soothing relief from the scorching sun. The buffalo seems to sigh contentedly, its eyes half-closed as it luxuriates in the cool, wet embrace of the mud. This image is a reminder of the simple pleasures in life, the joy of a good mud bath, and the resilience of nature’s creatures in adapting to their environment.

Photographer: Fadah

Image title: Sailing through the ice

Caption: None

Photographer: hanifi

Image title: bulgurcu

Caption: Wheat harvested in the Gaziantep province of Turkey is turned into bulgur after various processes. The resulting bulgur is laid out in the sun to dry. Bulgur needs to be stirred frequently to ensure it dries quickly. The different geometric shapes that emerge during this process are preserved.

Photographer: Joanna Steidle

Image title: Another World

Caption: This is a top-down drone capture of a fever of cownose rays mixing their way through a school of menhaden fish. Taken just off the coast of the Hamptons, Southampton, New York , USA . On this day the sky was clear, and the sea was calm, allowing the sunlight to enhance the depth and bursting sand clouds.

Photographer: qb.pixels

Image title: Alien made symbol

Caption: The crest of Buri in Sicily is likely a rocky ridge with Mediterranean vegetation, offering scenic views and possibly historical ruins from Sicily’s rich past.

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Panasonic’s S1RII is the company’s latest professional-level full-frame camera, featuring a 44MP sensor, burst rates up to 40fps with continuous autofocus and promises of improvements to its autofocus system, especially when it comes to recognizing humans and eyes.

We’re currently in the process of reviewing it, so when a friend-in-law asked me to be the photographer for her wedding, it felt like a great way to see how the camera would perform during a high-stakes, real-world shoot. It also promised to test the S1RII’s specific strengths; I’m by no means an expert wedding photographer, so I’d need to lean on the autofocus system and shoot wide, secure knowing I had the resolution to crop in to fix imperfect compositions.

Let’s start with what went well. The S1RII’s design is, in my opinion, more comfortable than the original. It’s substantially lighter and feels more like a tool designed for human hands than a piece of industrial equipment. I also have no complaints about the control layout; there are enough buttons for all the settings I need quick access to, and they’re easy to operate without looking.

The S1RII has all the controls you’d expect to find on a professional-level camera, and is comfortable to hold. Photo: Mitchell Clark

The image quality I got aligns with our studio test scene results: the pictures have a lot of detail, and, subjectively, I thought the straight-out-of-camera colors were quite nice. I’m also pleased with the dynamic range of the Raw files. It was an outdoor ceremony on a Las Vegas afternoon, so I spent most of the time exposing to preserve highlights with plans to raise the shadows in post. While I haven’t made it through every photo yet, they mostly seem to be handling relatively extreme pushes and pulls with grace.

Exposure raised 1.75EV in post, cropped to taste. Lumix S Pro 24-70 F2.8 | F4 | 1/800 sec | ISO 80 | Edited from Raw in Capture One Photo: Mitchell Clark

The autofocus system is where my complaints start. Panasonic has made what I think is a strange decision with the S1RII: if you have subject detection mode on, tracking will only work if it detects a subject. So if, for example, I had human eye detection on, I couldn’t put my focus point over the wedding cake, start tracking, and then recompose my shot.

This way of shooting may sound strange if you haven’t tried it before, but I’ve found it’s faster and more efficient than setting the focus point with the autofocus joystick. And, importantly, it’s what I’ve become used to: Canon, Nikon, Sony and Fujifilm all let you track arbitrary points even when subject recognition mode is on. If you mainly want to use tracking autofocus with the S1RII, you’ll likely have to constantly toggle subject detection on and off.

That limitation also wouldn’t have mattered as much if the S1RII had been better at recognizing subjects, but I found its performance a bit unreliable. Most of the time, it worked as intended, but there were several times when it just didn’t recognize that I was pointing it at a human. That meant I had to realize it wasn’t working, move my thumb to the joystick, and get the focus point where it needed it to be, all before the moment was over. This very nearly led to me missing the couple’s kiss during the ceremony, which would’ve been – to put it mildly – quite unfortunate.

There were plenty of times when the S1RII quickly and confidently locked on to my selected subject. Lumix S Pro 24-70 F2.8 | F2.8 | 1/60 sec | ISO 320 | Out of camera JPEG Photo: Mitchell Clark

To be clear, I wouldn’t consider this to be deal-breakingly bad autofocus; I still got plenty of tack-sharp photos, and I have no doubts that a professional photographer could shoot a wedding with the S1RII and end up with mostly keepers. However, despite the promised improvements, Panasonic is clearly lagging behind the competition when it comes to its autofocus system.

Case in point: I used a Canon EOS R5 II for part of the wedding, and never had an issue with its subject detection. Throughout our tests, we’ve found that Canon’s system has an almost supernatural ability to find and stick to faces even in challenging conditions where their eyes, nose and/or mouths are obscured. The same is true for Sony and Nikon’s autofocus systems too.

The EOS R5 II zeroed in on the subject’s eye, even in this relatively difficult situation. RF 70-200mm F2.8 L IS USM Z | F2.8 | 1/160 sec | ISO 1600 | Out of camera JPEG Photo: Mitchell Clark

One last complaint before we get back to compliments: the placement of the record button on the front of the camera makes it really easy to accidentally start taking a video. Thankfully, you can assign separate functions to it depending on whether you’re in stills or video mode, letting you set it to do nothing while you’re taking photos while retaining its original function for videos.

As for battery life, the S1RII did okay. I shot around 1,700 photos – many of them in bursts – and while I frequently turned the camera off to save battery, I did have it on for the entire 20-minute ceremony. I went through about one and a half batteries, putting in a fresh one between the ceremony and the reception. If I were to do it again, I’d probably opt to use a battery grip, especially if I wasn’t sure how long the ceremony would last.

I’m pretty happy with the S1RII’s photos, and so are the bride and groom. But…

I’m also happy to accept middling battery life if that’s the price for the S1RII’s large, bright and high-resolution EVF. And while I mostly used the viewfinder during the ceremony, I was happy to have a display mechanism with both tilting and full articulation when shooting detail shots of the venue and decorations, encouraging me to be flexible with my compositons.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with the photos I got out of the S1RII. And, more importantly, so are the bride and groom. Still, I wish the autofocus system had made it a bit easier to get those end results, and hadn’t added pressure to what is already a very stressful job. It certainly wasn’t the most difficult thing ever; I’m well aware that people shot weddings for years using cameras with single autofocus points or even – gasp – no autofocus at all.

Several years ago, I shot my sister’s wedding with a Fujifilm X-T30. The experience of using the S1RII was worlds apart, as it’s far more suited to the task. Even with my complaints, I’d still take it over that every day of the week. But the next time I’m asked to shoot a wedding, I won’t respond with, “Sure, let me just grab my S1RII,” or even “I’ll get the EOS R5 II.” I’ll probably say, “Ehhhh, maybe get a professional photographer.”

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