We're happy to announce the monthly winners of our Photo of the Day contest for December, 2008. Here's a look at December's winners, along with some comments from the judges:

What a great shot! The arrangement of elements in the scene and the girl's gaze make for a really riveting composition. The elements combine beautifully: The long line of women in white, their gazes turned away from the camera and photographer, thrown out of focus by the shallow depth of field, the lone girl in dark garb sharply focused, and turned toward the photographer, with those arresting eyes. Some pictures tell stories, others like this one pose questions: What are the women doing? Why is the one girl dressed differently? Does she have some relationship to the photographer, or did they just happen to catch each other's eyes? - The bit of mystery adds to the picture's appeal. Congratulations to Samir for this great image!

Sometimes, the subject does the heavy lifting in an image, reaching out and grabbing the viewer by the eyeballs. That's certainly the case here, but we suspect the composition and tonality were no accident: We'd wager that the original, raw exposure looked quite a bit different here. That's just a guess on our part, but the tonality is so striking that we suspect Dan spent some effort tweaking it in the computer. Whatever process led to the final image we see here was beautifully executed: The tonality of the clouds and the mountain is just right, and the weight of the clouds in the upper left of the image are offset by the mountain and tree that frames it in the lower right. A beautiful execution of a stunning subject!

The judges loved the moodiness of this shot; the contrasts between the bright lights of the carousel and the dark of its surroundings, the live characters in the foreground rendered as silhouettes against the static but more three-dimensional figurines on the carousel. And of course, the implied hush of the falling snow contrasts with the lively busyness of the carousel , brightly lit but empty of riders. (And what about the "couple" on the bench: We suspect they're statues, who else would be content to sit there watching the empty carousel, while being snowed upon?) This shot seems simple, but its execution was probably anything but: Photographer Rudy had to achieve not only exactly the right exposure, but had to also shoot at a shutter speed that would render the falling snow sharply enough to show it as a haze of individual flakes, rather than an undifferentiated blur. Ditto the focus and aperture. Overall, just a beautiful, evocative image. Kudos!

Camels of Rajasthan	Rebirth	King Creek Falls
by Mukesh Srivastava	by Amy Hopp	by Mitch Mitchell

There you have it: 31 great Photos of the Day, with 3 exceptional ones capturing top honors - so what are you waiting for? That could be your photo up there this time next month! Dig through your digital shoe boxes, pick your best and join the fun!