Action/Sport Category Winner: Suzy Burleson, 69, president of Letters Inc., Houston, TX

Returning to her hotel in Florence, Italy, Suzy Burleson noticed that recent rains had transformed the Arno River into a “muddy torrent.” As she crossed it on a footbridge, she sagely noted that the river’s new color “was ideal to show every swirl and eddy as each paddle slipped into the water.” Her composition deftly frames the still water, the blade-shaped single scull, and its Rorschach-Test wake. Despite having a DSLR in her bag, she had less than 30 seconds before the oarsmen disappeared, so instead she reached for the compact camera she had hanging from her neck.

Tech Specs: Canon PowerShot G9 (at 35mm equivalent); exposure, 1/1000 sec at f/4, ISO 80. Sharpening in Adobe Photoshop CS5.