Faces of Transportation
AASHTO's annual photo/video competition
2011 Contest Winner – Julie Duewel, Nevada DOT
To give you an idea of what to photograph, and what might be good to submit, we’re letting you in on the thoughts of some our past award winners and what made a particular photo worth submitting.
This week features Julie Duewel, the Grand Prize and People’s Choice winner from the 2011 contest. Julie is the photographer for the Nevada Department of Transportation.
My name is Julie Duewel – I’ve been the photographer for the Nevada Department of Transportation for 3 ½ years. Every year I have a blast shooting images throughout Nevada! I am so blessed to work for a great organization and have such an awesome job.
Last year I won the People’s Choice and Grand Prize in the Faces of Transportation contest for a photo titled “Balancing Act.” Before the Mike O’Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge opened in October of 2010, our NDOT bridge inspectors did a full inspection of the beautiful bridge. I was able to climb in the bucket, suspended 890 feet above the Colorado River, to photograph our inspectors. (Nope—not afraid of heights, but had to go through fall protection training—just in case!)
I shot many, MANY photos from the bucket and then went to the base of the bridge to shoot up at the inspectors harnessed and balancing on the bridge. I love this photo because to me it shows the danger and diverse nature of the inspector’s job, and transportation jobs in general. I also love that you can see a second inspector peeking around the corner.
I would encourage anyone to submit photos to the Faces of Transportation Awards contest. You can get such inspiration looking at other photographer’s photos and you never know what can happen—I certainly didn’t expect to win! So get out there and get shooting….
Faces of Transportation 
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