David M. Ritz, chairman and CEO of Ritz Camera Centers, recently received the annual Hall of Fame Award for 2007 from the International Photographic Council, a nongovernmental organization of the United Nations. The award honors legendary contributors to the photographic industry. Information about the council is available at ipc-un-ngo.org.

Leonard Freed, whose photographs documented the civil rights movement and other scenes of human struggle, died from cancer in New York City last November at the age of 77.

Freed was born Oct. 23, 1929, in Brooklyn, N.Y. He studied art at the New School under Alexey Brodovitch, the art director of Harper's Bazaar, an experience that turned his attention toward photography. After graduation he traveled extensively in Europe and...

Former Life magazine photographer Yale Joel recently died of cardiac arrest in New York City at the age of 87.

Joel began his photographic career in 1938, when he was 19 years old, going on to serve as a combat photographer for the Army Signal Corps in World War II. He joined the original Life staff in 1947, working at various times through the magazine's Paris, Washington, Boston and New York offices.

During the next decade, he twice won the...

Kennan Ward, a photographer based in Santa Cruz, Calif., earned one of three 2007 NANPA Fellow Awards, for photographers who have made significant contributions to the field of nature photography for at least 20 years.

Additional awards presented at the NANPA 13th Annual Summit included the NANPA Outstanding Service Award to Alice Robertson of Las Vegas, for her work developing the NANPA College Student Program.

This summer, photographers David M. Cobb and Jonathan Ley, both based in Portland, Ore., will embark on a 350-mile hike across Iceland. The two plan to traverse the country's volcanic core, beginning in Hraunhafnartangi, capturing images of caribou, Arctic foxes and the abundant birdlife along the Icelandic coast.

Mountaineer and aerial photographer Bradford Washburn died of heart failure Jan. 11 in Lexington, Mass.

Washburn was born in 1910 in Cambridge, Mass. In 1933, he graduated from Harvard University and served as an instructor at Harvard's Institute of Geographical Exploration from 1935 until 1942.

Throughout his 60-year career, he traveled extensively, and his aerial images of peaks and glaciers...

Seven students from the Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, Calif., were honored in the College Photographer of the Year competition, held at the Missouri School of Journalism in Columbia, Mo., late last year.

The Brooks recipients were Ramsay DeGive (Gold Medal, Spot News); Matthew Williams (Award of Excellence, General News, and...

Bruce Fraser, a pioneer in the field of digital photography, died of lung cancer last December at his home in San Francisco.

Fraser was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1954. He became interested in photography at an early age, and was introduced to a precursor of Photoshop, BarneyScan XP, in the late 1980s. His enthusiasm for the potential of digital photography led him to become involved in...

Canon USA has expanded its Explorers of Light panel with the addition of 20 photographers from all segments of the industry.

Joining the roster for the first time are Joe Buissink, Bob Davis, John Dibbs, Don Emmerich, Rod Evans, Hansen Fong, Paul Gero, Darrell Gulin, Jeff Hawkins, Stephen Johnson, Adam Jones, Vincent Laforet, Terrell Lloyd, Andy Marcus, Parker Pfister, Fran Reisner, Ken Sklute, Onne Van Der Wal and Jeff Woods.

Among the six professional photographers recently inducted into Microsoft's new Icons of Imaging program, three were from the western United States: Bambi Cantrell, a portrait photographer based in Pleasant Hills, Calif.; nature and landscape photographer John Shaw, who lives in Colorado Springs, Colo.; and wildlife and nature photographer Art Wolfe, who has a studio in Seattle.

The other photographers honored by Microsoft were Reed Hoffmann of Kansas City, Denis Reggie of Atlanta and Matthew Jordan Smith of New York (see microsoft.com).