Dan Sweet, media service manager for Columbia Helicopters in Aurora, Ore., has taken the top award in an international photo contest for images of helicopters at work. Sweet's winning photo depicted a Vertol 107-II helicopter at a snowy logging operation above Detroit Lake in Oregon's Cascade Mountains.

The work of Seattle-area photographer Tara McDermott is now available at the online gallery Dislocation Photo (dislocationphoto.com). McDermott is known primarily for her spare landscapes and lush colors.

Eric Charbonneau has joined WireImage, the entertainment photo agency and wire service, as staff entertainment photographer.

Charbonneau, who is based in Los Angeles, recently left Berliner Photography, where he covered the Academy Awards and Hollywood premieres for 18 years. His work has appeared in People, Vanity Fair, Harper's Bazaar and Rolling Stone.

Hy Peskin, sports photographer and philanthropist, died of kidney disease June 3 at the age of 89.

Peskin, a native of Brooklyn, N.Y., first entered the world of journalism by selling newspapers as a boy. He later became a sportswriter for the New York Daily Mirror.

After a stint in the Marines from 1943 to 1944, Peskin became interested in stop-action color photography...

James G. Lott, a longtime Seattle Times photographer, died in early July of a self-inflicted gunshot wound at the age of 52. Lott's award-winning work was marked by a compassion and empathy for the less fortunate, and his coworkers have created the Jimi Lott Scholarship through the National Press Photographers Foundation in his honor.

Co-workers remember Lott for his keen eye, boundless energy, willingness to experiment, and ability to capture moments and images that spoke to the heart.

For four consecutive years (1985-1988), he won the Reid Blackburn Memorial Award for outstanding...

The International Photographic Council, a nongovernmental organization of the United Nations, recognized the recipients of its 7th Annual Professional Photographer Leadership Awards at its International Professional Photographers Month luncheon at the U.N. in New York City on May 11.

The five award winners were...

Patricio Robles Gil has been named 2006 Outstanding Photographer of the Year by the North American Nature Photography Association. Gil is known for his passion for conservation and the use of photography in protection efforts in his home country of Mexico. The award will be presented at NANPA's 12th Annual Summit, to be held Feb. 9-12, 2006, in Denver.

Other honors being presented at the summit include...

Gary Shenk and Mark Sherman have been promoted to senior vice president positions at Corbis, while two other senior vice presidents, Jennifer Hurshell and Joe Barrett, have left the company.

As senior vice president, images, Shenk will supervise Corbis' image-licensing business. Previously he was a founder and general manager of FlixMix, a Universal Studios subsidiary.

Sherman has been named...

Six students from the Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, Calif., recently returned from Buenos Aires, Argentina, where they spent five weeks creating photo documentaries about life, culture and politics in that country. The students are Al Cuizon, Antonio Franco, Nick Mantzel, Jacqueline Mata, Brandon Nightingale and David Sowers.

Their exhibit opened Oct. 1 at the Lobero Theater in Santa Barbara. In addition to the exhibit, the students will produce a book and a CD of their images.

Randy and Andrea Wells, based in Bellevue, Wash., recently completed a travel assignment in the San Juan Islands for AAA Washington's magazine, Journey. Their images have appeared recently in Holland America's Caribbean and European brochures, Elle magazine, and books from Harcourt and Guest Informant.