These are our favorite photos we've taken this year

It goes without saying that the Digital Camera World team is nuts about photography. In addition to testing cameras and lenses and producing images for the website, many of us are professional photographers who take on client work as well. However, at the end of the day, we also just take pictures because we love taking pictures. 

Between all the personal photos and professional projects we work on, our memory cards are filled with hundreds and thousands of images. So, after a whole year of capturing images, which ones are our favorites? Which really stand out and mean something to us? 

Four members of the team share their favorite images they've shot in 2022 – and interestingly, they're all people pictures! 

Passion Projects

James Artaius
Editor

I've taken more creative, more outlandish and more technically accomplished photos in 2022 – but this one speaks to me more than any other. And as much as anything, it exemplifies why I take a camera with me everywhere I go. My dearest friend and I were sat in one of our favorite coffee shops, grabbing a java before we headed somewhere else, when I noticed that her eyes were a Pantone-perfect match for the walls, and her mustard-colored sweater matched the ornamentation. 

So I told her not to move, slapped the Olympus 45mm f/1.8 onto my Olympus PEN E-P7, and fired some frames. I quickly realized that, instead of the colorful environmental portrait I'd envisioned, what the scene really demanded was a more intimate mono shot. So I clicked the camera into black-and-white, reframed, and snapped my favorite shot of the year. 

Made in Manhattan

Chris George
Content Director

This is one of a series of portraits I shot on a visit to New York this fall. I was there to test the Fujifilm X-H2, which was launched at the X-Summit that had just taken place in Manhattan. I was shooting outside on a terrace at Fujikina – a day-long chance for X-shooters to try out Fujifilm's latest cameras and lenses. 

It was hot and sunny, so I used the shade available to get this tightly cropped headshot, taking full advantage of the lens' maximum aperture to blur out the sun-bleached buildings in the background.

Spider-Punk

Beth Nicholls
Staff Writer

My favorite photograph that I've taken this year is special to me in a lot of ways, firstly, it was captured at a secret social cosplay photography event that really challenged me and placed me outside of my comfort zone as a painfully awkward, shy and introverted photographer. If I hadn't found the confidence to approach this cosplayer and ask to shoot with him, the image would not exist. 

Secondly, one of my colleagues felt that this image of mine was good enough to be published, and it was featured in Digital Camera magazine's September Issue. Something I never imagined would ever happen, when I started out as a photography student with my bridge camera ten years ago.

Meadows in the Mountains

Hannah Rooke
Staff Writer

My favorite photo from this year didn't necessarily have the best composition or involve any mad techniques, but it captures two of my best friends absolutely in their element at a festival in Bulgaria called Meadows in the Mountains. This was the first year since pre-covid that I was back shooting at festivals, and it made me realize how much I love that area of work.