‘At the right place, at the right time’: Go Laurel Highlands recognizes 9 photo contest winners

For Connie Weyant, the photograph that placed her in the top nine of Go Laurel Highlands’ annual photo contest took years of patient waiting.

Weyant, of Somerset, has been observing Somerset Lake for about eight years in search of a bald eagle. She’s received countless calls from friends, pointing her in the direction of a potential sighting of our national emblem.

This year, she finally captured one with her camera.

About 600 to 800 images are submitted to the photo contest each year, and Executive Director Ann Nemanic says each one is unique.

Go Laurel Highlands, an organization that promotes activities and attractions in the region, holds the contest to bring in genuine, authentic photography for its annual destination guide, billboards and social media posts.

“Our job is to sell this region to people who may have never come here before,” Nemanic said. “Destinations are a choice, and if we don’t have the right images to portray who we are, what we are or what someone can experience, then we lose that opportunity.”

The photos submitted to the contest can portray any aspect of the Laurel Highlands, a 3,000-square mile region across Westmoreland, Somerset and Fayette counties.

It took Dan Thompson about 20 to 30 attempts over the course of an hour and a half to get the shot he envisioned.

“I had this idea to photograph somebody with the Milky Way,” said Thompson, of Pittsburgh’s Polish Hill neighborhood.

One of his friends, who practices yoga, agreed to pose for a photo beneath the night sky near Laurel Hill State Park. He placed a light in front of her to create a backlit silhouette.

Even when photographers submit shots from the same place, no two photographs are exactly alike, Nemanic said. One of this year’s winning photos, featuring the Saint Vincent Basilica, exemplifies this individuality, she said.

“We see that beautiful, iconic basilica as we drive between Latrobe and Greensburg, and yet this (photo) is so spectacular because of the rays of sun that are coming down and just hitting those steeples and the crosses perfectly,” she said.

When Jeff Kern captured the photo of the basilica, he did not think it would turn out well.

“When I came home, my wife said ‘That’s the one,’” said Kern, of Mt. Pleasant.

Mark Hemminger snapped a photo of the morning sun over a wintry Somerset County. It was by happenstance, he said, that he captured a ring of sunshine that caught the judges’ attention.

“I know you’re going to laugh, but I had my cell phone actually. I took it with a cell phone,” said Hemminger, of Somerset. “Just happened to catch it at the right time.”

Holly Harris had a photography first with an image she captured at the Mt. Vernon Furnace — a starburst effect.

“I was trying to get there before dark,” said Harris, of Coal Center. “I’ve never been there before, so I just happened to pull up at the right time.”

Of all the photos Tom Bush IIII submitted to the contest, he thought the image that earned him second place in the outdoor activities category was the least likely to earn recognition.

Bush, of Uniontown, submitted a still image he pulled from GoPro footage he took of whitewater rafters on the Lower Yough River in Ohiopyle. It captured the “quintessential Ohiopyle vista of the bridge and the experience of going under it,” he said.