Top 12 Dog Photos of 2022

Dog Photography Awards is a worldwide competition of professional and amateur photographers dedicated to dogs. It was invented by Audrey Bello and Claudio Piccoli, photographers and dog breeders. They came up with this idea because they consider all the dogs in the world worthy of admiration. In 2022, the competition was held in four categories: "Portrait and Landscape", "Studio", "Action" and "Dogs and People". In total, the organizers received almost one and a half thousand applications from all over the world, with the following works recognized as the best ones:

Dalia Fichman, 1st place in the Portrait and Landscape category. The author tells the histrory of this photo: “Every year people are buried by avalanches. The search in rough terrain is usually very difficult. The avalanche rescuedogs are often the first responders, fighting their way through the avalanche cones on their four paws with a lot of perseverance to look for the buried people, who are sometimes buried several meters under the snow masses. In Melchsee-Frutt (Switzerland) I have accompanied the rescue teams led by Nicole Dammann with the camera for a day. The dogs are trained using positive reinforcement to keep them enjoying the search. To capture the moment when the dog finds the buried person and digs through the snow, I lay down with the camera in a small, dark ice cave and let the dogs search for me. The moment when the snow cover opens up, the first ray of light penetrates the cave, the paws dig away the snow and the dog's nose sniffs towards you is wonderful".

Sophia Hutchinson, 2nd place in the Portrait and Landscape category. “This shot of Amber my Dalmatian is so special to me as this was one of the first walks we were able to do off lead since her two leg operations. It fills me with emotion seeing her so independent and captivated by the beauty of nature and wildlife", - Sophia Hutchinson said.

Joanne Liu, 3rd place in the Portrait and Landscape category. Another amazing photo story about the best living creatures on this planet: “These photos are of Greenland Dogs (Greenlandic: Kalaallit Qimmiat, Danish: Grønlandshund) in Ilulissat, Greenland behaving naturally on the land provided to them by the government. There used be 30,000 Greenland Dogs and now there are only around 15,000. In Greenland they are exclusively used as working sled dogs. Climate change has reduced their use in favour of skidoos, which are better able to handle marginal ice conditions.”

Su Kaye, 1st place in the Studio category. “Just trying to do something different from the norm and create something unique in my studio and a new style. Not something I've seen other people doing and has created a great response and good reactions", Su Kaye says.

Jane Thomson, 2nd place in the Studio category.

Daniela Schmid, 3rd place in the Studio category.

Francesco Mura, 1st place in the Action category.

Kjara Kocbek, 2nd place in the Action category.

Julia Hasselkuss, 3rd place in the Action category.

Sabrina Theden, 1st place in the Dogs and People category. This photo is entitled "Unconditional Love", and there is nothing to argue.

Sarah Abner, 2nd place in the Dogs and People category.

Russell Charters, 3rd place in the Dogs and People category.

The prize fund of the Dog Photography Awards is not amazing: just 2,000 Euros. That is, the winners in each category received 500 Euros. But their pictures are admired by the whole world. And we do, as well.