Winners of the Weather Photographer of the Year Contest Celebrate the Beauty of Nature
With nearly 9,000 photographs to choose from, the judges of the annual Weather Photographer of the Year competition had the difficult task of naming a winner. But in the end, it was a stunning photo of a foggy autumn morning in Italy that stole the show. Giulio Montoni‘s Morning Fog earned him the title of Weather Photographer of the Year in the contest organized by the Royal Meteorological Society in association with AccuWeather.
“This photo can only be taken from one point. There is a small church on top of a hill in the town of Airuno, in the province of Lecco in Italy,” shares Montoni. “Under the mist passes the river Adda. In the autumn months, on some days, it is possible to see this show with the first lights of sunrise. After 20 minutes, everything is over. This award repays me for the cold hours endured, waiting for the perfect light for that photo.”
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“Giulio captured this image on a foggy autumn day from a small church on a hilltop in the town of Airuno, Italy. Through the fog and with the help of the trees, you can just about see the winding course of the river Adda, illuminated by the first lights of sunrise.
The streaks or beams of sunlight visible in this image are called crepuscular rays. They are made visible by the scattering of sunlight by particles suspended in the atmosphere, such as small water droplets, dust, or smoke. Usually, crepuscular rays radiate through gaps in the clouds, but in this photo, the trees take the place of the clouds, casting shadows across the landscape, and the fog scatters the sunlight. Giulio had to be quick to take this photograph as within 20 minutes the scene had completely changed.”
