by Christopher D. Tennant ’01

Christopher Tennant ’01 [Photography, First Place, Serenity] graduated from Ithaca College with a degree in physics and then attended graduate school, earning his Ph.D. in 2006. He currently works as a staff scientist at the Thomas Jefferson National Laboratory in Virginia, where he designs particle accelerators. He lives in Williamsburg with his wife and two young sons.

"As a senior physics major at Ithaca College, I did an independent study project on high-speed photography to capture events that occur on very short timescales," says Christopher. "In this photograph, I've gone to the other extreme and made a very long exposure (90 seconds) so that the water appears completely smooth. The conversion to black and white strips the photography of extraneous elements and emphasizes texture, shape, and composition."