photo: © Chengming Liu - Emerald Waves At Dus, IAPOTY26 (Above Mountain Award)
The winners of the second International Aerial Photographer of the Year competition have been announced. From 1587 entries submitted around the world, the jury selected two main winners: a photographer of the year, judged on a portfolio of at least four images, and a photograph of the year, awarded to a single image.
The title International Aerial Photographer of the Year 2026 goes to Azim Khan Ronnie of Bangladesh. The International Aerial Photograph of the Year 2026 award, for the best individual aerial photograph, was won by Vitaly Golovatyuk of the Russian Federation.
The competition is dedicated entirely to aerial photography: images made from above, often using drones, but judged primarily on visual language, composition, story, and the ability to show the world differently.
Azim Khan Ronnie wins with a portfolio
Azim Khan Ronnie is a professional photographer from Bangladesh who currently lives in France. He has worked as a photographer for eleven years, covering travel, culture, sports, humanitarian subjects, news, and daily life. Before that, he spent more than nineteen years as a journalist for various news channels.
His winning portfolio demonstrates the strengths of aerial photography. From above, ordinary places suddenly become graphic, rhythmic, or nearly abstract. In the press release, Ronnie cites rowers on Lake Zurich, birds and people at Yamuna Ghat in Delhi, red chilies drying in Bogura, and the Rakher Upobash ritual in Dhaka.
These subjects already have meaning at street level, but the aerial view adds another layer. Patterns become visible, human movements converge with landscape and fields of color, and small gestures gain scale.
Ronnie says that in aerial photography he primarily looks for composition, beautiful light, meaningful moments, and visual balance. He wants viewers to keep looking, discover details, and ultimately feel the story behind the image.
Aerial photography as a narrative perspective
What is interesting about Ronnie’s approach is that he does not regard aerial photography solely as a technical or spectacular genre. He uses drones not simply to get higher, but to organize stories differently. From the air, connections often hidden at ground level become visible: the direction people move, the form of a ritual, and the repetition of labor, water, color, or shadow.
According to Ronnie, aerial photography can transform familiar landscapes into something new. Everyday scenes suddenly reveal patterns, geometry, and texture that are barely noticeable from the ground. That may be exactly why good aerial photography continues to resonate: it surprises not only through height, but through insight.
For his aerial photography Ronnie uses DJI Mavic drones, among others. He shoots in raw and processes his images in Adobe Photoshop. In the press release, he emphasizes that post-processing is intended primarily to strengthen an image, not alter reality. He considers that boundary particularly important in documentary and journalistic photography.
Second place in the International Aerial Photographer of the Year category went to Chin Leong Teo of Singapore. Barbara Brown of Australia placed third.
Vitaly Golovatyuk wins best individual aerial photograph
The International Aerial Photograph of the Year 2026 award went to Vitaly Golovatyuk. He is a cinematographer and photographer with more than fifteen years of experience, eleven of them focused on aerial imagery.
His winning photograph was made at Elk Park, outside Dongtai City in China’s Zhejiang Province, in November 2025. It shows a small pool or body of water in a red landscape. The clear reflection of the sky makes a bird appear to float almost weightlessly in the image.
It is a strong example of an aerial photograph concerned not only with overview, but also with illusion and simplicity. The composition is calm, yet the reflection creates a disorienting image: are you looking at water, sky, landscape, or a combination of all three?
Golovatyuk calls aerial photography a way to broaden his creative vision. He searches for unusual viewpoints and compositions that stand apart in a world where many images already resemble one another. He sees post-processing in Lightroom and Photoshop as complementary, not as a substitute for a strong in-camera capture.
Second place in this category went to Sanghamitra Sarkar of India. Kah-Wai Lin of the United States placed third.
Special awards and Top 101
In addition to the two main prizes, the competition presented several special awards. The 2026 Above Mountain Award went to Chengming Liu of the United States. Aleksandra Wilk of Germany won the 2026 Above Snow Award. Savadmon Avalachamveettil of Ireland received the 2026 Above Water Award, and the Chairman’s Choice Award went to A.J. Rich of the United States.
The organizers emphasize that the competition is about more than its main prizes. The Top 101 plays an important role: a selection of aerial photographs that collectively show the breadth of the genre. Some images are scenic and almost meditative, while others are abstract, graphic, or heavily processed.
Chairman Peter Eastway writes in the press release that years ago aerial photography attracted attention primarily through the surprise of its elevated viewpoint. That novelty has faded, but he believes the genre has actually become more interesting. It is not the drone itself that makes an image good, but what the photographer sees with it.
No AI-generated images
A notable competition rule is that every entry must have been made by a real person. AI that generates new image content is not permitted. At a time when photography, image editing, and generative AI increasingly overlap, that is a clear choice.
For an aerial photography competition, that boundary is especially important. The genre relies on perspective, timing, scale, and location. This makes it particularly interesting to see how photographers continue to use the real world as their starting point, even when their images sometimes look almost unreal.
More information, all winners, and the Top 101 can be found at internationalaerialphotographer.com.
