The contest’s winning photo, “Sunrise on the Reservoir,” was taken at Buck Creek State Park.
Photo by Andrew Grimm Photography
Urbana resident Andrew Grimm won the grand prize in the Ohio State Parks photo contest this year.
The photo was created in February of 2019 at Buck Creek State Park in Clark County.
Grimm was a Clark County resident before moving to Urbana after recovering from a shooting incident.
“It was February of 2019 right at the height of my civil suit,” Grimm said of a Clark County incident involving a law enforcement officer shooting and injuring him at a scene where he was reporting as a news photographer. “I used to walk the reservoir for peace of mind. I took the photo from the west end of the lake facing east. As soon as I saw the water was freezing I lined up at the rocks to get the ice forming over them. I just lucked out that there were no clouds or anything and ended up with a cool shot of the water freezing on the rocks reflecting the teal of the sky above.”
The first place award came with a DJI action camera as a prize.
“My kids saw it was waterproof so we took it to the Urbana pool with us all summer. It’s been loads of fun,” Grimm said.
Grimm is a freelance photographer. His work has appeared in the Urbana Daily Citizen and its affiliated special sections since he moved to the city of Urbana in 2020.
This year’s contest celebrated Ohio’s 76 state parks and the 75th anniversary of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, capturing the breathtaking beauty of state parks.
