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Photos courtesy of Ankush Sahgal

Diamond Bar High School senior Ankush Sahgal, right, was awarded the youth grand prize with his submission “Winter.”

Hundreds of Diamond Bar residents competed in the annual Through My Lens photography contest, with three Diamond Bar High School students securing the win for their submissions.

The contest is open to DB residents and separated into two divisions: youth (17 or under) and adults (over 17 years old). Participants can enter one of five categories: nature, digitally altered, people and pets. Within each division, the grand prize, first place and honorable mention recipients were awarded $150, $100 and $50 in their categories, respectively. All submissions were due in October.

Results were announced on Dec. 17 at the Diamond Bar City Hall, with returning senior Ankush Sahgal receiving the grand prize in the nature category with his submission titled “Winter,” which captured a hummingbird feeding on a flower near the gym.

“For the hummingbird shot, I would watch its pattern and set up my shot where I thought the hummingbird would be in advance and wait for it to return to that spot,” Sahgal said.

He also won first place in the people category for “Hungry,” a high-quality black and white photo featuring his friend in the rain during his photography class.

DBHS photography teacher William Foley introduced his class to the contest before the deadline submissions. Although he didn’t help with nor had the final say in his students’ submissions, he taught his classes about the composition and the basics of using the camera.

“I tried to recommend that all of my students enter,” Foley said. “But I do give special encouragement to those students who are especially talented, based on what I have seen of their work.”

In the digitally altered category, junior Aileen Park won first place with “I Believe We Will Win,” a picture showing a student cheering during Branding Iron

“He was showing a lot of school spirit, so I wanted to highlight that in my submitted photo by changing everything to black and white except for the things that he showed spirit with,” Park said.

Senior Alexander Moon won in the pets category with “Hard Day’s Night,” capturing his dog sleeping peacefully after a long day of play in a different perspective that shows a reflective light on the floor his dog is laying on.