Best Photographer Award — Manuel Antonio, 2015

In 2015, I won the Best Photographer award for Manuel Antonio — voted by the local community. I spent 20 years based there and it will always be a place I love. In 2024 my family and I moved up to Tamarindo, Guanacaste, where I’m now based. I still photograph weddings in Manuel Antonio and the Southern Pacific when couples ask, but most of my work is now in Guanacaste. If you’re planning a wedding in the area, my Guanacaste wedding photographer guide is a good place to start.

To give you some background, Evelyn Gallardo began the “Best of Manuel Antonio Awards” three years ago, in conjunction with a guidebook she was writing titled “The Best of Manuel Antonio & Quepos 2012.”  The goal of the guidebook was to attract tourism and locals to all the businesses and attractions Manuel Antonio & Quepos have to offer. The guidebook would create more interest online and direct and attract travelers to the area. The contest would generate even more community involvement support, and education.

The residents and locals in the community cast votes and submit questionnaires on the best restaurants, tours, activities, artists, services, musicians, and best photographer in the Manuel Antonio and Quepos area. Ballots were cast in-person at different stores and through email submissions. The results were all to be published in the online guidebook. The concept and contest ended up being such a hit within the community, it continued to grow into an annual event.

So again, thanks so much to everyone involved in the awards, who participated in the voting, and who went to the awards dinner to celebrate the winners.  Photography really is my passion in life and it is so great that I get to do it for a living.

Pura Vida