Sleeping Giant takes out top Epson-sponsored photography award
The 17th Epson International Pano Awards has announced its 2026 winners, with Spanish photographers Daniel Viñé Garcia and Tomás Sánchez Ruiz named Open Photographer of the Year and Amateur Photographer of the Year respectively. Garcia took the top Open honour on the strength of a portfolio that spans the high Andes and the Argentine Puna, with his winning image, The Sleeping Giant (pictured here) capturing the Parinacota Volcano in Chile.
Photo Credit: The Sleeping Giant, by Daniel Viñé Garcia, winner of the Open Photographer of the Year category at The 17th Epson International Pano Awards.
Craig Heckenberg, Managing Director of Epson Australia and New Zealand, says: “Photographers at every level, from first-time entrants to established professionals, use the Pano Awards as a benchmark for their own work. The new Awards’ aerial category is a perfect example of why the competition has stayed relevant for 17 years. It responds to what photographers are actually doing and it gives the global industry a view of where the craft is heading next.”
This year’s competition drew 4,084 entries from photographers in 93 countries (up 19% from 2025), with 2,122 entries into the Open competition and 1,962 in the Amateur competition. The field included 680 entries in the new Aerial categories.
Winning Open Photographer, Garcia says: “The original capture was a 360-degree aerial panorama made from 33 individual exposures. After one last burst of light, the landscape gradually took on magenta tones, wrapping the volcanoes and the high-altitude lakes in a particularly special atmosphere. I later refined the framing from the full panorama to concentrate the final composition on the volcanoes, the light and the shapes of the landscape.”
Other key awards included The Epson Digital Art Prize which is decided by the executive team at Epson Australia from the top 50 entries in each category of the Open competition. In addition to their creativity, these entries must show excellence in digital post processing as well as exceptional photographic technique. The winner of this year’s Epson Digital Art Prize went to The Rugby Players shot by Preeti and Prashant Chacko, a couple from India who produced a stunning image of southern white rhinos in their natural habitat at the Solio Game Reserve in Kenya.
The Epson International Pano Awards is the world’s largest competition dedicated to panoramic photography and Epson Australia is the main sponsor alongside Epson Southeast Asia. Its reputation rests on a format that demands more from a photographer than almost any other.
David Evans, Pano Awards founder and curator, says: “The popular addition of a new Aerial category this year in both the Open and Amateur competitions opened up so much of the world above tripod level and the panoramic format lends itself beautifully to this way of seeing. I look forward to watching how this category will evolve over coming years, as technology enables photographers to push their own boundaries and limits.”
Anyone interested in seeing the full gallery of 2026 winning and runner-up images can visit here .
