[Click on each image above to see it larger and to see the rest of the photos in 鈥.鈥漖
Wow! What a great Soaring Sixteen set of matchups. Thanks to everyone who played. Now we鈥檙e on to the Egret Eight, where the winners of the previous rounds will compete for a chance at our finals. Today it鈥檚 surfing bird versus eagles fighting mid-air, both from our gallery, 鈥溾 and winners of Matchup 1 and Matchup 2, respectively.
The top quartet will make it to the Feathered Four, then two onto the championship match. Our won the last first-round head-to-head.
For those of you just joining our game, each round we鈥檝e posted two entries from this year鈥檚 爆料公社 Magazine Photo Awards, in anticipation of announcing our official winners鈥攊t鈥檚 coming soon!鈥攕elected by our design director, Kevin Fisher, our photo editor, Lila Garnett, and publisher and editor-in-chief of Nature鈥檚 Best Photography magazine, Steve Freligh.
More than 1,300 of you chose the winners of our Soaring Sixteen matchups. The ultimate victor of Bird Madness will appear on , along with a story about how he or she captured the shot. Our Jan-Feb 2012 issue will feature the awards鈥 official winners.
Vote here! Voting for the first round of Egret Eight closes at the end of the day on Wednesday, Dec. 21. The next round starts on Thursday.