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Photojournalism and documentary photography is a tough assignment but Shutterbug readers performed well by capturing gripping moments of real life. There are stories all around us just waiting to be told with our cameras and readers did a fine job telling theirs. For this assignment, we asked you to capture a scene or a situation that relayed a story without manipulation. We were looking for unstaged images that documented real life in a revealing way. Or to bend the old cliché, we were looking for pictures that were worth a thousand words. And we got them. Here are our 10 favorites.

Anyone who has walked the streets with a camera (or a smartphone) has witnessed scenes of everyday life that seem too good to pass up for a photograph. But how often do you stop and actually capture them? That’s the trick to great street photography: you’ve got to be ready and you need to have no fear of shooting candid images of people on the street, most times without their permission. But there’s another type of street shooting that can be a little less stressful and that’s urban landscape photography. For this assignment, we asked you to think of your town or city as an urbanized Grand Canyon and to look for unique angles and great lighting to capture the architecture and setting.

What makes a great travel photo? Many things, of course, but we’ve found the best images always tell some sort of story. For this assignment, we weren’t simply looking for pretty pictures from a vacation. Beautiful photos are all well and good but they’re a dime a dozen these days. Instead, we were seeking unique travel photos that included some interesting elements in the frame to give a sense of place or context. We wanted to imagine we were standing right beside the photographer, whether they were taking a photo on a dusty street in Marrakesh, or turning their camera toward a vast plain in Montana. While neither of those locales are featured in our 10 favorite images from readers, the places that are presented here look pretty awesome.

Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Ok, maybe not tigers this month but the other two made the cut in some of the winning photos for this assignment. Wildlife and nature are favorite subjects for Shutterbug readers and, as expected, we reviewed a ton of amazing images from readers in these categories. The tough part was narrowing it down to just six favorites but we think we’ve picked some fabulous images to spotlight here.

Each of my Web Profiles columns will now include suggestions on how to increase the number of people who not only visit your Web site or blog but want to come back for more. To provide real world examples, I’ll pick sites that put these tips into practice.

Every month, Shutterbug columnist Joe Farace chooses his favorite photography websites and online photo portfolios from readers. Here are four photo sites he thinks are a cut above.

Each month in this column I gather a collection of websites, sometimes with a loosely related theme. This month’s sites have little in common except an excellence of vision, proving they are not only most uncommon but the result of hard work.