Photo.net Monthly Project

October 2009: Abstract

This month, let’s all stop chasing that “tack sharp” photo or striving for the perfect pose for a portrait. Why not try working with color and form instead? Abstract can mean many things, out of focus, blurry, blocks of color, shadows of light and dark, the door is open to just about anything.

September 2009: Outdoor Flash

Flashes aren’t just for dark rooms and photography studios. Using flash outside can really punch-up what might be an otherwise boring photo. They can make colors pop and can fill in shadows caused by strong sunlight. Head out with your flash and see what you can come up with.

August 2009: Cell Phone Photos

This month’s project is just to shoot a photo with your cell phone camera. These cameras are often low quality, have little in the way of camera controls, and are unpredictable and fuzzy at best. But that’s part of the fun. You don’t need $5000 worth of cameras to make an interesting photo. Why not try using something you’ve probably got in your pocket or purse anyway?

July 2009: Global Moment

The purpose of this project is to get a group of photographers from across the world at approximately the same moment. This project isn’t a stickler for shooting at the same exact second, and long exposures are supported (and encouraged). However, try to start your exposure as close to 3:00 UTC/GMT as possible.

June 2009: Love and Marriage

It’s time for the yearly photo.net homage to the grand adventure that is love and marriage.

June is the month of weddings for many communities around the world. While most people will never have any interest in being a professional wedding photographer, weddings can offer amazing opportunities for interesting photography. So if you are going to a wedding this month, bring along your camera and see what images you can discover. Not going to a wedding this month? Don’t worry about it, show us your best “love” themed image.

May 2009: Slow Water

Moving water is a very difficult thing to photograph in a way that captures reality. That is because a photograph can never recreate the way that water looks when it is moving. However, one method that people have long used is to leave the shutter open for a long time and let the water become all blurry and smooth. No, it doesn’t look at all how moving water actually looks. But what it does do is evoke the feeling of moving water for many people.

April 2009: Panoramic

A panoramic image is one that is significantly longer in one dimension than another. To say it another way, a panoramic image is a long rectangle. While there is no set definition for what aspect ratio defines an image as panoramic or not, I would wager a guess that for many people an image needs to be at least twice as long on one side vs the other (an aspect ratio of 2:1) before they would call it “panoramic”.

March 2009: Repetition

When searching for scenes that could make a strong image, one of the best places to start can often be to look for repeating subjects that make a pattern. You will often hear photography instructors say things like “patterns bring a sense of order and rhythm to an image”. I’m not sure how true that is, it’s a bit “metaphysical” for my taste. But I do know that the human eye generally enjoys a good pattern.

February 2009: Window Light

Window light is some of the best lighting in the world. It is soft, it’s magical, and best of all, it is free. Find a scene lit only by window light and see what you can do with it. Take a portrait by window light. Or just let the light wash over a classic “bowl of fruit” still life. No matter what, you will learn why photographers have been relying on window light for years to create beautiful images. This project is a repeat of one of the projects from last year. But it’s such an important aspect of photography that I thought it was worthy of doing again.

January 2009: Urban Images

Cities are big these days. Packed with people, cars, buildings, and noise. Everything moves so quickly that half of my memories of being ‘in the city’ are a nothing more than blur. That’s why I try to come back from every visit with at least one photo of something I had to slow down to see, something I wouldn’t have noticed if I had just kept on rushing around. If you’ve never looked for beauty beneath the dirt of the city, why not make it your photo project for this month.

December 2008: Animals and Their People

This month how about some photos of animals and their humans?

Why do we take so many photos of our pets? Probably because they are always around, never yell at us about a bad hair day, and don’t mind the extra attention.

November 2008: Hip to be Square

No fancy techniques. No required subjects. Just a cropping decision. Shoot square, crop square, I don’t care. No, I don’t care.

The photography world is dominated by rectangles. How about some love for our friend the square? (Yes, math geeks, I realize that a square is technically a rectangle.)

October 2008: Bounce Flash

Everyone knows that direct “on-camera” flash is harsh and unflattering in almost every situation. The light source is too small and too close to the subject to give anything other than harsh light. But what to do about it? After all, you can’t carry around a 2×3ft softbox with you everywhere you go. The answer is right above you.

September ‘08: ‘For Sale’ Theme

Nothing fancy this month. No wacked out techniques or crazy schemes. Just a simple theme: “For Sale”. Find something, anything, that is being sold and take a photograph. Bonus points for funny signs or weird locations. Go to it!

August ‘08: Hands At Work

Sometimes the best way to show something is to break it down into its most simple aspect. When showing someone at work, I find that a great way to do this is to tightly focus on what their hands are doing. Hands at work can be a fascinating way to create a portrait of a person.

July ‘08: Macro and the World of Tiny Things

A lot of photographers go through phases when they are uninspired with their usual subjects. No matter how excited you usually are about weddings or portraits or sports or even photos if your pets, you can run out of ideas and interest from time to time. One of my favorite ways to combat those uninspired times is to make the switch to macro. I pull out my macro lens, or a digital camera with a macro-mode, and concentrate on finding the small treasures that we miss in our every day life. There are millions of interesting subjects in this “World of Tiny Things” and it is easy to create images that are completely new to you.

June ‘08 v2: Love and Marriage

June is the month of weddings for many communities around the world. While most people will never have any interest in being a professional wedding photographer, weddings can offer amazing opportunities for interesting photography. So if you are going to a wedding this month, bring along your camera and see what images you can discover. Not going to a wedding this month? Don’t worry about it, show us your best “love” themed image.

June ‘08: Stopping Motion

One of the most wonderful aspects of photography is that we can freeze for eternity a moment that would have otherwise passed in the blink of an eye. Giving us insight into the world we never otherwise would get to see. Try going out and using a high shutter speed (or electronic flash) to stop motion completely. Use your camera to show the world something it never could have seen otherwise.

May ‘08: Slow Shutter Speeds

For many people, photography is all about freezing a moment of time. 1/30, 1/500, or even 1/8000 of a second. But what about the power of capturing 1/4, 1/2, or even 5 whole seconds of time? Slow shutter speeds give photographers a world of creative opportunities. Huge depth of field with small apertures for landscape photography, smooth flowing water in a image of a stream, or light streaks left by dragging the shutter when handholding, all are interesting techniques made possible by slow shutter speeds.

April ‘08: Global Moment

The April ‘08 project is a global collaboration between photo.net members. First mentioned by Tero Pylkkanen and then promoted by Pete Millis, we are encouraging all photo.net members to try and take a photo at the same time across the globe. The time chosen was: April 5, 2008 at 15:00 UTC/GMT. Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the same as Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).

March ‘08: Window light

Window light is some of the best lighting in the world. It is soft, it’s magical, and best of all, it is free. Find a scene lit only by window light and see what you can do with it. Take a portrait by window light. Or just let the light wash over a classic “bowl of fruit” still life. No matter what, you will learn why photographers have been relying on window light for years to create beautiful images. User images were posted to a thread in the “No Words” forum for this project.