Photo Challenge: LEADING LINES

This month's challenge is "Leading Lines." The challenge reads: There are many lines to look for when shooting your images...Vertical, horizontal diagonal, curves & "S" curves...even converging lines. You have a month to post your image on your blog, and leave your link/url in the comment section of the challenge blog. Well, here are three photos that use leading lines to lead the viewer into the photo. Be sure to check out the other entries at Blogger's Community Photo Challenge! The first photo is from Newport, Rhode Island, taken along the 10 mile Ocean Drive. The second photo is one of the wonderful views of Manhattan from Governor's Island. The last photo is from one of my favorite locations...Sandy Hook.

Current Challenge - Colors of Autumn

Marie posted the current challenge back in the middle of October and, of course, we chose an Autumn theme for it. Rather than grabbing local color, I waited until I was able to go to Newport, Rhode Island (this year's fall color trip for my husband and me). The following are three photos taken on that trip. Hope you enjoy!

Rule of Thirds Contest

Well...it was a real surprise and honor to be selected as the winner in the Rule of Thirds Contest on our Bloggers Community Photo Challenge! Thanks to all who voted for my image. I realized after posting the other two examples for this subject that it was to be a secret vote, so I sent Marie an entirely different photo. It really wasn't hard to do that, since I frequently compose my images using this rule of thirds. Sometimes I break it on purpose, but I have a lot of images that conform to the Rule. Here's my 'winning' photo, entitled SECRET GARDEN:



Here's what Marie wrote in the Challenge Blog:

"Vicki 's Secret Garden is our winner. None of the team members were involved with this contest. That is why I had everyone send me their images & votes. Thank you all who participated & voted!

We will still post helpful photography tips, so you may still get alerts from the challenge blog.

Check out our future topics on the sidebar.

Enjoy your summer & take plenty of pics.

Congratulations Vicki!Here is a helpful link on composition: http://www.johnharveyphoto.com/LearnComposition/"

I would like to wish everyone happy shooting this summer...and be sure to keep the topics in mind when you're out and about with your cameras.~Vicki

Bloggers Community Photo Challenge: RULE OF THIRD CONTEST

This is a fun way to learn about photography...one of the fundamental rules (and one of the main one that can be broken with great results once you've mastered it) is the Rule of Thirds. It's more of a suggestion than an actual rule, but is something that's very important for photographers to understand. There are also some 'rules' for this contest:

1. All images will be a certain size 72 DPI 4X6(432 pixels X 288 Pixels) Try to get as close as you can, no larger.

2. No watermarks, signatures or copyrights symbols on photos.

3. To submit,you must send a copy of your image to me @ Mariebm56@aol.com & I will add all photos to a post. Please label the subject area - Challenge Contest. Days to submit photos JUNE 10 & 11th only. We should have the voting on the 13 & 14th.

4. Our team members/judges will decide which best follow the challenge & also include good photographic qualities.(sharpness, contrast, color or B&W)Once our team makes the final selection, we will leave it up to our community to vote on the winner.

I'm sending one of the images below to Marie for the contest...want to guess which one? :)

Blogger Community Photo Challenge: FLOWERS

The last challenge before the summer break is Flowers. To visit the Challenge Blog and the links to all the other entries, click on the banner below:

Blogger Community Photo Challenge: PHOTO STORY

The Current Challenge is to create a Photo Story of related images. I probably have a ton of photos I could use, but lately I've been focusing (no pun intended) on Sandy Hook, part of the Gateway National Park System, and absolutely love taking different angles and types of photos of the lighthouse...so, my entry is a series of photos of the Sandy Hook Lighthouse. I'm not sure if it qualifies, but I love it. Click on the green banner above to go to the Challenge Blog and check out the other wonderful entries.

(Also, click on the collage below to view it larger.)

Blogger Community Photo Challenge: Tranquility

(click the banner to go to the Challenge and to view the other entries)

This week's challenge is "Tranquility"...a very ephemeral thing. It's not something you can describe in concrete words...it's a feeling more than anything else. Not everyone will agree with everyone else about what's tranquil, or at least the first thing to come to mind for one person will not be what a second person will think of right out of the box. I have a ton of photos that I consider tranquil, but this is one of my newest, so I thought I'd use it. It's a photo of a wildlife viewing area on Sandy Hook, part of the Gateway National Park System--a wonderful place for viewing wading birds. Hope others find it as tranquil as I do.



The same day, I took the following photograph. I always find flowers a tranquil subject...this is no exception:

Tulips on a Hill

The skies have mostly been gray here, which kind of matched my frame of mind. For those of you who don't know, I lost one of my sisters a couple of weeks ago and then, on top of that sadness, ended up with a sore throat/fever/headaches/etc. The weather here has mostly matched how I was feeling. Last Friday, the sun came out and the day was glorious. I grabbed my camera (my NEW 40D--another long story) and headed to my favorite garden spot to check out the tulips. It was late in the day and I was able to get some great photos of the flowers with great light. This is just one of the many images I captured that day. I guess I'm coming out of my funk.

Blogger Community Photo Challenge: Birdhouses

Thought I'd be really pro-active this week and post my photo at the beginning of the challenge, instead of at the very end just under the wire. I just got some new plug-ins for photoshop and decided this would be a great chance to play with them. I took a photo that wasn't the best one and tried to make it better using onOne's PhotoTools2 and PhotoFrames4. I think the photo turned out nicely...so am anxious to use it on a photo that starts out as a good one. :) Here's my entry for "Birdhouses:"

Blogger Community Photo Challenge: Winter

(click the banner to go to the challenge, read the rules and see all the entries)

Winter in NJ can be snowy one year and clear and warm the next. This year, all the snow we've had is gone. More could come, but for now...nothing. This image is from earlier this winter when we actually had some of the white stuff softening our world.

Blogger Community Photo Challenge: Close Ups

The current challenge is Close ups...and I'm lucky that the Deep Cut Orchid Show took place last week at a location very near me. I went there three out of the four days it ran and had a lot of fun shooting the orchids. They are such weird flowers--some look like faces, some look like aliens...all are beautiful! Here are a sampling of some of my shots with my macro lens. Hope you enjoy...

Hearts Challenge

The Bloggers' Community Challenge "Hearts" is in progress. It's just for fun, no voting on this one. To check out the information for this challenge, and to see the other entries, click on the banner below:



My entry below was taken in St. Augustine, Florida. These flowers were growing in the courtyard of the bed & breakfast where we stayed, and they really did look like there were hearts in the flowers.

Hearts 'n Flowers

Blogger's Community Photo Challenge: Still Life

The current challenge (which ends tonight) is Still Life. This is definitely not my favorite type of photography...in fact, it's probably near the bottom of the list. Here's one of my few attempts at shooting still lifes...

Be sure to click on the banner to check out the other entries for this challenge and/or to enter an image yourself. Happy Shooting!