December P&S Reflections of Christmas

December_DSLR-Reflections of CHRISTmas

December Challenge

O.K. everyone here we go again, it is time to announce the next challenge. Remember that we now have the entire month to post an image for the challenge. It is now time to judge the entries for Nov. If you have not already voted don't forget to choose your favorite DSLR and your Favorite point & shoot image and put the word VOTE in the comment section. Please try to vote by Dec. 8th so that I can announce the winners. Now to this months challenge. Well it is December and that means it is Reflections of Christmas" so let me see your best photo of "Reflections of Christmas" .

Photoman

Welcome to the newest photogs Lucille and Dawn, and Michelle from Nov.

November_P&S_Wildlife

Noveber P&S Round- new one

It may be a stretch for round I don't know, but my bubbles didn't turn out too well. This is my actual post.

November_P&S_Round

An Extension

I am granting an extension to the challenge well to be honest, I am going to extend all challenges for the entire length of the month. I just forgot to tell everyone. From now on all challenges will be for the length of the month. I will try to post the new challenge on the 1st of the month but if I forget, let me apologize ahead. Sorry, I may forget or get to busy. Also we have a new entrant who I just found out about and she has not been able to upload so I am publicly saying that I am granting the extension now to all. If you have already uploaded and would like to upload another you may. Only one entry though you will have to choose between the one you have now and the new one. So everyone has another 10 days. Happy shooting.

Photoman

Noveber P&S Round

Michelle

Michelle I just saw your comment, in order to submit an image I have to add you as an author. In order to add you as an author I need your email address. I will send you an invitation once you accept the invitation you will be able to submit images. You need to have a google account in order to join so if you don't already have one you will need to go to Google.com and sign up for a free account. Once you have done this you can accept the invitation. If you leave your email as a comment to this post I will send you an invite. No one will see your email besides me as I will not publish your comment so you can feel safe leaving your email address as a comment.

Photoman

November_DSLR_Round

November_DSLR_Round

Next months challenge!

Well I said that I would keep this challenge going so I am going to give it a try. I will only promise another 3 months after that I am not sure that I can do it any longer. I am leaving for Africa in January tentatively on the 29th and will be gone for 6 months God willing. So I may not be able to finish out the month of Jan. as I will be very busy with finalizing all of the details of the trip. I am not sure what I will do but I think I am going to find someone to run the challenge for me while I am gone. Who knows maybe I will have time to enter it while I am gone. I have decided that the challenge needs more competitors to make the challenge more interesting. So I am opening the challenge to those who shoot with any digital camera. I would like to keep the point and shoot images separate from the DSLR images. So those of you who use a DSLR will need to title your images as follows for each month November_DSLR_Wildlife if you are a point and shoot then you will need to title your images November_P&S_ Wildlife. November is the month of the Challenge, DSLR and P&S are the type of camera you use and Wildlife would be that months category. So for the month of November the challenge is Round. There you have it let me see your best rendition of Round. No stipulations other than it has to be shot between the 1st and the 20th of November.

Aplogies and Promises

I promise I will keep the challenge going if the person who commented anonymously will promise to continue to follow the blog and comment about the images. After reading my first response to their comments I realize that I came across a bit condescending and did not intend to. One thing I hate about the written word is that it often comes across harsh. It is often taken the wrong way, a voice fluctuates when a person speaks and adds life to the word said that a pen and paper often steal leaving the message cold and hard. I apologize for not reading my post before posting or maybe I could have tried to make myself not sound so cold.

Photoman

Anonymous

I appreciate that you take the time to follow the challenge and that you are close to two of the challenge participants. I did not mean to imply that I want you to stop commenting on the challenge, please do not. It is encouraging to see that people are following the challenge who are not participants. So feel free to comment in the future if the challenge continues to exist. I will make a decision soon as to the future of the challenge.

Photoman

Anonymous Response to last post

So I had 2 quick responses from the 2 photographers who are here each month submitting images for the challenge and I have added their responses to the end of the post for all to read. I have also received an anonymous response from someone who is very familiar to the workings of the challenge who feels it is imperative that the challenge continue. I am wondering why this is so important to them if they are not ones who participate on a regular basis. Please no anonymous responses to my last post. If the blog is important to you I would like you to share your identity otherwise your comment does not hold much sway in my decision to concerning the future of the challenge. If you would like make yourself known I will post your response along with the others.

Photoman

Decision Time

I started this blog (A Photographic Challenge) hoping to be able to have many people take part in the monthly photography challenge. It has been 9 months now and I have 13 different photographers who have agreed to participate in the challenge each month. So far, I have had only 2 photographers take part in the challenge on a regular basis (I have to admit that even I don't take part every month). I am a little disappointed that the challenge is not doing better and I need to make a decision regarding the future of the challenge. I would like to hear from the followers and participants of this blog as to why you think I should continue the challenge. So, if you have any interest in the challenge please respond to this message. I would like to have more participants each month to make the challenge seem worthwhile and credible.

Sincerely,

Photoman

Pitland says:

I must admit I to am a little bit disappointed in the lack of participation. I enjoy and like it because it keeps me focused and I learn so much from the challenges. I have learned a lot of new skills. I hope we can keep it going.

Mr. Bryce says:

I agree with Earl, it is disappointing. I think there was more participation when we had judges. I also have learned a great deal about my camera, and has forced me to think "outside the box" with photography.Would there be any way to have judges again?

SelfPortrait

Music

Self Portrait

Music

Music

Check Out the Links

I just added some links to some interesting sights. Check them out when you get a chance, a lot of good info about photography.

Photoman

August winner?

Well it looks like I am not going to be able to call a winner for August until some of you vote. I voted and Joe voted but I think that is it so far. There is no way to declare a winner as so far there are no images with more than 1 vote each. Therefor I am going to go ahead and decide a topic for this months theme. The winner will get to choose the next months competition. So if you have not voted get to it you slackers you. Sorry I guess I am a slacker as well, I did vote but I didn't make the time to go out and shoot in August so I am a slacker also. I Hope to not be a slacker in the coming months. O.K. the theme for the month of September is Music. Let your imagination bring music to your eyes and capture it with your camera. Wow that was hokey but I don't care.

Since we didn't have a lot of entries for last months artistic challenge I am going to once again post a 2nd challenge. I am going to do a different theme for the artistic challenge this month. September's artistic challenge theme is Self Portrait. So get out there and get a shot of yourself fix it up in Photoshop or whatever program you like and submit it to the challenge.

Remember above all else just have fun while learning about photography, that is the reason I started this challenge.

Photoman

Fast Lane

Original:



Artistic:

Joe's Secondary Challenge

I had lots of fun with this! Glad I could enter this challenge. Thanks!

Artistic Endeavor

Life in the Fast Lane

Chicago

And the winner is.....

Earl Pitman congratulations Earl.

Earl chose the theme for August and I think he chose well, this will be a challenging and fun theme. So get off the sofa and go out and shoot "Life in the Fast Lane". Yep the theme is
Life in the Fast Lane.

Also for the month of August I am giving another challenge for this new challenge the rules are simple. Using the theme Life in the Fast Lane create a photographic piece of art. Here are the simple rules: 1. The piece must start out as one or more photographs that you took with your camera between the 1st and the 20th of August 2. You can use photoshop or any other program you may own to create your piece 3. You must create the piece yourself. There are the simple rules this challenge is designed to allow you to show your artistic talents not just your ability to take great images. (Yes Joe, you can enter this challenge)

So 2 challenges this month both with the same theme Life in the Fast Lane. So all you slackers who have been neglecting the challenge get out of the slow lane and show us your rendition of
Life in the Fast Lane.

Joe's Photo

I know we are really supposed to email photoman our pics and then he will post them but I cant seem to remember or find that email address. I'm probably looking at it right now or something but any way here is my post. Not my favorite to say the least but its something I guess.

Uploading Images

I didn't receive any images from others to be uploaded this month. If you are trying to upload and are having trouble you can still email them to me, if they are a day or so late I will allow them. I am also available if you have questions about uploading.

Photoman

Red White & Blue Church Garden

I didn't shoot this image specifically for the challenge but while I was looking at the images that I did shoot I came across this one. I liked it better than any that I had set out to shoot so I am submitting it.

Photoman

Red, White, and Blue Food Coloring

Red White and Blue

Next Months Challenge

Well the judging has not quite been completed for this months challenge so I cannot call a winner yet, but I wanted to go ahead and let everyone know what next months challenge is. I also want to remind everyone to look at the new judging format and to take part in judging Junes challenge. As a result of not having a clear winner for July I am once again going to choose the next theme. July's theme is "Red White and Blue" .

Enjoy shooting, Photoman

Once again the Judges have dropped the ball.

O.K. I guess the judges have dropped the ball on us again, I made them aware that it was time to judge and they still neglected to make time to judge the images. I guess it is time to come up with a new judging system. So I have decided that starting now we will no longer rely on judges but will be self judged. I was hoping to have more photographers before we started self judging but I think we will have to give it a shot starting now. Here is how it will work. Each photographer can vote once and cannot vote for themselves. So after all of the images have been uploaded then the voting will start. We will maintain the same deadlines for uploading by midnight the 20th and the judging will start on the 22nd. That way if there are any late submissions due to electronic hiccups then I have 24 hours to get them uploaded. Starting next month each of you will be responsible for uploading your image, if you have questions as to how this is done feel free to call or email me. To vote just leave a comment for the image you like best, just type "vote" in the comment for the image you like. Votes cannot be left as anonymous, all anonymous votes will be deleted. All photographers may vote even if you do not submit an image you may still vote but your name must appear next to your vote. O.K. there are the voting guidelines lets see how this works for us. If you have read this then lets try it out for this months challenge. I will add the name of the photographers to the images that were submitted this month so you will know that I did not vote for myself.

Photoman

This image is submitted to late for the contest but I wanted it to be seen

Door & Doorways Entry 5

Judges,

I am allowing this image to be in the challenge even though it is late, due to a computer error. Please judge it also.

Photoman




Entry by Rodger Toothman

Door & Doorways Entry 4

Entry by Bryce Holland

Joe Franklin's June photo

A note to the judges,

Please feel free to leave feedback on this photo, however Joe is only doing the challenge for fun as he currently does not have the correct type of camera required for the challenge. I would also like to welcome Joe to the Challenge, I am glad that he has joined and I look forward to seeing his images each month.

Photoman


I had a lot of fun with doors and doorways. Hope you all did too!

Joe

Doors & Doorways Entry 3

Entry by Photoman

Doors & Doorways Entry 2

Entry by Saralee Lenhart

Doors & Doorways Entry 1

Entry by Brandon Lenhart

June's Challenge

Well last months challenge was kind of a bust, I must say that I am a little disappointed that only one person attempted the challenge. I cannot say much though as I didn't participate either. Lets not have a repeat in June, there are 12 photographers who have signed up for the challenge lets see if we can have at least 10 entries this month. Enough lecturing lets get to the challenge,
this months challenge is...........

Doors and Doorways

Good hunting everyone,

Photoman

No Judging Is Necessary This Month

I can officially congratulate Bryce Holland for winning this months challenge. I also want to give him extra cudos for being the only participant to accept the challenge this month. This challenge is my brainchild and I didn't even make the time to participate. We currently have 12 photographers who have signed up to be a part of the challenge and have a few more who have been invited but have not yet accepted their invitation. Hopefully this will be the last month that we have only 1 image submitted.

Entry 1

A Reminder

Just a reminder as we have some new photographers that have joined recently, this months challenge theme is PATHS AND PASSAGES. Good luck and happy shooting the deadline is the 20th at midnight.

A rule change!

I am going to allow images to be cropped but only to a square format. So your options are full frame just as it was shot or square frame keeping one side (the shorter duh) its original dimension and cropping the longer to match it. Please let me know if you have any questions about this change. This rule as all rules are subject to change at any time as needed as the challenge grows. A quick reminder, you are allowed to make minor changes in Photoshop to your image, if you are able to make the adjustments in your camera then you are allowed to make them in Photoshop (or whatever software you use to manipulate your images) but only minor adjustments please.

Photoman

Welcome to the new photographers.

I would like to welcome David Nicely a co competitor of Shoot the Hills and Scott Huck the Staff Photographer of Cedarville University to the Challenge. I will also say that I have extended an invitation to 2 other photographers but they have not joined yet. These 2 additional photographers brings us to a total of 11 photographers to date. I also want each of you to know that you are welcome to invite other photographers to join the challenge. Just let me know and I will give them an official invite.

Photoman

And the Winner is......

Congratulations Jeff West you are the winner for the month of April. I must apologize to all that the judging was so late. I am not sure what happened and therefor I am rethinking how to make this work better. Until I can come up with a better plan we are going to be status quoe with the judges that I have in place. As a result of the late notice of the winner I am going to choose May's theme. For the month of May our theme is Paths or Passages happy hunting and shoot well. I really hope more of you can participate this month.

Photoman

Another Entry

I know it's past the due date, however, if Gary is gonna extend the deadline, and this was taken only 3 days after the deadline, I'd thought I'd give it a shot.... (now that Gary is having a heart attach, I'm just kidding. This image is just for viewing pleasure!)

My Apologies

I am not quite sure what happened to my judges this month but for some reason they all forgot to judge the competition. I am trying to get it done and if it doesn't happen tomorrow I will just have to extend the deadline for this month.

Reflections photo entry

Reflections photo entry

Reflections photo entry

Reflections photo entry

April's Challenge

Well once again congrats to Bryce for his image of the flower in the road image. Bryce chose the challenge for April. So everyone needs to start looking for REFLECTIONS, not just any reflections though. Your reflection must include water in some form as a part of the image. So you have about 3 days to start thinking of your idea for next months challenge. I will remind you that you cannot shoot the image before April 1st and it must be uploaded or emailed to me before April 21st. So good hunting gals and guys, I am looking for more photographers if you know someone who shoots with a digital slr that would like to join let me know.

Photoman

And the winner is.....

The Scores are Entry 6 - 69 points, Entry 5 - 69 points, Entry 4 - 74 points, Entry 3 - 65 points, Entry 2 - 65 points and Entry 1 - 79 points.

So the winner is Entry #1 by Bryce Holland with 79 points, way to go Bryce nice shot. Bryce will choose from a list of themes for next months theme. I will post the new theme as soon as I get an answer from Bryce.

Don't forget to take a shot at judging an image from one of our Judges, this judge learned real quick just how dificult this months challenge was. Be nice but rate the image honestly on the same things we are rated on.

Photoman

Roadside Distraction

I will have the winner posted shortly, I just found out that judge #3 has sent me their scores via email instead of uploading them directly so I will post their scores soon and name the winner as well.

Photoman

From a Judge - Roadside Distraction

O.K. Photographers here is an image from one of the judges it is this judges idea of a roadside distraction. Here is your turn to critique the judges. So be nice but be honest and tell this judge what you think of their image as it relates to this months competition.



Photoman

Entry 6

Judges and photographers, I am allowing this entry to go up late as it is my fault. It was sent to me yesterday and I didn't upload it. I was having trouble with my email and I got a phone call today from the photographer asking why their photograph wasn't up. I apologize for my error.

Entry 5

Entry 4

Entry 3

Entry 2

Entry 1

Reminder of the rules!

I am sorry that I have not said anything sooner and that some of you have done this for both challenges now, but I need to stop it now before it becomes an issue. This was brought up to me by one of the judges and it is a clear violation of the rules. I am sure that it was overlooked as I had to reread the rules to be sure that it was a rule. First let me talk about another issue that will be dealt with later, the rules state that each of the images must be uploaded anonymously and that I would give each of you a unique id to use to upload your images so that know one would know who's images are who's. I have not given anyone a unique id and I don't intend to at this time but if you guys think it would be best, we can go this route sooner than later. That is the best way to be anonymous, this however is not the rule in question but it will have to be dealt with soon I am sure. The rule that is in question I will be starting to enforce during March's challenge. The rule states that the images must be uploaded without any words of description and no names or titles. I will start enforcing this rule based on the fact that I feel that the image must speak for itself. Any person viewing your image should be able to understand the theme just from looking at the image. Sorry if this sounds harsh but if your image needs a description to express the theme then it probably shouldn't be entered. The idea of this challenge is to make us as photographers really think about our image and use the camera to capture the theme.

O.K. guys let me say that the judging was a bit messed up this month, I don't know if I didn't make myself clear enough or what. I am able to announce a winner even though all the judges didn't judge everyone. One of us had a perfect score from all of the judges. Therefore there is no way the rest of us can beat him. So Congratulations go to Jeff West this month for his image of the guy with the bad habit and messy hair. By the way Jeff is also the model in his image, sort of a self portrait I guess. All kidding aside it was a great image and when I first saw it I knew that I wasn't going to win. Way to go Jeff, you get the bragging rights for the next month and you get to name the next challenge.

Before I tell what Jeff has decide on for the next challenge I would like to say welcome to 3 new photographers. They are being named in the order that they accepted their invitation to join. Welcome David Jackson, Todd Kuhns and Saralee Lenhart. It is no longer a male only competition guys we have a lady among us now. For you newbies the other 4 photographers are myself (Gary Phillips), Earl Pitman, Jeff West and Bryce Holland. So welcome and II look forward to seeing what images you will each come up with for the March Challenge.

O.K. the new challenge is Roadside Distractions. The rules for this post are the same as always and the rules that are specific to this challenge are as follows. First we mean literal roadside distractions not metaphorical ones, and you must include the road in your image not just the distraction. i.e. if your roadside distraction is on the highway you must include the highway in your image. That is it so good hunting everyone. A reminder to the newbies you must post your image by midnight the 20th, any image uploaded after that will not be judged.

Photoman - aka - Gary Phillips

For the Judges

I need to apologize to the judges, I forgot to tell them this last month so I am letting them know now. Sorry to drop the ball on you, if you have any questions please let me know.

Let me tell you how the judging will work. The judging board consists of 3 judges, who will have 7 days to judge the images and and email me with their results. I will then tally the results and post them for all to see, any discrepancies will be dealt with publicly on the blog so that everyone will know that I am not cheating. Rules for the judges - Rule #1 - All images must be judged by midnight on the 27th. Rule #2 - If a judge finds out who an image belongs to they cannot judge for that month and must let me know so that I can find an alternate judge for that months competition. Judging Criteria - (The basic criteria for each months competition will not change, some months there may be special criteria that the judges will be looking for.) There are 5 areas that each image will be judged for and 4 of the areas are worth a maximum of 5 points One area is worth 10 points, so a perfect score is 30 points. Areas of judging are 1. Composition - 5pts 2. Relevance to Topic 5 - pts 3. Artistic Expression 10 - pts 4. Focus 5 - pts and 5. Exposure 5 pts. As you can see the technical areas are worth less than the artistic area, I want you to push yourself to be more artistic than technical. But I also have it set up so that you cannot win it on artistic expression only. All images should be technically sound as well as artistic. These rules and criteria will be basic for each of the competitions, below you will find the Challenge for this month and any specific rules related to this months competition.

Photoman

Love in the Streets

This month's challenge made me think long and hard on how I would shoot this. My original plan was to compose another "oh, that's so sweet" shot. Well, I think God had a different plan.

I went with our Journalism class on their photoshoot for their next issue of The Spectrum; and would you know it, their theme is love! That got me to thinking. Jesus often demonstrated his unconditional love in unconventional ways, often in dirty environments. Think about it. The ten lepers would not have smelled or looked very nice when Jesus healed them!

So that is why I'm titling my entry "Love in the Streets." I'm pretty sure that you'll get it once you see it.

Unconditional Love

Unconditional Love

Unconditional Love

Private Fair stands proudly at the entrance to the Dayton VA Medical Center, as a never ending reminder, to all, of the Unconditional Love … given by the men and women who have served in the Military and in some cases made the ultimate sacrifice. Private Fair, we salute you all!

36 hours to go!

36 hours to get your images posted.

36 hours to go!

36 hours to get your images posted.

Unconditional Love...?!

This is a great twist to the ever long and sterotyped V-day crap. Gary, I think you've hit it head on! This is a tough one, and I look forward to seeing everybodies work!

Above all things, do this for our Lord, and then have fun doing it! Peace,
jeff

And the winner is.......

O.K. let me first apologize for the way the judging was handled. At the beginning of the challenge I set up guidelines for the judging but then when it came time for the judging I forgot to tell the judges the guidelines. So the judging was not done on a point basis as I had planned. I also want to apologize if you think the judging was a bit harsh. I wasn't going to allow the judges to post critiques but then I decide that it was good for us to hear what other people think when they see our images so I allowed the critiques to remain a part of the judging process. Please try and take the criticism with a spirit of grace and meekness. The 3rd judge in particular was a bit harsh but I felt that the judges remarks are what you would expect in a true photography competition with open professional judges. That said I am going to instruct all of the judges to tone it down a bit in the future. My intention for this blog is for it to help us learn about photography and our cameras so that we will be better photographers. If I don't allow critiques from the judges we will not learn how to compose our images better in the future.

That said I will now explain the way I chose the winner for this months challenge. I had 3 judges judge each of the images 1st through 4th place. Each image was awarded a place by each judge. 1st place = 4 pts, 2nd place = 3 pts, 3rd place = 2 pts and 4th place = 1 pt. So for instance if an image received 1 1st place vote and 2 3rd place votes the total scores would be 8 points. The image that scores the most points will be the winner for this months challenge.

4th place winner = Eyes of Time with 5 points by Earl Pitman
3rd place winner = Elowen with 6 points by Bryce Holland
2nd place winner = Brown Eyes with 8 points by Jeff West
1st place winner = Eyes with 9 points by Gary Phillips

Winner of the challenge wins the opportunity to pick the theme for an upcoming challenge and bragging rights for the next month.

Next month is the month of Valentines day so I thought it would be appropriate for the theme to relate to love, but I wanted to narrow our focus a bit so instead of just saying the theme is love I decided that the theme for February will be "UNCONDITIONAL LOVE". I gave you a head start but the image still has to be shot on or after Feb 1st and on or before Feb 20th.

Congratulations to everyone but I really want to get more people involved. I would like to see about 10 photographers by March. I want everyone to try and invite one other photographer to participate and have them signed up by March 1st.

Photoman

Brown Eyes

Here is an image by the remaining participant of this months competition. I sure hope we can get some more people to get involved. Rodger is still having trouble with his email account and has not been able to accept my invitation and he didn't even know until a day so ago what the topic was for this month. He was supposed to try and email me the image so that I could upload his as well but I never received them. So it looks like just four of us this month. Judging starts in 45 minutes. Good luck, I think I will probably post the next challenge tomorrow sometime so we will have more time to work on the next competition. I hope you all had fun submit some of your ideas for topics and I will try to rotate in some of your ideas as well.

Photoman

Eyes of time

Eyes that have seen 90 years of joy and sorrow but can still look with excitement to the future. Smile on Ruth (her Eyes reflect her beautiful smile)