But the images I like the most came right after this assignment.

When we were done and they went to have lunch I was walking home and saw this artist preparing to reproduce by drawing a local church on paper.

© Luca Fazzolari

After asking if it was ok for her I set up the camera and waited for the right moment.

While I framed instinctively once viewing the results at home I was surprised to see how everything felt in its place on its own in particular the reflection for the drawing sheep of paper on her face and the umbrella used to avoid sitting on the wet ground that frames the subject.

I did appreciate also the taste in choosing colours and on how these matched the rest of the background.

The main challenge has been waiting for people to go away from the background and for the artist to forget that I was there and regaining her concentration on the drawing itself.

This is an examples of how interesting could be life in a city without cars, in most other places I would have been either on one or it could have been impossible to set the tripod on their way.

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Luca Fazzolari is a portrait photographer working in Venice: couples in honeymoon, weddings and holidays.

Website: http://www.photographervenice.com

© Stephanie Laird

I personally love high impact images and that is my usual goal. When I first started getting interested in photography my images were, well, boring and very ordinary. I was introduced to Adobe Photoshop Elements and that little program absolutely changed my take on photography. I became hooked on Elements and have had some wonderful experiences since learning this program. The only thing it can’t do for you is eliminate the occasional creative block that I think we have all have suffered at one time or another.

© Stephanie Laird

The “pushing through” process produces many images that I probably will not be submitting to anyone one for consideration for fine art or greeting cards but if you stick with it long enough, the grove comes back and all of sudden you get an image that is “Yeah, I can live with this one!”. Then low and behold you start to feel the magic that you use to feel come back. All I can say, is if you feel that your creativity has dried up, don’t give up. I lost two years of creating just because it wasn’t coming as easy to me as it once did. Some of my most successful pics were creating trying to get out of my creative rut! Stick with it, it will return!

© Stephanie Laird

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Stephanie Laird licenses her images as fine art and greeting cards. She has won many competitions and has many publishings to her credit. She has written 3 tutorials on editing with Adobe Photoshop Elements to help people that want to focus on the more creative side of photo editing.

Website: http://www.stephanielaird.com/

© Kavitha Subramaniam

Sitting on a fixed seat that’s perched on an elephant is all well and good, but there comes a moment when the Mowgli in you just wants to jump up and sit upfront with your legs behind its ears – wild and carefree. And boy, was it amazing! Nothing beats the feeling of Kamdi’s ears flapping against my legs as she made her way through seemingly impossible routes.
As I was taking a back seat to my friend’s adventure up front, I decided to focus on how her hands looked against Kamdi’s hard skin. It seemed to resonate with me; here is this amazingly strong creature, yet she’s so fragile. After all, we were instructing her where to go, which way to turn and when it was time to eat. When I think about it now, I do feel a little sad for Kamdi. But at that very moment, all I felt was love and respect for this beautiful creature.

© Kavitha Subramaniam

I’m just glad that Kamdi is in good hands with the lovely people at the elephant camp. It was a joy talking to her and feeding her loads of sugar cane. Just being in her presence was an experience I’ll never forget. For a short moment, we were both creatures connecting in a foreign land. I hope she felt the same way too.

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Kavitha is an amateur photographer who loves to travel and connect with the local folks.

Website: http://www.flickr.com/photos/redbohemia/

© Brian Parillo

It’s Sunday, nobody will care. I quickly change my lens and I feel like I’m in a race. What am racing for? Light usually and cloud positioning. These poor buildings. They must feel like I’m paparazzi when I show up because I really do want to invade them in every way. So out of my car I go as I begin staring up at these giants. It amazes me every time. I walk around them for a while and try to find something that looks different to me. Something that gives these enormous slabs of concrete a voice. I can imagine what I must look like to the average passerby.

© Brian Parillo

Lying in the middle of the street on my back or standing on some ledge must look fairly ridiculous. However, when I find a moment that truly speaks to me everything slowly goes to silent. The only thing I hear, which I ignore for as long as I can, is the security guard who is quickly walking toward me shouting “Sir, excuse me, Sir excuse me,! Excuse me!” Here’s where things get a little hairy. I’ve almost got my shot and he’s getting really close to ending this for me. I open up a little wider on my focal length, drop my camera speed one stop as the sun tucks behind a cloud, and I start shuttering away. “Excuse me Sir”, I hear again for the last time as I pull my camera down from my face. “Hi,” I say as politely as possible. “You can’t take pictures here,” he says as I ponder the idea of that phrase being my epitaph. “Oh you can’t?” “Okay sorry, take care.”

© Brian Parillo

As I get in my car I quickly review my shots. No, no , no, no, no, maybe, maybe, possibly but the light is a little to hot on the top portion of the far building in this shot. I may be able to save it in post. I start my car and off to the next location. I’ve always felt like some refugee on the run while stalking these buildings. It feels a bit sin city like down here and I’m enjoying every minute of it.

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I’ve been shooting architecture for quite a few years now. I choose to shoot in black and white mainly because it extenuates the lines of a building and because it separates the elements of the photograph resulting in a more clean and efficient look. It also creates a feeling as if you’re being dropped into a mysterious abstract world. I see integrity, elegance, strength and vulnerability in black and whites and I try to carry those emotions into my shots as well.

Website: www.brianparillophotography.com

© David Julian

On this Sep­tember morning, there were probably forty people within a hundred feet of me near the base of the ever- popular Haystack rock, so I chose to move in closer to nature and leave the people out of frame. It’s easy to reach these multi- hued Ochre Sea Stars at low tides, but a challenge to find an unpop­ulated com­po­sition that really comes to life. I wanted to show the habitat more than to focus in on the animals them­selves, which I would make detailed por­traits of later. I also made a gallant effort not to step on the anemones, mussels and tiny crabs covering the area. I must have looked like a strange clown balance- stepping toe- to- toe with the extended tripod legs held high over my head.

Once I found the perfect com­po­sition, I mounted my SLR and a Canon 17- 40mm wide zoom, com­posing half my frame with the starfish grouping and half with the landscape and shoreline. The warm morning sun lit my fore­ground perfectly. Timing was important as incoming tidal waves swirled in and around my sinking tripod legs at staggered intervals, causing a shift in its position. I stopped my lens down to f16 so I would have a sharp enough back­ground to show the nur­turing sea and landscape’s details. A slow exposure allowed me to soften the receding waters leaving a reflected sky. The result was a pleasing description of animals in their environment.

But I was not finished telling the story of this amazing place, because it is acces­si­bility that allows us to see the colorful creatures of this envi­ronment and make our con­nection to them. My next task was to show the starfish and the people in an imag­i­native way. I put my camera in my bag and strolled along the tide pools noting how people viewed the uniquely accessible offerings of undersea nature in their path.

© David Julian

Once I had a feel for their behavior, I set out to reverse the typical pho­tograph of people watching nature. Instead, I put my camera’s point of view as close to the starfish as possible, and let the people become the back­ground. This technique worked per­fectly, and put the emphasis on the natural history of this location rather than our occu­pation of it.

Next time you are out in the world shooting nature, macros landscapes, try an exercise of thinking of the idea or story before the compositions, and you will be more deeply linked to your subject. From there, I believe your perspective and compositions will reveal themselves naturally.

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Photographer/Educator David Julian teaches creative workshops across the US, and offers screen-shared online custom learning.

Website: http://davidjulian.com

© Andrew Prezioso

This is actually not the photo I wanted to get. When I was walking back to get my camera after dinner/buying bottled water for the next day, I noticed the sky was golden. I wanted to get that photo; but by the time I was able to gather my equipment, it was too late to get the golden sky. By the time I got out there with my equipment, the sky had turned that pink/red/purple color. Regardless of the change in scenery, I knew the framing of the picture would be important. Obviously, taking just a picture of the sky is a boring photo. There was just something about the clock that I thought provided a terrific contrast between it and the sky.

© Andrew Prezioso

I fired a couple of frames of the scene, and was immediately pleased with the scene I was able to capture. Originally, the shot looking at the clock straight-on was my favorite, with its more vibrant colors. But recently, I liked the other one slightly better; the bird flying adds a nice touch to the photo. Also, behind the trees in the bottom left corner of the photo, you can see what look like storm clouds in the distance, rolling in. It also helps that the bird is flying away from the clouds, like it is trying to escape the storm.

Even though it was a fairly simple photo set-up, it is still one of my favorite non-sports shots.

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Andrew Prezioso is a senior journalism major at University of Richmond.

Website: http://amprezioso.smugmug.com/

© Colin Gallagher

The road into the valley looked pretty well-plowed, which worried me. I wanted fresh snow. Untouched. My fears were soon dispersed as we made a right onto a side road and clearly left our mark as the first ones there since the snowfall. A mile drive through snow drifts and sagging, snow-laden evergreens later, we pulled off next to a bridge. Strapping on the boots, I headed out into the woods towards the lovely stream cutting through it. The first few shots were nice, and served their purpose in getting my juices (and warm blood) flowing as I stepped carefully from rock to rock, trying to get a shot down the stream towards the bridge. The game of cat and mouse with the sun was growing frustrating, the dark midday shadows cutting harsh lines through most of my pictures.

Enter Solstice, my friend’s adorable dog.

Crashing through the trees off the right side of my shot, a few of the smaller, bare trees brushed up against the evergreens towering over them, sending dusty snow sprinkling down through the sunlight. And just then, a breeze blew through. From the very tops of the pines, snow crystals began raining down all around me. The light from the sun softened, glittering as the cloud of snow diffused the harsh rays. I stood there, mesmerized for a moment while I got a second helping of falling snow in my own little part of Poe Valley. Then I remembered something…

Push the button, Colin.

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Colin is a 27-year-old Bellefonte photographer from Pennsylvania. His uncanny ability to completely destroy any piece of lighting equipment that he touches continually drives him outdoors to capture the breathtaking scenes Mother Nature has to offer.

Website: http://colintgallagher.com

Now about this person, it would be very unfair to say that he is doing it because he can. No! He is doing it because he has to. So that he can feed his family. Employment is a major problem in India, and so people literally do/have to do anything to earn a meal. But we can clearly see that the job this person is doing is inhuman. The smallest mistake and he could get crushed under the weight. Or maybe even run-over by a car.

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Dipayan Bhattacharjee is a passionate Street & Portrait Photographer who loves to show posed beauty as well as candid truth.

Website: http://50mmstreettog.blogspot.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/xedmundian

© Nick Fancher

The other important element in this shoot was the location. It was shot at the historic Milo Arts center in Columbus, Ohio. I had been given a tour of the place a few months prior, and noticed the amazing attic. It was over one hundred years old, and looked untouched. So when I was planning the location of my shoot with Abigail, I thought her timeless look would fit well in that old space. I also borrowed my friend’s tilt-shift lens to further add to the old feeling. ” – Photographer Nick Fancher

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I identified with this image because of the contrast in the composition. It has a very cool color palette, yet rather than being distant, it’s engaging. The bright white light of the window behind Abigail increases the intensity of the image. Her gaze goes from engaging to hypnotizing. As I work with Nick and document his work, I am fascinated to break down the creative process, seeing every detail he puts in place as an artist. The creative process is something that isn’t often explored, and that’s what I hope to provide with my work.

That’s why I’m currently working on a feature-length documentary that will focus on Nick and his work, as well as two other great photographers – Andria Lindquist of Seattle, WA and Kim A. Thomas of San Francisco, CA. The documentary, titled “Portrait” is now funding on Kickstarter. It will explore the question: “In the age of Instagram, what sets a professional photographer apart?”

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Andy Newman is a freelance video producer, director of photography, and editor specializing in commercial, short form documentary, fashion and modeling videography.

Website: http://portraitdocumentary.com

This was an image that won me a Bronze Bar from The Guild of Photographers recently.

The building in the background is the historic Merchant Adventurers’ Hall, in the center of my hometown, York, which dates from 1357 and is a popular location for wedding ceremonies in the city. York is a very photogenic city generally, with many wonderful locations to photograph bride and grooms!

I positioned the couple on the left-hand third of the frame and then did a test shot for the ambient light, which at this point was fast disappearing. The ironic thing about shooting at dusk, is that if you want to capture the lighting that you see in front of you, you need to underexpose. This is because the sensor does its best to render everything it sees in front of it as if it was shot at two in the afternoon. I then used the pop up flash on my Canon 60D to trigger the Speedlite that Barry was holding, pointing into the umbrella at camera left. The pop up flash was used as a trigger only, and did not throw any light onto the scene. The Speedlite did a fantastic job of rendering Katy’s dress and didn’t need any compensation.

The image looked good straight out of the camera, but I took it a little further in Lightroom. I decided to darken down the background some more, so used the adjustment brush to reduce the exposure of pretty much everything except the couple and a patch of  lawn in front of them. Then there was just a trip into Photoshop to clone out an intrusive sign that was sticking out of the lawn to their right, and that was job done.

Vital statistics: Camera: Canon 60D with 17-55mm F2.8 lens, Canon 580EX Speedlite, manual exposure, F3.5, 1/100 sec, 1250 ISO, evaluative metering.

David Bellis is a professional portrait and wedding photographer in York, UK, a historic and photogenic city.

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Website: http://www.bellisweddingphoto.com/