Picture This

Trains are an ever-popular photography subject but we didn’t want to limit this assignment to just one mode of transportation. Instead, we decided to do a riff on the Christmas movie classic “Planes, Trains and Automobiles” and let readers decide which speedy subject they wanted to shoot. We weren’t, necessarily, looking for action shots of these vehicles for this assignment but adding an element of motion in your images did not hurt. 

Despite all the advancements in imaging—including the advent of color and the now dominance of digital—there’s something about classic black-and-white photography that will never go out of style. That’s not to say that just because a photo has been shot or converted to monochrome it’s guaranteed to be a great photo. The choice to go black and white must have some meaningful relationship to the subject matter or scene to be effective. For this assignment, we asked readers to submit their best black-and-white photos that use the dramatic impact of monochrome in a powerful way. Our six favorite images here certainly show just that.

Fine art photography is a broad category of imagery that can include landscapes, cityscapes, macros, wide angles, long exposures, abstracts, portraits, nudes, semi-nudes, black and whites, color photos, surreal photos, hyperreal photos, nature photos, and on and on and on. But what we were looking for with this assignment were simply beautiful or striking images that showed your vision as a photographer. 

Without a doubt, the most popular images on the Internet (aside from cat photos) are of sunrises and sunsets. What is it about these daily acts of nature that so inspire us? It’s hard to say but easy to see. 

Long a favorite photo subject of Shutterbug readers, this month’s assignment was your chance to share all your crazy, beautiful images of the world’s weather. We were looking for anything from lightning strikes to dust storms to deep powder to swirling tornadoes (but not too close!). 

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.