The Photo Challenge

I have a very close friend that I love dearly. We both have a love for the outdoors and photography. Last week she challenged me to enter a photo on our state's Facebook page. The only reward was a mention on their Facebook page.

I accepted the challenge. Who doesn’t like a good challenge?

The challenge wasn’t between the two of us, it was us against them. “Them” being all of the other photographers that would submit photos. Maybe between the two of us, one of us would be selected.

The challenge was taking a photo from a hiking trail within our state, but the wording in the challenge also included walking trails. So out we go individually to get the winning photo.

I chose to take mine during the day after finishing my work and before dinner. I soon discovered this wasn’t as easy as I had anticipated.

I have been taking pictures for as long as I can remember. I believe the first thing I ever asked for at Christmas was a camera. I have had so many. Throughout the years I noticed that I don’t take too many bad pictures – at least I like them - until my latest camera.

My photos have been featured on the Travel channel, on posters, newspapers, and in various publications including the Smithsonian magazine.

When DSLRs came out I was one of the first to purchase one. At that time in my life I was considered an “early adopter” (buying technology when first introduced before it was popular). I had purchased a digital camera earlier -- 2.1 mg pixels which was quite advanced and costly at the time, far more expensive than my 35mm Canon film camera with changeable lenses.

My old DSLR had served me well. After taking 10s of thousands of pictures I found myself having a difficult time buying accessories such as a replacement for my remote control and camera battery. And the images didn’t seem as clear as before.

So I decided to upgrade. The new DSLRs now have an HD movie mode. I chose a Canon 7D so my old lenses would fit on the camera and purchased a new 18 - 200mm lens. The combination of the new camera and lens were an upgrade. Wonderful!

I went on a photo shoot with my new camera and all was well, except I didn’t see the improvement in the quality of the photos and the new camera took three times as much space as the old one, quickly filling up the card. It also weighted a ton and after three outings I developed tennis elbow.

I digress… Back to the challenge.

This past week was hot and extremely sunny. Not the best conditions for taking photos, but doable.

I went out several times to walking trails at local metroparks. Upon returning I wasn't happy with any of the photos of these trails. Overexposed. I ran into the same problem a couple of weeks earlier using a new fisheye lens in the same sunny conditions.

Was it me? Or was it the conditions? I didn't recall having difficulty taking photos on extremely sunny days with my old DSLR.

Why has this changed? What am I doing differently? So I start experimenting which made matters even worse. AV, TV, M, manual focus, auto focus, light meter inside the camera, light meter outside the camera, different filters, histogram. All this resulted in extreme confusion.

Hours with my photo editing software -- Lightroom and Photoshop -- examining photos with their settings didn’t result in a solution to the problem. But the same problem existed no matter what camera setting was used. Underexposed, overexposed, correctly exposed, down each stop, up each stop. The same problem existed – bright, washed out areas in the photo.

Was the camera broken? Was there something wrong with the lens?

Finally after taking hundreds of pictures, I chose one. My girlfriend calls on Wednesday night excited that she has submitted hers and was wondering when I would be submitting mine. We thought the deadline was Thursday night since they would be letting us know on Friday.

She tells me which walking trail her photo is from and it is the same as mine. Darn.

Tomorrow is Thursday. I keep Thursdays clear for Burn Notice -- my favorite television series — which includes a daytime marathon on USA Network.

I get up extremely early to get my work done, prepare breakfast for BH and pretty much following him out the door to get my photo from another trail in another city.

It’s a beautiful morning. It’s early and the sun isn’t very high yet, but as you can see in the photo above, it's cloudless. I have taken many photos on these trails before, including midday, and I’m eager to return and compare. The other photos were taken in the fall and now it’s summer so I anticipate the quality wouldn’t necessarily be the same.

I return home after a funny incident, that I will blog next, and quickly look at the photos, knowing there isn’t time to go out again.

I am pleased! In fact I took two, I won’t tell you out of how many, that I loved! There are many photos of the trails that are quite acceptable. Now to choose.

Later that night I submit mine in eager anticipate for tomorrow's results. I submit two, one of a trail and one of a bridge going over the river that is on the trail, not knowing if this dual submission would cause disqualification, but I supposed it wouldn’t since it wasn’t a real photo contest. Below is one of them I submitted.

Friday the results are announced and neither one of us were chosen.

All in all, it was a wonderful week with plenty of outdoor activity, miles of walking, and just enjoying nature. I have become one again with my camera.