The Black and White Photography Challenge

The Black and White Photography Challenge is making rounds on Facebook. I love looking at the work of my friends.They never fail to impress me. Their work gave me ideas on how to shoot photos the next time an opportunity arises. Sometimes I ask them questions on their techniques and accessories they use. They are also generous in sharing what they know.

For some reason, two friends of mine tagged me to do the challenge on the same day with photos from same shoot location. I obliged. These are two people I look up to in photography. It is an honor to be challenged by them.

They both tagged of a boardwalk in Siargao. I am now convinced to go there next summer.

They both tagged me  in a photo of a boardwalk in Siargao. I am now convinced to go there next summer!

The two of them identified me as a blogger. Hence, this blog post. In the challenge, I was asked to post 1 Black and White photo each day for five consecutive days and tag one friend each day to do the challenge.

I started choosing photos in my folders that I think were crisp enough to be manipulated using photo editing software. Yes, I often compensate my limited photography skills with my IT skills.  Googling is one of my special talents. I searched Pinterest for ideas and forums and blogs for tutorials. Kinarir! (You’d think this is my career.) In a recent out-of-town trip with my cousin, I choreographed some shots and I told him how I would post-process the photo. To which he replied, “You are not photographer; you are a photo editor.” Haha Well, yes, I am an editor!

As much as I love colors (proof of which is my tendency to bump up saturation sliders in apps to get the brightest of colors in photos), black and white photography has its own charm. I would rely on shadows and shades to allow my photos to show depth and character. In many instances in the past, whenever I get blurred photos, I turn them to black and white to save the photo from deletion. This time around I specifically chose photos that have potential for enhancement. I post-processed some photos that in the end did not pass my strict standards for this challenge. Feelingera lang, may standards pa akong nalalaman. (I am pretentious. I have make-believe standards. Hehe!)  Here are the samples of the rejected photos I edited. Charing. Parang reality contest, may elimination round. (Kidding. Just like a reality contest, there is an elimination round.)

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In the first photo, I wanted to it to have that enchanting forest feel to the image but it was a blurry image and I felt dizzy after staring at it while editing. I chose another style of editing for the second photo that I had to redo post processing. In the third photo , the flower did not stand out from the background.

These are the photos that made the cut. Naks!

This was taken while I was on a pumpboat to Magallanes.  I like this photo because of the reflection on the water. However, there is something that needs to be done here . We live in a flood-prone area. Those living near the water need to be relocated. This photo was taken a year ago but I still saw these houses when I passed by this area two weeks ago.

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My cousin recently bought a car. We took the vehicle for a joyride around town. I was seated in front and I brought my camera along. Thus, I got a good spot for snapping photos. I re-edited the photo. This is one of my rejected photos. I rejected the editing. I am fond of high contrast and high exposure photos that I end up with bright whites which in the rejected photo eliminated the beauty of the clouds so I repeated the post processing and went easy with the exposure.
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When I first bought a digital point-and-shoot, one of the few tricks I tried to learn was to shoot using its macro feature and my favorite subjects are flowers. Nine years later, I still love taking flower photos. This is a photo of a flower called cosmos. I hope I got the name right this time. This is an example of my tendency to edit photos using high contrast and detailed sharpening. One can see the grains and specks which I shall declare that they add character to the photo. Palusot! I have edited the photo several times over because I worked on a low resolution one which showed some pixelation when viewed on a tablet.  OC lang. My cousin gave me some tips on working on the luminance to remove the black specks (in photography, they call that noise). I will keep that in mind.

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For my fourth photo, I wanted to use a photo taken from one of my trips.  Because I noticed my fondness for jet black photo, I tried to go for a lighter tone. I also learned how to add some haze on the photo for that dreamy effect. This was in Kapurpurawan, Ilocos Norte.

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For the fifth and final day of the challenge, I saved the best for last. KIDDING!!! I tried to showcase (showcase talaga? kumikitang kabuhayan? NOT!- — Really? Showcase? Like a successful livelihood?) the range of the what I can do with photography my editing skills by using different subjects and different compositions.  I try to post photos I have not posted before. For the final day, I wanted to do portrait.  Because I lack time to find a model and most of my photos of people are already on Facebook, I have no other choice but do a self-portrait. (Napilitan lang kunyari. — I am acting like I am forced to do this.) Having tried to photograph myself using the timer (lumabas din ang katotohanan. ginusto niya to! LOL — The truth surfaced. She likes doing this. ), I know how exhausting it is to go back and forth, set the timer and pose for the camera; only to find out that the focus did not turn out right.  Here’s the secret to a stress-free self-photography: tripod, camera cable and laptop. Prop your camera on a tripod, connect the cable to your laptop, use the live viewer of your camera software, position yourself in front of the camera while holding the laptop, view the image on the laptop to get the angle and pose till you get the shot you wanted then click the button on your software to take a photo. Oh, another tip:  take advantage of the diffused morning light from your window. 😉 Voila!

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This has been an exercise on creativity. I have not done much watercolor art recently so I welcomed this kind of challenge in creativity. I realized that there is so much to learn but I enjoyed the process.  Oh, by the way,  I added my watermark on the photos. It is not  a font. It is my own handwriting. I used an app called Sketches.  I used the tablet since the screen is bigger. I used the app and wrote my name using my forefinger, saved the image and superimposed it on my photos.  (I googled how to make the background of my watermark transparent so it would look like I wrote directly on the photo.)

That was a long post.  Thank you if you have read until the end of the post. I hope you learned a few tips or two. Feel free to leave a comment  below. You may give a critique about my photos.

By the way, my friend, Kit,  belongs to a group who does wedding photography and videography. Like their Facebook page if you want to hire them or just be inspired with their work: Infinity Studios.

My former colleague, Joseph, also does wedding photography. To get in touch with him,  like his Facebook page: JosephGaw Photography.

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