This Week in the Digital Photography School Forums

Weekly Assignment

We finished the Spring assignment this week. People had some very creative entries. From spring allergies, to bouncy springs, to some great photos of the season, we had a lot of entries to choose from. We did manage to pick some favourites though. Our winner was Nathan deGargoyle for his picture of buds bursting and rain falling. A true sign of spring. Our runners up were Amy-Rose for her portrait that not only had an umbrella to protect from spring showers, but also had the reflections of clouds in the eyes, and jlschmale for the picture of the red Radio Flyer in a strawberry patch. Talk about spring!

This week’s assignment is Circles. So if it’s round, if it looks like a circle, if it has something to do with a circle, why not photograph it. In order to be eligible for the mini-contest to have you picture shown on the blog, your picture needs to have been taken between 9-23 April 2008, it must include “Assignment:Circles” somewhere in the post, and the exif must be intact. Next week’s assignment will be Angles. Make sure to read this post about new rules regarding this and future assignments.

Weekly Poll

This week we asked forum members about whether they like to photograph alone or in a group. The results were pretty clear! Lots of people enjoy photographing alone, though we do have a few people who enjoy photographing in groups.

kimmie said “I voted alone. While I’m new at this and would love tips, I would find it distracting to what I wanted to achieve – trying to get a great shot, or have to have idle chatter. Of course there is that other side where I might possibly have missed something that someone else caught! But I think I’d still prefer alone!”

Not Too Shabby said “I really like to get together with friends to go on photo excursions but unfortunately been working too much of late and at the moment most of my shooting is by myself. I really like taking friends along that aren’t into photography they put a different perspective on things and one of my friends is really fearless with creepy crawlies and is an old bushie from way back so he’s great, he flips over rocks and logs for me so i can be ready for what’s laying in wait. the centipedes are so quick!!!!”

If you are interested in finding a group of people to go photowalking with, make sure to check Flickr for local groups, finding photo clubs, or checking Meetup.com.

Watch for a new poll to be posted later today.

Hot Threads

• Megapixels?: Cameras seem to be increasingly getting more and more megapixels. But how many are enough? Should you get as many as you can or is there some magic number out there? Or does it all depend on the lenses? Come join in the discussion.
• Canon Users – What’s your favorite general purpose lens?: Each camera has a set of lenses. These lenses may be similar, but that doesn’t always mean they are the same quality. So what may be a good Nikon lens, may not be a good Canon lens. So, if you use a Canon, why not come make some suggestions about what your favourite general purpose lens is.
• DSLR Accessories / Must-Haves: DSLRs seem to create a never ending need for accessories and other gadgets. So which of these accessories do you consider to be the most essential? Which ones do you just *have* to have?
• DSLR Accessories / LEAST-Haves: And here’s the other end of the scale. What is that item that you bought that you never should have wasted your money on or that has become a very expensive paperweight? What are the things that you would personally stay away from even if someone was giving it away?
• Selections: sky (applies elsewhere also) using color range: If you’re looking for a new and useful way to do selections , this before and after tutorial gives a good example of how to do a selection using Photoshop’s Color Range tool. Even if you’ve used it before, check out the discussion to see if there is anything new you may not have used before.

Other Threads to Note

It’s time for another week of What Would You Do, our weekly post-processing thread where the goal is to use the original picture in the first post and edit it how you would like and then come back and post it along with a description of what you did. Last week’s thread was great and I think we all got a few ideas for how to restore an old photo. It’s also time for the Classic Rock Challenge. This week, the goal is to interpret a song title from “25 All-Time Greatest Bubblegum Hits”.

Finally, if you weren’t already aware, Digital Photography School is running a Competition to win a Nikon D60. That’s one heck of a prize! All you need to do to be in to win is to be a member of the forum and be an active member of the forums between now and the end of April. Every time you post in our forums in any way (asking a question, answering someone else’s, sharing an image, critiquing someone else’s, posting a review of a camera or book etc) you enter this competition. The more you post the more chances you have to win (make one post in April and you have one chance to win, make 200 posts and you have 200 chances to win).