Take a picture of a machine signifying the purpose of machinery in a modern age.

I’ll leave it up to you to decide what counts as a “machine”. Have fun with this one – please send your entries in by noon on Tuesday 21^st May.

There’s a huge variety of interpretations of the simple theme this week. For those who aren’t familiar with how this works, people usually comment on other people’s work, say why they like it, and give a bit of feedback. This is one of the most important parts of the Photo Challenge.

White. I like colour challenges, and white is probably one of the most present and ‘varied’ ‘colours’ we have around anyway. Which means we have many variations of white.

Please send your white-themed entries in by noon on Tuesday 14^th May. Have fun!

For a bit of interest, I think it would be good if everyone can write a quick note in the comments to say what is “retro” about their picture – whether it is the subject matter or the photographic technique. And if you used an interesting technique – say a few words about how you did it.

Take a photo that looks like it was taken years ago. I’ve tried this before and it was quite fun, but I did end up using quite a bit of post-processing.

According to our usual rules, you are allowed to edit your pictures after shooting, and this week is no exception! There will be a healthy dose of bonus points to anyone who shoots their entry on film

Please send your entries in by noon on Tuesday 7^th May. Have fun with this one!

Stage 1 – Find a location
You can do this exercise anywhere, in your garden, up a mountain, or if the weather isn’t so nice, in your living room or kitchen!  Once you’ve found your location, sit down.

Stage 2 – Observation
Don’t get your camera out yet, you’ve got some preparation to do first!

I want you to spend a full 10 minutes looking at your surroundings.  Really look closely.  How does the light interact with objects nearby? What textures can you find? How does the setting feel?  What details would you have missed if you’d just walked past?  Does anything produce a natural “frame”?

Spend these 10 minutes to pick a subject and plan the shot you’re going to take.  If you need to move around to find the best angle, do so! This stage is all about planning though, so don’t pick up your camera until the 10 minutes are up!

Stage 3 – Implementation
Now you can get your camera out!

Spend the next 5 minutes taking your photo.  Move around the subject to get the best angle, frame it carefully.  If you need to adjust anything in the scene (eg move a twig out of the shot, cast a shadow over part of the image) then now is the time to do so. Take as many shots as you need to get the shot you spent all that time planning.  If you can get it in one shot, great!  If it takes you 20 attempts, well that’s cool too.  Just don’t get carried away and overrun your 5 minutes!

As with all challenges like this, if you don’t like the results you got from the first time you tried it feel free to repeat the exercise later in the week, but please don’t be tempted to cheat by skipping any stages, you won’t learn anything that way!

As usual, please send your entries in by noon on Tuesday 30^th April. Good luck!

This week we have a fantastic 17 entries, including three from new people! Please welcome Kitzzy, Conor and Kevin. If you haven’t done so already, please have a quick look at the usual rules (don’t worry, nothing scary) and feel free to introduce yourselves on our say hello page.

Click on the photos to see them larger, and also to read the comments that people wrote about their own entries. We don’t usually publish text with photos but on this occasion it made a lot of sense.

I haven’t got any inspiration today – where do you get yours?

Please send your photo in by noon on Tuesday 23^rd April. Good luck!

I am genuinely surprised at the range of similar-but-different interpretations from quite a specific theme, so very well done to everyone.