52Frames Portrait Photo Trending

I belong to the 52Frames photo challenge. Every week we need to submit an image that corresponds to the specific subject matter. This week was “portrait” - preferably of a stranger. So I created a composite of my husband looking both forward and to the side superimposed on the only photo we have of his father - someone I never met and is technically a stranger. Although I have never been and probably never will be in the top three out of 2500 to 3000 in mages submitted every week, there are trending photos that switch out throughout the week on the website. Since someone told me about the trending photos I have been checking the website at least daily to see if my photo trends. Since I was told about it my photos have been trending every week since. I’m not sure how the photos are selected but it is such a treat to see that they do. And this week in particular because the image of the father and son at the same ripe old age optical illusion means something special. And the comments written about it are very heartwarming. It has brought back a lot of memories for my husband. I am sorry that I never had a chance to meet him, but I do feel like I know him. At least we have one photo of him. And it was a passport picture. Thanks for trending my photo 52Frames - regardless of the criteria! 

52Frames Portrait of a Stranger Weekly Photo Challenge

The subject this week for the 52Frames photo challenge was “portrait -of a stranger” - except this time the stranger part was optional for those folks who get very anxious talking to strangers. I did make a feeble attempt to meet a stranger, but wasn’t in the mood because it’s been much too hot! And I wanted to try a technique that I learned from a fellow framer so this would be a great opportunity. I took a front and side image of my husband and spliced them together. It created an interesting optical illusion. But there was something missing. Then I remembered that we had one photo of my husband’s father. So I took a photo of it and tried to create an image blending the front, side and whole. It was interesting to see the father and son shown at about the same age - usually you see father and son at a young age. This portrait captured the father and son at an old age. When I showed it to my husband he was taken aback - because he wasn’t expecting it. So I knew I did a good job. I never met my husband’s father because he lived on the other side of the world and passed away before we had a chance to visit the family. So technically he is a stranger. I really enjoyed working on this project. After all, a single photograph is rarely enough for me. I like to create another level and appreciate all of the new techniques I’ve learned since becoming a member of the weekly challenge almost four years ago. I’ll be interested to see the comments this week! 

52Frames_Portrait

My husband refused to participate and the crisp, clear photos of the cicadas didn’t meet the requirement of a human portrait for the 52Frames photo challenge this week. That left one subject - me. The idea was to create an environmental portrait. That meant adding elements to the image that reflected that person’s personality - or something like that. So the only things I could think of, given the limited options, was to make sure an iPad was in the frame, and something about digitalart and custom pet portraits. That approach lead to a day of difficult positioning and lighting and focusing using my iPad Pro as the camera. It was even more difficult afterwards to find something that was halfway decent. The quality of the photos was questionable, and the subject was not a happy one. I liked the idea of a mirrored reflection and half of a face. After reviewing, cropping, and recropping several photos and discussing it ad nauseum with my husband the selected image was made. It included half a face, an obvious iPad, and the hint of a custom pet portrait on the T-shirt I was wearing. I’m not very happy with this week’s challenge at all, and this is the 27th week I’ve been participating. This week is “wide angle.” I’m not sure how it will be accomplished with my iPhone, but something hopefully will pop in to my head.