Weekly Challenge 16: Darkness

After 15 challenges (check them out here) today we are going for 16. If I call it a challenge this time it is because it really is. We are going to play with something dangerous, which is the photographer’s main enemy: darkness. You dare? Keep reading…

How does it work? (Reminder)

Every week I will propose a new challenge, it is a topic that you will have to capture in a photograph and upload it to the Facebook page of the blog putting in the description the keyword that I will indicate for each topic.
The themes will be varied, from portraits to Macro photography, through landscapes, black and white photography, or babies.
The topics will be proposed on Saturdays, so that you have the whole weekend to work on them. You will have one week to upload your photograph (one photo per participant), until Friday of the following week. On Saturday I will update the article with the photo that has captivated me the most and I will propose a new topic, and so on…

Weekly Challenge 16: Dark..

If it’s a challenge, it can’t be easy, right? The purpose of these challenges is to take us out of our “comfort zone”, the type of photos we have always taken, and approach a more difficult photographic technique or theme. It is the only true way to learn. You don’t learn by going to photography classes or reading tutorials with a lot of theory on a blog. You learn by putting all that into practice.

Today I want to invite you to experiment with darkness. That enemy feared by all photographers. Let’s challenge him come on. I want you to forego the generous light sources and try to take a “correct” picture by relying on poor light. It can be moonlight, candlelight, or outside light that reaches the subject in very small amounts. The important thing is that it is a scene with very low light, and that you are able to capture a correct photo.

You will get a dark photo, it will occur to you to extend the shutter time, but immediately you will realize that the photo is blurred. You’ll have to play around with the ISO, but be careful not to fill the photo with ISO noise. You must leave the camera on a tripod or stable surface. In short, it will be a very fun game. Here you have a starting point to fight against the darkness.

If you achieve the challenge, few photos will resist you now.

As usual, to participate in this week’s challenge upload your photo to the Facebook wall of the Photographer’s Blog: In the description of the photo please mention the keyword “Darkness Challenge” followed by a title of your choice.

Alternative Means to Participate

For those of you who are not from Facebook I have enabled new social networks to participate.

• Flickr: accessing the Group Mural of the Photographer’s Blog and uploading the photo directly. Give your photo a caption and be sure to mention “Darkness Challenge” in the same.
• Twitter: uploading the photo directly to Twitter with the hashtag #DarkChallengeBDF

Update

To photograph in the dark you have to have noses. Darkness is the main enemy of the photographer. And if a photo in low light is already difficult (at the risk of getting a blurry photo, full of ISO noise, or simply too dark), adding the creativity that you have thrown into it is simply worth applauding.

I loved “Depositing Smoke” by Kevin Padilla. In it, he not only challenges the adverse conditions of low light producing a magnificent perfectly lit work, but he goes a step further by playing with the composition and inducing a certain “illusion” in the photo. Notice how easy it was to direct the smoke downwards: turning the photo upside down.

Simple but magnificent.