The theme of this week’s Mobiography Showcase Challenge was ‘Rainy Days’. When the weather is cold and wet outside it is often easy to give up and resign yourself to the fact that the day is most likely not going to hold many photo opportunities. As this weeks showcase illustrates this is far from true. Wet weather creates so many photographic opportunities which aren’t available when the sun is shining. For example; look for reflections in puddles, rain drops on windows shot at close quarters, macro shots of rain drops on flowers or lone figures stooped underneath an umbrella, all make for excellent subjects when the rain is pouring down.
Featured photographers this week include: Ann Hecht, Bartek Parzyszek, basakaytek, Carol Haynes, Charles Read, Nadine Funke, Dina Alfasi, Evelyne Sieber, Laurence Bouchard, Lisandra Mendes, Pier Luigi Dodi, Elaine Taylor, Sya Putry and Katie Wall.
Take part in next week’s showcase challenge
The theme of next week’s showcase will be ‘Street Photography’. As this is a popular genre of photography and one which is ideally suited to the smartphone I will be eagerly waiting to see what the Mobiography community submit.
To enter the challenge simple start sharing your best ‘Street Photography’ inspired smartphone photos by using the #mobiography_challenge_15. on Instagram
The best ones will be featured in next weeks showcase, so get sharing now.
Always looking for cows, even at 120 kmh
‘Always looking for cows, even at 120 kmh‘ by Ann Hecht – “Driving around does not stop me from taking pictures. It was raining on this particular day. The camera usually focuses on the raindrops but this time focused on the landscape. Always looking for cows. I love the layers that I ended up with. The grass in front, the fence, the tiny cows and the hills, the telephone wires in the sky and a couple of blurred raindrops on the window. I edited the photo in snapseed to bring out the soft subdued colours.”
The Dark Tower
‘The Dark Tower‘ by Bartek Parzyszek – “I took the picture during a visit to Przemyśl as part of monthly meetings of mobile photographers. We meet once a month with people from all over Poland and beyond, and visit the City and promote mobile photography. This example fell on Przemyśl. The theme of one of the competitions during the trip was the “view”, I’m not a big fan of landscapes, so the difficulty of doing it was even greater.”
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‘Untitled‘ by basakaytek
IV
‘IV‘ by Carol Haynes – “We had record rainfall in our area last year. Something like 1200mm of rain in 2017 overall, not including snow. Inspiration was everywhere, if you enjoy photographing drops.
On this day, I spotted some leaves covered with water globes in my garden when the rain subsided for a bit. I didn’t want to lay on the wet grass to capture them so I carefully carried them to my patio table, poured myself a cup of coffee, grabbed a cushion for the wet chair and just clicked to my heart’s content.
Ideally I should have used my table tripod but I really didn’t think I’d stay outside very long. It would surely rain again. I used my coffee cup to prop my phone, to keep it steady as I rotated my position to use the natural light. I did not use any added lenses either.
This photograph is from last June, from memory, I most likely used the auto-ajusted feature in Snapseed’s Tune Image tool. ”
Reboot
‘Reboot‘ by Charles Read – “The Rain Room was an indoor installation created by Random International (an arts collective) and installed at MoMA in NYC in 2013. It has since travelled to other cities around the world and has been the subject of thousands of Instagram posts since then.
Sensors in the floor cause the rain jets in the ceiling to turn off as visitors make their way through the space, so even as the rain pours – and pour it does! – there’s no need for an umbrella. People lined up for hours to make their way into the installation – ironically, on the day I visited, lines were short because it was pouring outdoors (umbrellas definitely required!).
While I captured dozens of images here (mostly blind, as it was difficult to see much of anything), this was the very first image I shot, and remains the best of the bunch. The strong, single spotlight at the room’s far end created ideal conditions for a phenomenal silhouette – for anyone willing to get one’s knees wet while waiting for subjects to pass.
Captured on my iPhone 4s and cropped in Snapseed, this was the first of my images that was ever featured by a hub on @instagram, and it remains a personal favorite.”
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‘Untitled‘ by Nadine Funke – “For more than 2 years, I have taken part in the weekly photo project called 52Frames and and a couple of weeks ago the challenge was to find “Something new”. So on my way to work I took the same street as usual but kept my eye open if I would find something new, then I saw an open gate and thought I would see what I can find. I found a typical Berlin backyard and because it had been raining the night before I was able to get this puddle shot.”
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‘Untitled‘ by Dina Alfasi – “When I took this photo I was just having some fun on a winters day. It was shot with the iPhone 10 and edited with VSCO.”
Tourist in Hoi An
‘Tourist in Hoi An‘ by Evelyne Sieber – “On my recent trip to the ancient city of Hoi An, Central Vietnam, I was fascinated by the mix of eras and styles of shophouses, temples and colorful French colonial architecture.
On my last day in this city we experienced some rain showers but of course tourists were still carried around by the typical tricycles. The colorful bicycle, umbrella and driver looked so picturesque against one of the many yellow painted walls, I just had to click away…
I used my usual editing process of correcting perspective issues, cropping and adjusting colors and brightness in Snapseed.”
Future days
‘Future days‘ by Laurence Bouchard – “‘Future days’ was shot in Shibuya, Tokyo. There’s a cool, small tunnel with a bus stop at the other end. The bus stop isn’t really protected from the weather so a lot of rain hits the perspex glass which creates a cool raindrop filter. The difficult part was waiting for the right silhouette to materialize. Fortunately, it wasn’t too long before a couple holding hands passed through and I shot them in burst mode. I then used Snapseed to crop the image and a vignette filter to darken the outside.”
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‘Untitled‘ by Lisandra Mendes – “I took this picture when I was returning from a trip in Rio de Janeiro. I was inside my car, driving, but as I saw the statue of “Cristo Redentor” (Christ the Redeemer) almost covered by the clouds I had to stop to picture this moment.
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‘Untitled‘ by Pier Luigi Dodi – “I was going to visit the beautiful pagoda you see in the background. It was during the rainy season and it was raining cats and dogs. I didn’t take my camera, but then this old monk arrived and the only possibility was to take the photo with my iPhone and I did it! Kyauk Kan Latt Pagoda, Hpa-An, Kayin State, Myanmar, 2016
I shot it with my iPhone 6 Plus and processed in Snapseed and Black App.”
After the rain
‘After the rain‘ by Elaine Taylor – “This photo was simply the result of one of those fleeting moments when my eyes caught sight of the tiny world around me. The rain covered flower was drying in the sun and caught my eye as I was going about my day. I took the photo with my iphone7 plus through the Hipstamatic app (Loftus / Love 81 / Apollo) for my Hipstamatic 365 Project. I was quite surprised how close I could get before the image blurred, although I remember thinking I would have liked to have had a macro lens to explore the detail further.”
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‘Untitled‘ by Sya Putry – “My inspiration for this photo came from all the great photography from members the the Mobiography community, there are so many examples of great photography from some amazing photographers. Regarding this photo, when I saw the group entered the challenge of ‘rainy days’ I was excited to join in. This time I took several photos and edited immediatly with my smartphone (note 3 samsung ). I used the Snapseed app to edit the photo.”
Rainy Days
‘Rainy Days‘ by Katie Wall
Don’t forget…
The theme of next week’s showcase will be ‘Street Photography’. As this is a popular genre of photography and one which is ideally suited to the smartphone I will be eagerly waiting to see what the Mobiography community submit.
To enter the challenge simple start sharing your best ‘Street Photography’ inspired smartphone photos by using the #mobiography_challenge_15. on Instagram.
The best ones will be featured in next weeks showcase, so get sharing now.
If you haven’t already done so, follow Mobiography on Instagram and hashtag your photos with #mobiography. Don’t forget to sign up to the Mobiography email list to get the latest news and updates direct to your inbox.
