A week ago I went to my mailbox and found the results sheet from the Iowa State Fair Photography Salon sitting in my mailbox waiting for me.

The Iowa State Fair Photography Salon is one of the most prestigious and hardest photo contests in the state. I usually count myself lucky if I get one picture accepted. There have been plenty of years where I have been shutout. It is always with low expectations when I grab the yellow card out of my mailbox and take a look at it:

It would appear that I got one picture accepted and that picture got an award. That is nice. If you pushed me on it, I would probably rather get multiple pictures in rather than an award, however an award comes with a cash prize, so that is nice.

I don’t know what picture got accepted, but I guess this gives you a reason to go to the Iowa State Fair. I will find out when I go to the Photographer’s Reception in early August.

Since I can’t pick up my pictures until the last day of the fair, it looks like I will be going to the fair on the last day again. If you would like to attend with me, let me know. I usually hit the fair about 11 AM on that day. Leave after 10 PM, so this isn’t a trip to be considered lightly. And if you are a woman, for God’s sake, wear sensible shoes!

Unfortunately, there is no badass band like Here Come the Mummies playing on the last day of the fair this year. However, Nelson will be taking the stage at 8 PM that night. Although I confess, I’ll probably try to make my way to the Bill Riley Stage at 8 PM to see Unspoken. They are a Christian rock band.

Looks like all the hands that were in the air to join me at the fair just went down when the bodies they were attached to read the words “Christian rock”. I’m telling you, Unspoken is a solid band and you would probably love the song “Who You Are” and more than enjoy the tune “Reason”. If you don’t like “Start A Fire”, I think you probably just have terrible taste in music.

Hit me up on the horn or the Snapchat or the Insta or the Tweets or the emails if you are interested.

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The other Sunday Brandon joined us for our post-church feeding. I have had my eye on Brandon for awhile now as the model for Page 36 of THE PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT. I used this chance to get him to come over so we could get Page 36 knocked out.

Page 36 – Use shutter speed to capture anger.

I took several pictures for Page 36 (including one with a camera inside the aquarium), but only one can be physically adhered into the physical A PHOTO JOURNAL. Here are some of the other pictures I liked, but will only exist in the tunnels of cyberland:

The shutter speed on these pictures is 1/8000th of a second.

This is the list of pages I have left to capture for THE PHOTO JOURNAL PROJECT:

PAGE 16 – Photograph the last thing that made you laugh.
Page 18 – Shoot the other half of this picture by Jason by Jason Evans.
PAGE 27- Create drama around the edge of your frame.
Page 28 – Recreate a famous photograph without looking it up.
PAGE 31 – Tell a joke with two pictures.
Page 64 – Head out with a fellow photographer and play a game of photography dare.
PAGE 66-67 – Make a sequence of four pictures inspired by the rise and fall of Britney Spears (or another celebrity).
Page 73 – Turn form into rhythm.
PAGE 101 – Find an object, close your eyes and compse your shot using touch rather than vision.
Page 106-107 – Email one of your pictures to your photography hero and ask them what they hate about it.
PAGE 116 – Shoot an advert where the image says it all without need for any additional copy.
Page 117 – Freeze the frame exactly 57 minutes and 32 seconds in to your favourite film. Take a picture inspired by what you see.
PAGE 121 – Show us that photography is a form of magic.
Page 123 – Don’t take any more photographs -none- until you see something that emotionally moves you. Only then pick up your camera.

I might be looking for some volunteers to help finish this project off.

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Reminder that this week’s theme for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE theme is SIGNS:

SIGNS

A SIGNS picture is any picture that involves a SIGN(S).

Happy photo harvesting!