Category Archives: Jesse

Alexis, Anders, Andree, Andy, Baier, Becca, Bethany, Bill, Billy, Brandon, Carla, Colleen, Derrick, Elainie, Flat Earth Joe, Holidays, J.T., Jason, Jay, Jen, Jesse, Johnathan, Jonah, Jorge, Kio, Logan, Michelle, Micky, Mom, Nader, Naima, Nate, Nora, Scottie D., Shannon, Teresa, Vest, Willy

Blessings 2020

November 26, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

Let’s face it. 2020 has been a terrible year. I could spend hours and hours polishing this turd, but a turd is still a turd.

I basically only see 2 other people on a regular basis right now. Willy and I haven’t held a Friday Night Supper Club since March 13. We went to Jimmy’s for their Friday the 13th sale. I can count on one hand the amount of times I’ve seen any of my nieces and nephews this year. I’ve been able to hold a couple of Union Street Theater Nights in the reconfigured Union Street Theater, but it isn’t really the same. The masks and the sound of the air purifiers makes conversation a little difficult and food is definitely a missing element. Since March, the only stores I have been inside are the Boone Wal-Mart and Boone Hardware. I go to Hy-Vee every other week. I’ve seen Bethany twice. Nate and Laura once. Becca, not at all. I haven’t seen the Lockners at all. I’ve seen the Gorshes thrice. I run into Willy around town now and again. Jay stops by here and there to work on his homework. I see Jesse now and again. I haven’t met Kalista’s baby. Baier, Russell, Andree? Distant memories. Since I left the Computer Mine with the belief that I would be working from home for a few weeks, the only co-workers of note that I’ve seen in person are Vest, Lowell, Kim, and Elizabeth. I haven’t met Jorge’s twins. My church has had maybe a dozen worship services and those are suspended again. The Mission Trip is cancelled. There will be no Mission Trip next year. Youth Group has been put on hold indefinitely. For the first time since September 18, 2004, they played football games at Jack Trice Stadium and I wasn’t in attendance. The Cyclones Women’s Basketball Season just tipped off. I wasn’t there. I will most likely, not be able to attend any Cyclones Men’s games this year.

All of that being said, 2020 has still been an embarrassment of blessings for me. In a time where the pandemic was horribly mismanaged by an inept and corrupt federal government, causing employment rates to go through the roof and food insecurity and evictions to sweep across the country like a second plague, I have not had to worry about my job. As these pandemic pounds can attest, I haven’t once had to worry about my next meal. I was in a solid enough financial position that when the $1200 dollar stimulus check hit my bank account I wasn’t sure what to do with it. We were supposed to put it where it would do the most good, so I donated some of it to Joe Biden’s campaign.

While the only people I see on a regular basis are Mom and Teresa. I am still blessed with a pretty incredible family:

While I see them rarely, I still have a pretty incredible set of friends:

While we don’t get to worship an awesome God together right now, I still have a pretty incredible church family:

While I continue to work at home, I still talk to and try to stay in contact with my amazing work family:

And while Naima is becoming off the charts spoiled, I’m blessed to have her in my life as well:

I hope to see so much more of all of you in 2021. In fact, I’ve started to compile a list of things that I look forward to doing when this pandemic subsides. It isn’t a glamorous list. But that is a sign of 2020.

Equipment, Flowers, Formal Portrait, Jesse, Naima

Tamron 70-180 f/2.8

November 17, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

When I got a refund for my Iowa State football season tickets back in August, I used the money and put it towards the purchase of a new lens. The biggest gap in my Sony mirrorless line up was what I would call a mid-telephoto lens. I don’t need a 400mm lens, yet. But something near a 200mm lens was definitely needed.

I considered about 4 or 5 different lenses before ultimately deciding on the Tamron 70-180 f/2.8. I was willing to sacrifice a bit on the length in exchange for have a consistent widest aperture of f/2.8. That was a pretty easy trade to make.

Here are some of the specs of the lens:

Specifications

Focal Length: 70-180mm
Maximum Aperture: f/2.8
Minimum Aperture: f/22
Angle of View: Diagonal: 34 Degree 21′ – 13 Degree 42′ (for full-frame mirrorless format
Minimum Object Distance: 33.5 inch.
Filter Size: 67mm

Here are some pictures of the lens:

I took a series of pictures to present an idea of the lenses reach. A 50mm lens is pretty close to way the naked eye sees the world. I took a picture with a 50mm lens and then a picture with the widest setting on the lens (70mm) and then the closest setting on the lens (180mm).

50mm at 5 yards

70mm at 5 yards

180mm at 5 yards

50mm at 10 yards

70mm at 10 yards

180mm at 10 yards

50mm at 25 yards

70mm at 25 yards

180mm at 25 yards

50mm at 50 yards

70mm at 50 yards

180mm at 50 yards

Here are a collection of the first images I took with the new lens:

It has been a few months since I bought a new lens. I’m starting to jones for one. Look, Lensbaby is having a sale!

Carla, Cathie, Fisheye, Jesse, Kim, Michelle, Micky, Shannon, Vest, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 268 – FRAMED

November 2, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

A reminder to start of this post. This is the last day to suggest a theme for the next 52 weeks of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. There is only one way to suggest a theme for the next 52 weeks in THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. Don’t email me a suggestion. Don’t text me a suggestion. Don’t call me with a suggestion. Leave your suggestion(s) in the Comments section of this here journal entry.

All suggestions will be considered, but might not necessarily make the cut. For example, if you suggested CATS, that would be dismissed out of hand. Save your key strokes.

The last time we didn’t hit double digit submissions was September 23, 2019. The theme was STREET PHOTOGRAPHY. If I don’t get a couple of suggestions, I might just make every week STREET PHOTOGRAPHY. Not just out of spite, but also because I do legitimately love STREET PHOTOGRAPHY. Even though, a pandemic that is completely out of control in Iowa, is not a good time for STREET PHOTOGRAPHY.

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57 straight weeks of double digit submissions!! WooHoo! I was worried about FRAMED, but I didn’t even have to send any reminder messages to people.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Carla Stensland

Micky Augustin

Michelle Haupt

Tamara Peterson

Christopher D. Bennett

Kim Barker

Cathie Raley

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Mike Vest

But enough dwelling on the past. Time to look to the future. We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future! This week’s theme:

TREE

TREE! What a great theme! But what is a TREE image? It is any image of a TREE or anything that deals with trees, like a leaf, or mulch, or a stump, or lumber or, you get the idea.

Here is a look back at all the times that TREE has been a theme for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE:

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 27 – TREE

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 84 – TREE

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 151 – TREE

WPC – WEEK 196 – TREE

WPC – WEEK 242 – TREE

I look forward to seeing your new interpretations!

HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

The picture has to be taken the week of the theme. This isn’t a curate your pictures challenge. This is a get your butt off the couch (my personal experience) and put your camera in your hands challenge. Don’t send me a picture of you next to the Eiffel Tower, when I know you were in Iowa all week. I will point out that I have let that slide some in the past. I will not in the future. Since it is literally about the only rule.

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.

I now allow people to text me their submissions. In the past, I had made exceptions for a couple people that aren’t real computer savvy, even though it was an inconvenience for me and required at least 3 extra steps for me. I am now lifting that embargo because I have a streamline way of uploading photos. I’m not giving out my phone number, but if you have it, you can text me.

It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very woody Monday!

Aaron, Andy, Animals, Bill, Cathie, Dawn, Elizabeth, Fisheye, Jesse, Kim, Kio, Micky, Naima, Photoshop, Shannon, Tamara, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 267 – ANIMAL

October 26, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

56 weeks in a row people. We even had double digit submissions before Monday morning! Now this week’s theme is a little more challenging, I feel like we will once again, hit double digits. You can tell that the weather must be getting colder. While the theme is ANIMAL, every single picture taken was of a pet. Wel, one isn’t, but it is also taken inside. I wasn’t going to take a picture of Naima, but my original plan fell through. Or actually fell down. Well, wasn’t inflated anyways.

I’m not saying my submission this week is anything special, but it uses a new technique that is fairly controversial in photography circles. If you were in Iowa last week, you might have a good idea of how it is manipulated. Or you might not. There will be a post on this “new” thing in the future.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates, you came to see the submissions:

Tamara Peterson

Bill Wentworth

Aaron Barnett

Kio Dettman

Dawn Krause

Micky Augustin

Kim Barker

Kio Dettman

Christopher D. Bennett

Jesse Howard

Elizabeth Nordeen

Cathie Raley

Andy Sharp

Shanno Bardole-Foley

FRAMED

FRAMED! What a great theme! But what is a FRAMED image? A FRAMED image is easier to make than it might sound. All it is, is an image where your main subject is buffeted on a least one side by something that isn’t the main subject. So basically, a subject matter, with negative space on multiple sides of it. For the sake of this challenge we will consider negative space, either something that is nondescript, one color, or out of focus. Of course, there are other ways to define FRAMED. Something that is in a framed is FRAMED. However, the idea here is to create a framed for you subject with other things in the environment.

Here is a look back at the 5 times previously that FRAMED was a theme:

RWPE #5 – FRAMING

RWPE Y2 #29 – FRAMING

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 15 – FRAMED

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 112 – FRAMED

WPC – WEEK 212 – FRAMED

I look forward to seeing your new interpretations.

HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.

It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very framed Monday!

Andy, Angie, Animals, Black & White, Candid Portrait, Cathie, Dawn, Elizabeth, Evie, Jesse, Kalista, Kim, Kio, Michelle, Micky, Monica, Shannon, Tamara, Teresa, Vest, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 266 – BLACK AND WHITE

October 19, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

Double nickels people! Sammy Haggar might not be able to drive 55, but we can do 55 straight weeks of double digits like it ain’t no thing.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Andy Sharp

Monica Henning

Elizabeth Nordeen

Dawn Krause

Kio Dettman

Micky Augustin

Tamara Peterson

Angie DeWaard

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Angie DeWaard

Kio Dettman

Christopher D. Bennett

Cathie Raley

Kim Barker

Michelle Haupt

Teresa Kahler

Mike Vest

Kalista Howard

Jesse Howard

ANIMAL

ANIMAL! What a great theme! An ANIMAL photo is a simple enough concept. It is merely any picture of an ANIMAL (wild or domesticated) or an ANIMAL byproduct (meat, toy, tracks, food). Easy enough!

Here is a look back at all the times in the past that ANIMALS has been a theme for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE:

RWPE Y2 #44 – ANIMAL

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 26 – PET

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 77 – ANIMAL

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 153 – ANIMAL

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 164 – WILD ANIMAL

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 166 – PETS

WPC – WEEK 254 – ANIMAL

I look forward to seeing your new interpretations!

HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION
The picture has to be taken the week of the theme. This isn’t a curate your pictures challenge. This is a get your butt off the couch (my personal experience) and put your camera in your hands challenge. Don’t send me a picture of you next to the Eiffel Tower, when I know you were in Iowa all week. I will point out that I have let that slide some in the past. I will not in the future. Since it is literally about the only rule.

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.

It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very animalistic Monday!

Alexis, Animals, Birthdays, Carla, Elainie, Jesse, Johnathan, Linda, Logan, Sarah Toot, Teresa, Vacation

Walnut Woods Bird Blind

October 14, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

I need to start today by wishing my cousin Sarah a happy birthday. Happy birthday Sarah!

I hope it is as amazing as you want it to be!

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Back when I was on vacation, one of the State Parks I visited was Walnut Woods in the Des Moines area. I’ve driven by the sign for the turnoff to Walnut Woods hundreds of times. It seemed like I should finally make that turn and see what it is all about.

I didn’t get to spend much time exploring Walnut Woods, but by far my favorite thing I found there was the bird blind that overlooked about a hundred bird feeders. The bird blind is closed because of the badly mismanaged pandemic, but you could still stand near the bird blind and enjoy the birds. I probably didn’t have the exact lens I would have wanted, but I still took a plethora of bird photos. Even took some I liked.

This trip to Walnut Woods inspired me to want to buy my own portable bird blind. I’m going to get right on that after I buy a larger external hard drive, 3 new monitors, and a new projection screen. Maybe a retired Iowa State football locker. It is definitely on the list!

Alexis, Art, Birthdays, Brandon, Carla, Cathie, Drone, Elainie, Elizabeth, Jason, Jesse, Johnathan, Kim, Kio, Logan, Mom, Politics, Self-Portrait, Shannon, Tamara, Teresa, Vest

WPC – WEEK 264 – SIGNS

October 5, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

Sorry that this is several minutes late today. I went to cast my ballot for the 2020 election during my lunch break from the mine:

A reminder that if you live in Iowa, early voting starts today! It might be easier and safer than voting on November 3. But you have to make the choice that is best for you.

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I need to start today by wishing Johnathan a happy birthday. Happy birthday Johnathan!

I hope your birthday is as amazing as you want it to be!

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WooHoo! 53 straight weeks of double digit submissions!! Once again, I didn’t even have to send out any reminder texts.

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates! You came to see the submissions!

Kio Dettman

Tamara Peterson

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Jesse Howard

Christopher D. Bennett

Teresa Kahler

Cathie Raley

Kim Barker

Elizabeth Nordeen

Carla Stensland

Mike Vest

SELF-PORTRAIT

SELF-PORTAIT! What a great theme! But what is a SELF-PORTRAIT? This is simply a portrait where the subject and the photographer are one and the same. If you don’t like taking your own picture, you can always take a picture of somebody else taking a SELF-PORTRAIT. That is a pro tip for ya!

Here is a look back at the previous 7 times SELF-PORTRAIT was a theme:

RWPE #8 – SELF-PORTRAIT

RWPE Y2 #52 – SELF-PORTRAIT

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 25 – SELF-PORTRAIT

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 68 – SELF-PORTRAIT

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 144 & WEEK 145

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 179 – SELF-PORTRAIT

WPC – WEEK 245 – SELF-PORTRAIT

HOUSEKEEPINGA MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.

It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very selfish Monday!

Baseball/Softball, Black & White, Candid Portrait, Faust, Flowers, Formal Portrait, Jesse, Macro, Still Life

2010-04-05

September 12, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

The pictures in the folder 2010-04-05 are from a combination of us introducing Jackson to the greatness of Homerun Derby and then the rest are pictures for a MACRO theme of the first year of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE, then known as THE RANDOM WEEKLY PHOTO EXPERIMENT.

WEEK 13 - MACRO - CHRISTOPHER D. BENNETT

Makes me want to get a big red bat and knocks some balls around the yard again!

By adding these pictures to the Photography 139 Gallery, I was able to restore the following historic “An Artist’s Notebook” entries to their original glory:

Home Run Derby: The Next Generation

The Virtue of the Bored

RWPE #13 – Macro

Next Saturday’s walk down memory lane will involve the most beautiful campus in the entire world.

Andy, Becky, Black & White, Cathie, Dawn, Elizabeth, Jesse, Jodie Cue, Kim, Logan, Micky, Nature, Shannon, Teresa, WPC - Submissions

WPC – WEEK 260 – SKY

September 7, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

We did it! 49 straight weeks of double digit submissions! This week, I did have to pull over next to Ulysses S. Grant’s house and rattle a few cages, but we did make it to double digit submissions!

This is a wrap on the 7th year of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. There were 857 submissions for this set of 52 themes. If you want a walk down memory lane, click on the link below:

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – YEAR 7

But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:

Elizabeth Nordeen

Logan Kahler

Andy Sharp

Micky Augustin

Dawn Krause

Kim Barker

Cathie Raley

Jodie Cue

Jesse Howard

Shannon Bardole-Foley

Becky Parmelee

Teresa Kahler

Christopher D. Bennett

Macro

MACRO! What a great theme! But what is a MACRO photo? It is basically a close-up photo of something.

I look forward to seeing your interpretations!

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HOUSEKEEPING

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 RULES DIVISION

Your submission needs to be emailed to bennett@photography139.com by 11 AM on the Monday of the challenge due date.

It should be pointed out that this blog auto-publishes at 12:01 on Mondays. So it wouldn’t hurt to get your picture in earlier.

That is it, them’s the rules.

A MESSAGE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHY 139 SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION DIVISION

Nobody showed class, taste, and sophistication this week by signing up for a Photography 139 email subscription. I’ll try and do better next week.

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That’s all I got for today, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will commune right here again next Monday. Hopefully it will be a very close Monday!

Angie, Becky, Dawn, Jesse, Macro, Michelle, Micky, Vest, WPC - Reminder

WEEK 261 THEME REVEAL – MACRO

September 7, 2020 Christopher D. Bennett

First of all, happy Labor Day. I hope you spend sometime to day thinking about how much better your life is because of organized labor movements. For example, you like weekends? Thank you unions! You like fair wages and relative income equality? Well, this has begun slipping away, but thank you unions for these things almost existing at one time. You like not having to send your 6 year old to work in the coal mine? Thank you unions! You like having widespread employer-based health coverage? Well actually, it is an extremely stupid idea to tie people’s health coverage to their job, but it is a vast improvement from before when next to nobody had health insurance. Thank you unions! Finally, do you like the Family and Medical Leave Act? This law requires employers to provide up to 12 weeks of job-protected unpaid leave annually to care for a newborn, newly adopted child, seriously ill family member or for your own illness. Thank you unions!

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If my vacation is going as planned, I’m somewhere on a road or in a park in eastern Iowa right now. Therefore, I will publish this week’s submissions later tonight or early tomorrow morning. Sometime after I get back to the Photography 139 worldwide headquarters.

However, just because I’m out gallivanting around, doesn’t mean you can’t start on this week’s theme. It is:

MACRO

MACRO! Wait, didn’t we just do MACRO 3 weeks ago? In fact we did. Last week’s theme SKY represented the end of Year 7 of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. With the end, I’ve decided I want to line up the beginning of Year 7 of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE with the beginning of the calendar year. The problem, it is 17 weeks until 2021. I know, that seems like forever and a day. But the real question was, what to do in the 17 week interim? Give you guys a 17 week break. Nah fam. I’m gong to have 17 weeks of Hall of Fame of themes.

What does that mean?

Well, I went through the list of every theme we’ve had over the 7 years of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. I compiled a list of the themes that we have used the most and created a list of 17 themes that have been used the most. Actually, the list ended up being 22 themes, and then 4 had to sadly be eliminated. I mean, they were sent to the farm to live with grandpa.

5 themes have been used in every set of 52 THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE themes:

1. SELF-PORTRAIT
2. SIGNS
3. MACRO
4. STILL LIFE
5. WATER

2 themes have been used in 6 out of 7 sets.

6. BLACK & WHITE
7. ANIMAL

15 themes have been used in 5 out of 7 sets.

8. FRAMED
9. REFLECTION
10. SHADOW
11. NIGHT
12. TREE
13. FOOD
14. FLOWER
15. ART
16. ROAD TRIP
17. RELIGION
18. MUSIC
19. COLORFUL
20. FACELESS PORTRAIT
21. RUINS
22. TRANSPORTATION

I randomly eliminated 5 themes from the third set to get to my Hall of Fame list of 17:

1. MACRO
2. WATER
3. STILL LIFE
4. SIGNS
5. SELF-PORTRAIT
6. BLACK AND WHITE
7. ANIMAL
8. FRAMED
9. TREE
10. ART
11. NIGHT
12. RUINS
13. FOOD
14. FACELESS PORTRAIT
15. COLORFUL
16. ROAD TRIP
17. TRANSPORTATION

Now you know the list and order for all the themes for the rest of 2020.

If you want to take a look back at the ghosts of MACRO past, here are the links to the 7 previous times that MACRO was the theme for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE:

RWPE #13 MACRO

RWPE Y2 #5 MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 50- MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 66 – MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 109 – MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 175 – MACRO

WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE – WEEK 257 – MACRO

THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE was originally called THE RANDOM WEEKLY PHOTO EXPERIMENT. It was first published on January 14, 2010. While I am not its guardian, it was originally more of an idea by Vest. Originally the submissions were published on both of our websites. Well, his submission and my submission were published on both websites. Then whomever else we got to submit were published on their respective websites.

On Monday mornings, a new theme was spit out by a random generator program that Vest wrote. The very first theme was USE OF SPACE. Now I write up the entire list of 52 themes and put it into a list generator website. Whatever it spits back out is the order of the themes.

THE RANDOM WEEKLY PHOTO EXPERIMENT was for a from a success. I was lucky to get 3 to 4 submissions on a good week. I cancelled THE RANDOM WEEKLY PHOTO EXPERIMENT after two years. The final theme was SELF-PORTRAIT. It was published on January 2, 2012. There were only two submissions. My submission and Vest’s submission. In fact, you had to go all the way back to November 21, 2011 to find a submission from somebody besides me or Vest. There was one submission by Jesse for the theme SIGNS.

I pulled the plug, and thought is was a fun attempt at getting participation for the website. However it failed miserably. However, every once in awhile, people would tell me that they missed it and wished I would bring it back. I mostly ignored these people, because if they enjoyed it so much, I’m pretty sure that they would have submitted. Finally after about the fifth different person pushed for its return, I reluctantly brought it back. This time, under the new name, THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE.

On September 21, 2015 THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE burst from its tomb like Lazarus. Resurrected by a groundswell of support. The theme for the first week was NIGHT. There were submissions from Angie, Becky, Micky, Michelle, Dawn, and Vest. It was good start, but I expected it to peter out quickly. Here we are, 5 years later. To my amazement, the strongest this weird little experiment that Vest and I started in 2010 is somehow the strongest it has ever been.

I thank everybody that participates. Either every once in a while or every week. It really is one of my favorite parts of running this website. To everybody that thinks about participating, but just hasn’t pulled the plug. Remember, it doesn’t have to be a masterpiece. The idea of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE isn’t to create a masterpiece. The point is to create!