theonlyD800inthehameau
Photography by theonlydeadheadinthehameau
Lens-Artists Challenge: Bars
Posted on July 3, 2026
I spy, with my photographer’s eye, something beginning with ‘B’. Which is fortunate, because that’s the subject of this week’s Lens-Artists Challenge.
More specifically, I’ve gone with this image of a heavily barred window in what is clearly an abandoned building ,which I doubt would be worth the effort for anyone to try and break into.
(For good measure, this is to be found in the nearby village of Bussière-Poitevine.)
Lens-Artists Challenge: Tools of Composition
Posted on June 26, 2026
Framing an image so it’s something more than just a snapshot is one of the fundamental joys of photography, and I’m always on the lookout for a view or perspective that lifts a ‘picture’ out of the ordinary.
The wonderful architecture of the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi is a goldmine of creative compositional opportunities, including this arcade of arches and marble pillars, reflected in still pools.
Lens-Artists Challenge: Rule Of Three
Posted on June 3, 2026
We’ve probably all heard – and applied – the rule of thirds to some of our images, but a similar compositional concept, although somewhat less familiar, is the rule of threes.
Broadly speaking, this has it that images containing three subjects can be more pleasing to the eye than any other number. To me, it really depends on the subject(s), but certainly a group of three can work well.
This is actually an image from an assignment I was given in one of the photography courses I took when I was living in Abu Dhabi. I suppose you could say it’s quite…..er, striking.
Lens-Artists Challenge: Choose A Colour
Posted on May 20, 2026
For this week’s Lens-Artists Challenge, set by Ritva, we’re asked to show an image that features, almost to the exclusion of all others, just one colour.
I went for blue, and chose this other-worldly photograph of a tank of jellyfish featured in the Aquarium of the city of La Rochelle.
Lens-Artists Challenge: Texture
Posted on May 14, 2026
Last week, I used an image from Petra to illustrate a quotation, and when I saw that this week’s topic was ‘texture’, it made perfect sense to go back to the same folder, especially as texture is one of my favourite things to photograph..
The ancient city of Petra is largely constructed from sandstone and the effects of the weather over thousands of years means that almost the entire site offers jaw-dropping images of textural potential. This is just one example (and believe me when I say that I’ve got plenty more where these came from).
Lens-artists challenge: illustrated quotation
Posted on May 6, 2026
“Match me such marvel save in Eastern clime,
a rose-red city half as old as time.”
John Burgon – ‘Petra’
Lens-Artists Challenge: On the water
Posted on April 28, 2026
This photo was taken from the promenade in Scarborough at low tide last summer. My eye was caught by the juxtaposition of the stark lines of the steps with the abstract free-form ripples and reflections in the pools of water.
Lens-Artists challenge: History Through The Lens
Posted on April 19, 2026
The Lens-Artists challenge this week is ‘history through the lens’.
If I were being pedantic (pedantic? moi? surely not) I could argue that every photograph ever taken is an example of history through the lens, because it captures a moment in time that has already passed into history, even before you get a chance to look at it.
Of course, this isn’t really helpful for the purposes of the challenge. What we’re after is something indisputably old, and preferably crumbling.
But enough about my selfies. Like most photographers, I suspect, I have plenty of images of old buildings in various states of decay and disrepair. However, I wanted to find something a bit different.
This is part of a tableau in a museum set in an old chateau (I forget exactly where, unfortunately). The table is set with furniture and crockery of the interwar years, but what made it stand out for me was the blown-up to life-size old photograph that had been somehow printed onto a cloth sheet to form a backdrop to the scene.
Two particular features worthy of note: the massive wooden clogs worn by the gentleman on the right. And I hope that the other man in the picture is not really who he looks like.
Lens-Artists Challenge: Lucky Shot
Posted on April 14, 2026
It was the famous French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson who coined the expression ‘the decisive moment’, in his seminal book, ‘Images à la Sauvette’, published in 1952. In photographic terms, the decisive moment is that split second when you press the shutter at exactly the right time to elevate an image out of the ordinary. Of course there is a huge degree of skill involved in that, but also an element of luck.
This week’s challenge is to show photographs that were taken in that brief but decisive moment and, unusually for me, I’m posting two images this time.
My first thought on reading the challenge was ‘fireworks’. It’s surely at least 99% luck if you get a truly memorable image from a firework display, and the chances are that you will instead end up with – almost literally – a damp squib. Somehow, though, I managed to nail this one (and quite a few more, as it happened) on New Year’s Eve in Sydney, close to twenty years ago:
Much more recently – only last weekend, in fact – we went to admire some Highland cattle at a nearby village fête. There were two adjacent pens, one containing two bulls and the other holding some cows with their calves. Having snapped (well, ‘pressed’ really nowadays, isn’t it?) away merrily for a while, I was getting ready to leave when the older bull and one of the cows went in for what can only be described as a smooch through the bars that separated them. I guess I was lucky to be there when it happened.
Into The Frame
Posted on April 6, 2026
For this week’s Lens-Artists Challenge we’re asked to display images that have a clear ‘three-dimensional’ structure: foreground, middle ground and background. I suppose that is the two-dimensional equivalent of a beginning, a middle and an end in a piece of fiction.
Anyway, I think this fits the bill. I took this photo on the Sir Bani Yas nature reserve in Abu Dhabi. It was about the time of golden hour but there was too much sand in the air on this day, so the whole world had a very hazy feel to it.
Fortuitously, this lone oryx walked into the frame and a flash of sunlight caught its swishing tail, creating a perfect foreground object. The line of gaff trees provided the middle ground and that mysterious pyramid shape (it’ just a hill) added interest to the background., which would otherwise have been just sand-laden air.
Top Posts & Pages
theonlyD800inthehameau 