Weekly Photo Challenge: Illumination

Lights are functional — everyday objects in our rooms and on our streets. Yet lights can be powerful symbols: signs of life, curiosity, and discovery. We’re interested in seeing what you come up with for illumination — particularly your creative interpretations and more abstract approaches.

— The Daily Post editorial team

I was really inspired by the latest photo challenge over at The Daily Post. Weekly Photo Challenge: Ilumination is all about lights. I’ve been practicing taking shots at night and enjoy photographing different types of lights and lamps, so this challenge excites me!

I really dig the look and effect of the tiled gallery, which I’ve used to compile my illumination shots below. I hope you like this collection!

Shinjuku, Tokyo

Grand Bazaar, Istanbul

Ibiza Town, Ibiza

Plaza Mayor, Madrid

Griffith Observatory, Los Angeles

Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk

Austin, Texas

London, England

Hagia Sophia, Istanbul

Bit of Inspiration

Blogging can be a scary activity when we’re publishing something lighthearted; there are always elements of fear and uncertainty when we release our words into the wild. To write so openly and eloquently about such a deeply personal experience takes another level of bravery, one that we’re moved to acknowledge.

— The Daily Post

Code is poetry.

— WordPress

Bungy Madness in Wellington

What an exhilarating day in Wellington! Check out Lori, Automattic’s HR Lead, on our latest adventure:

Bit of Advice

With WordPress for iOS, you can share photos, write posts, and edit content on the go. Download it from the App Store.

— WordPress

Writing Challenge: Starting Over

I like the theme of this week’s creative writing challenge, Starting Over, which encourages us to muse freely about beginning again and wiping the slate clean. I appreciate the freedom to be creative and explore different forms. Since I rarely dabble in poetry and freeform writing, I’ll experiment here.

Starting Over: In Fragments

A new pair of shoes.

The first chapter of a book.

A new hardbound journal, waiting to be opened.

A neighborhood walk early in the morning with your loved one.

A haircut exposing the back of your neck for the first time in years.

An egg.

The first rays of the sun peeking over the horizon.

A jump off of a cliff.

Cala Tarida, Ibiza, Spain

A field of cherry blossom trees, on the cusp of exploding in shades of pink.

The first buds poking out of the dirt in your garden.

The glint on a ring as you hear the words “I do.”

Your newborn son, held for the first time.

A letter of apology sent to a friend.

A visit to a place from your childhood that forces you to remember something you’d forgotten.

A soft pillow beneath your head as you lie down to sleep.

A coffin lowered into the clasping earth.

The pain of finishing a draft and realizing it’s only the first.

A resignation letter handed in to your boss and a backpack in the trunk of your car.

A tank full of gasoline.

A shiny new WordPress blog.

An iOS app to post whenever you want, wherever you want.

Ziplining in Costa Rica

Oh, what a day in Costa Rica. We made our way into the rainforest near Arenal Volcano and spent the cool, misty afternoon zipping through the treetops. The view from above was spectacular — I had to shoot a video while I was flying through the air so I could share it with you:

Bit of Advice

You don’t have to turn your blog inside out to create something utterly one-of-a-kind, but you should strive to make your own point of view clear in whatever you choose to blog about. It’s your voice that makes a post out of the ordinary.

— The Daily Post

Weekly Photo Challenge: Beyond

Rocks and pyramids at Giza, Egypt

The Daily Post asks: Do you have a photo which invites the viewer to look beyond? Are there hidden depths in the background? Is the focal point just a framing for the rest of the picture?

Beyond. What a great theme for the Weekly Photo Challenge. It works well for this shot I took with my iPhone in Egypt. In the foreground, the focus is a pile of rocks, but off into the distance, you’ll see iconic landmarks: two of the pyramids at Giza.

I hope you like my interpretation of “beyond”!

I Love WordPress

I love WordPress! Some links worth checking out:

• WordPress for iOS: Designed for the iPhone/iPod Touch and the iPad, this app makes it easier for me to share photos and write and edit posts on the go.
• WordPress.com News: A blog I follow on all things WordPress.com, from new features and themes to cool sites and great writing in the community.
• WordPress.org: The hub for self-hosted blogs and websites powered by WordPress software.
• WordPress.tv: A resource of lectures, tutorials, and presentations focused on WordPress and the community, for blogging newbies to core developers. I’ve watched some insightful, helpful talks here.
• WordCamp Central: The place to learn about community-organized events called WordCamps, put together by WordPress users worldwide.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflections

It’s wonderful to see photographers on WordPress.com contributing guest photo challenges to The Daily Post. In this week’s photo challenge, Reflections, a photographer named Jared talks about using reflections in the composition of a photograph. He posted a fantastic image from the dock of a local park in which he used a mirror as a prop, creating an illusion within the frame.

I love how reflections in a photograph create a sense of duality and even surrealism. For my submission to this challenge, I’ve decided to share various photographs of reflections — in mirrors, on the surface of water, and through windows — and display them in a circle gallery. To me, the circle shape evokes a mirror, so this type of gallery seems appropriate.

Reflection, Lisbon, Portugal

Reflections in Water, Academy of Sciences, San Francisco

Reflections on a lake in Scotland

Window, La Pedrera, Barcelona

Reflection, Lisbon, Portugal

The London Eye and reflections in the Thames River

Window reflections in the Embarcadero in San Francisco

Reflection, London, England

Street Mirror, Brick Lane, London

 

Weekly Photo Challenge: Green

The folks at The Daily Post presented the WordPress.com community with a colorful photo challenge: Green. It’s a multi-photo challenge, so I’ve decided to display my collection of green shots in a slideshow.

I’ve taken all of these photographs when I’ve been out and about and on the go — from my travels through Europe to the Middle East. I’m happy to share these shades of green with you!

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Diving into Halong Bay

Whoa! Someone on our boat took a dive into the bay:

Daily Prompt: Quote Me

Do you have a favorite quote that you return to again and again? What is it, and why does it move you?

These questions from today’s daily prompt have stirred me.

One of my favorite quotes comes from Gertrude Stein:

When you get there, there isn’t any there there.

When I was 19, I moved to the French Riviera. A screenwriting major, I chose to study in Cannes. I wanted to intern at the international film festival and rub elbows with important people in the industry. I wanted to become fluent in French.

Soon, I’d be bilingual. And meet a director. Or a producer. It was my chance.

And so, I went to France. I had French classes in morning, I served coffee to celebrities, I carried sound equipment across the beach for TV crews, and watched movie premieres.

But ultimately, nothing materialized from the experience, or nothing tangible I could show for. When the semester ended, I went home. A year later, I graduated with a film degree, but eventually shoved my scripts in a drawer. End scene.

Wandering the Streets in Hanoi

Here’s a view of a street near my guesthouse in Hanoi, Vietnam. The roads here are chaotic at first, but once I started weaving in and out of traffic alongside everyone else, I sensed a flow to all the madness…

Bit of Advice

You’re the storyteller, so talk to us. Ask questions. Or crack a joke, if appropriate. Be authoritative, but don’t distance yourself: interact with your reader. Engaging nonfiction writers employ narrative techniques — just as fiction writers do — and experiment with elements such as point of view, persona, and tone.

— The Daily Post

Weekly Photo Challenge: Love

What great timing! The Daily Post announced its latest photo challenge: Love. Just now, as I was walking down the street in the Prenzlauer Berg neighborhood of Berlin, I saw this stencil on the wall:

Thanks to The Daily Post folks for such a lovely theme!

Each detail is like the stroke of a brush on blank canvas, filling in detail and completing the picture in the reader’s mind.

— The Daily Post

Writing Challenge: Details

The latest writing challenge at The Daily Post, “The Devil is in the Details,” prompts us to dive into the details: to practice our powers of observation to bring a person, place, event, scene, or anything else to life. To create a rich picture in a reader’s mind in three paragraphs. I’ve chosen to zoom in on one part of my home: my bookcase.

My Bookcase

I’ve always been fascinated by the bookcases in other peoples’ homes. I sit down on someone’s sofa and see what they have on their shelves, learning about what they read, what they think about, and what they collect. And now, I gaze up at my own bookcase in my living room — three black shelves bolted to the wall. When I moved into my home last year, I filled the middle shelf first, with hardcover books I’ve read and loved — or have yet to read and simply want to show off. Teju Cole’s Open City. Oliver Sacks’ Musicophilia. Jared Diamond’s Collapse. And a few recent favorites: Born to Run, about the elusive long-distance running tribe, the Tarahumara; and The Lost City of Z, a riveting nonfiction narrative from one of my favorite writers, David Grann.

The best piece of advice I received from a screenwriting professor? “Enter a scene late and exit the scene early.”

— The Daily Post