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Theme

This theme seeks your best straight-out-of-camera JPEGs: no adjustments, curves, tweaks, post-processing, cropping, or straightening is allowed. Think "Polaroid", "Instax", "Kodamatic", etc.

Be as creative as you can before pressing the shutter button: external filters, in-camera filters, in-camera HDR functionality, scene modes, or other creative settings are acceptable if set/configured before the image is captured.

This also means no processed raw images: shoot RAW+JPEG if you want, but only submit the JPEG produced from the camera.

Scans of film shots are welcome to submit too. Please use your best judgment as to what constitutes "creative darkroom techniques" or scan touchups. Follow the spirit of the rule as best as you can.

There's no way to enforce the SOC rule, this is all on the honor system. Let's have some fun and see what we can get, Polaroid-style. =)

Edit: Editing for downsizing or reducing JPEG quality only to satisfy the 2MB upload limit is perfectly acceptable. Sorry for not making that clear originally.

Voting Rules

  • Vote up as many images as you like
  • Please, up votes only! Do NOT vote down your competitors! If you don't like an image, don't vote
  • Voting closes on March 1, 2021 at 12:00 AM UTC. The winner will be chosen based on votes at that time

Submission Rules

  1. One photo submission per answer. Multiple entries are encouraged, but please don't spam answers. The aim is quality over quantity.
  2. Post only photos taken by yourself or the person with you.
  3. All entries should include a line of text with the location, subject, and date.
  4. The submitted image must conform to this site's content license, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA 4.0) with attribution required.
  5. Do not use this as a forum for photo critique. Use chat instead, or ask a new question about your image.

Next Contest

  • Suggest a theme for the next contest. Leave a single comment below in the format,

    Theme: <one sentence description>

  • Upvote the comment(s) with the theme you would like to see next time.

Good luck!

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    \$\begingroup\$ I'd like to suggest "available darkness" as the next theme. It's an old phrase from film photography days, when it was significant effort to get beyond ISO 1600 and still get an image with a full tonal scale. \$\endgroup\$
    – Zeiss Ikon
    Commented Feb 16, 2021 at 17:49
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    \$\begingroup\$ @Luuklag, See (for one example): "Proposal: Rules for New Photo Contest on Main Site", the decisions with respect to this have been made after a discussion on meta. \$\endgroup\$
    – Rob
    Commented Feb 17, 2021 at 15:10
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    \$\begingroup\$ @AJ Better be since I posted two. I'm sure any camera is fine including a phone. Just don't do any processing aside from getting the picture to fit into the upload size restrictions. \$\endgroup\$
    – Eric S
    Commented Feb 19, 2021 at 15:21
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    \$\begingroup\$ @AJ absolutely, phone photos that aren’t edited are elgible. \$\endgroup\$
    – scottbb ♦
    Commented Feb 19, 2021 at 15:46
  • 3
    \$\begingroup\$ Theme: Reflections. Use of mirrors or windows to get reflections. \$\endgroup\$
    – Eric S
    Commented Feb 22, 2021 at 18:13

55 Answers 55

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Lone Transmission - Hertfordshire, UK - July 10, 2020

Lone Transmission

The preview compression kinda ruins the detail; click through to the full res JPEG for better viewing.

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Coastal Cairn – Juan de Fuca Provincial Park, Vancouver Island, British Columbia. August 13, 2018

enter image description here

Taken with iPhone 7 and built-in "noir" filter with automatic settings.

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Concert at the remains of the Roman Agora (just below the Acropolis) in Athens, Greece.

Taken on a Huawei P20 Pro, auto settings (equivalent to 35mm film, f/1.8, S 1/100s, ISO 64, HDR on, AWB) - Summer '20.

Roman Agora in Athens, Greece - Summer 2020

You can notice the audience trying to be isolated from one another due to the ongoing pandemic.

The image is a bit distorted due to the phone lens and the colours/contrast/cropping not great, but it was taken in the heat of the moment and I think it gets the feeling of the moment across.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Do you know who was playing? \$\endgroup\$
    – scottbb ♦
    Commented Feb 17, 2021 at 19:03
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    \$\begingroup\$ I did notice at the time but I can't remember now. As you can see it wasn't a very small concert, but these are common in Greece in the summer months :). \$\endgroup\$
    – DimP
    Commented Feb 17, 2021 at 19:13
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Bang! - Manchester, UK - November 2020

photo of firework oajh

(Resized for upload requirements - may have lost some quality also).

A firework exploding over my balcony on Guy Fawkes Night 2020; I got incredibly lucky with the timing and framing of the shot...less so with the focus...

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Seattle

Seattle July 8th 2019. iPhone Xs. Reduced JPEG quality to fit upload requirements

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The Stair at Skellig Michael – June 11, 2019

The Stair at Skellig Michael

This is a view from the monastery atop Skellig Michael, an island off the coast of Ireland, once a retreat for ascetics and more recently a filming location for the Star Wars franchise. A weather warning caused an early return, and I was able to get this shot while the last visitors had climbed but before everyone started back down.

Sony a7R II, Lensbaby Composer II/Edge 35. ISO 100, 1/250, most likely f/3.5. Scaled with ImageMagick.

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enter image description here

Flowers after a rainstorm

I took this photo in May 2013, after a rainstorm, while sitting on the balcony of the flat I shared with two fellow students. We had this single one plant on our balcony, and if it hadn't been for the occasional rain shower it probably would have withered by week three.

It was taken with a Canon EOS 1000D, 1/400 Sec. f/6,3 200 mm, 100 ISO.

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enter image description here

Margate, Kent, England

Canon PowerShot SX60 HS

28th May 2017

At the time I took the photo I didn't notice the couple holding hands by the beach.

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Zeiss-Ikon Super Ikonta B (532/16), ca. 1948, uncoated f/2.9 Tessar.

Arista .EDU Ultra 400 (= Fomapan 400), exposure unrecorded but probably f/16 at 1/250, processed in replenished Xtol stock. Scanned, resized.

Cat Tracks and Snow Diamonds

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The currently largest container ship in the world, the HMM ALGECIRAS of the Korean shipping company Hyundai Merchant Marine during it's first visit to Hamburg in June 2020

enter image description here

original jpeg, resized to be uploadable on stack.imgur.com ILCA-77M2, Tamron 1:2.8 70-200mm, 1/2 Sek. f/8 150 mm

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Skyline outside Osaka castle

Just the skyline outside Osaka castle on 2019/3/31.

Shot with ZTE Axon 7 A2017G. ISO 100, 1/432, F1.8

Man I miss traveling there...

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enter image description here

My cat, Zoe, 2012-02-12.

One of the first pictures I took with a new SEL 30mm/3,5 Macro lens on my Sonly A6000.

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Sushi at a charity fundraising event

Potomac, MD

February 2018

enter image description here

Taken on a Nikon D5100, using the original kit lens and the built-in flash with a flash diffuser cut from a cheap translucent white three-ring binder.

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Heidi Fahrenbach at Three Musketeers Workshop

Taken on 22 January 2019 at a workshop with Guido Karp. The goal was indeed to show how close you can get to a final image with good lighting and settings. So while I took the image, I can only take limited creative credit for it, as the scene was pretty much given. I still like it as a reminder what is possible in cam.

Lighting was clamshell lighting with a softbox above and below.

Camera: Sony a7 III with Sony Macro 90mm 2.8

Settings: 1/160sec at ISO 200 and f4.0

If you wonder why ISO 200 although it is a strobe shot: The Bokeh balls are cheap fairy lights from a dollar-store held very close to the lens. On ISO 100 they already would have been too faint.

It is probably the image I have done the least in post ever. The edited raw only has minor skin retouch and some stray hair removed. Nowadays I no longer take a jpg alongside with the raw. And I lean heavily towards post production and composition.

Heidi Fahrenbach

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    \$\begingroup\$ Hi Kai. I edit your post to use Imgur's image display option by adding an l (lower-case "L") to the image filename before extension. Note that I didn't resize your upload at all. Clicking on the image link still points to the full-size image you uploaded. I did this because Stack Exchange sizes large images to fit the width of the post area, which makes portrait-oriented images very large. If you don't like my edit, you can revert it. =) \$\endgroup\$
    – scottbb ♦
    Commented Feb 17, 2021 at 20:27
  • \$\begingroup\$ @scottbb Thanks, mate. \$\endgroup\$
    – Kai Mattern
    Commented Feb 17, 2021 at 22:31
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Dresden

River Elbe as seen from the bridge Albertbrücke in Dresden, Germany

2020-09-23

Samsung Galaxy S9

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Taken December 11, 2020 in Cabot VT. Butternut squash cubed for freezing. Taken with Nikon Coolpix W300. I had to "Adjust Size" down on the Mac to get it to a postable size (originally 4enter image description here MB)

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This is a fox from Yellowstone, taken out of a car on June 15th, 2019 with a Canon EOS T1i. ISO:1600, 1/640, f/5.6. Lens is a Tamron 70-300mm F/4-5.6 Di LD Macro. Image had to be downsized to fit within file size limits.

enter image description here

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Taken April 29, 2019 in Cabot VT. "Mama?"enter image description here. Taken with Canon Powershot A2300. I had to "Adjust Size" down on the Mac to get it to a postable size (originally 2.1 MB)

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enter image description here

Just for fun. This picture was taken with a somewhat unconventional camera,

produced by Hewlett-Packard: a HP ScanJet G4050.

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Reclamation, 2003

Kawee Camera ("Patent Etui"), 13.5 cm f/4.5 Schneider-Kreuznach Radionar, 9x12 cm Fomapan 100, HC-110 Dilution E. Exposure unrecorded. Scanned, sized.

enter image description here

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Last autumn, 11 Okt. 2020, @Timmendorfer Strand, Ostsee (Baltic See) enter image description here

Sony ILCA 77MK2, Sony 1:2,8 16-50mm, 1/640 Sek. f/3,2 26 mm

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Traction Engine "Nightmare" taken at the Isle of Wight steam festival in August 2014. Taken on 120 B&W film with a 1934(?) Zeiss Ikon Super Ikonta A.

Traction engine

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Taken October 23, 2020 in Cabot VT. Small tree, now named "Hamlet" framing moon. Taken with Nikon Coolpix W300. I had to "Adjust Size" down on the Mac to get it to a postable size (originally 3.8 MB)Small tree, now named "Hamlet", framing moon

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    \$\begingroup\$ Alas, poor Yorrick! \$\endgroup\$
    – scottbb ♦
    Commented Feb 18, 2021 at 13:37
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Rain. Gasteig München, November 3, 2019

Self-portrait. Shot on a Pixel 3 XL from inside the building through a glass wall / window overlooking a street in the rain. Re-exported with reduced quality to fit 2 MiB.

self-portrait in front of glass wall

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Taken August 27, 2020 in Cabot VT. Pikeman. Taken with Nikon Coolpix W300. I had to "Adjust Size" down on the Mac to get it to a postable size (originally 4.0enter image description here MB)

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