This week’s challenge hosted by Tina allowed me to explore a few new (to me) photo challenges. Tina writes, “This week we’re suggesting that in addition to our challenge, you explore and link to some of the other creative opportunities our friends and fellow challengers make available in the WP blogosphere (or any other sites where you post images).” You can read her entire challenge post here.

In looking at other challenges, one that intrigued me is WeekendSky. The blog is written by Hammad Rais. You can find his latest post as of this writing here.

I have hundreds of sky photos featuring sunsets and sunrises, but the first image that came to mind is one I captured in Nashville in 2016. In walking around the city, I noticed a glass-covered high rise had a crew of window washers at work. Once I’d processed the image, I realized that what I found most interesting is the partly cloudy sky reflected in the glass. The reflected sky gave the appearance of the building being semi-transparent.

I’ve followed photo challenges almost since the beginning of my blogging career, but haven’t always joined in. I use other people’s challenge responses as a learning tool to hopefully improve my own photography. One of the challenges I’ve been following (though admittedly not often participating) is Cee Neuner’s FOTD (Flower of the Day) Challenge. The link is to the January 9 challenge post, the latest as this is being written. Cee also hosts a list of photo challenges for bloggers to choose from if they would like to find a new challenge source.

In early August, North Dakota’s sunflower fields are fully developed and only await the farmers to harvest. North Dakota has planted the most sunflower acreage in the nation for over 20 years, maybe longer as 1995 is the earliest date I saw on a chart I found on the Internet.

In 2020, Lynn and I drove out to a sunflower field near our home in Fargo, and staying on a public right-of-way, I set up a tripod and captured some images of the field. It was nearing sunset and I found a nearly perfect example and put the sun just off camera on the left.

The word is Weather for this week’s OWS (One Word Sunday) Challenge hosted by Debbie Smythe. This is one of the challenges I just learned about by reading other bloggers’ challenge responses.

In 2014, on our Alaskan cruise, our visit to Glacier Bay was hampered by less-than-ideal weather. The low cloud ceiling blocked those expansive mountain views, but the soft light blocked those harsh daytime shadows and, in my opinion, gave this view of the Glacier Bay coastline an otherworldly, spiritual feel.

Recently, Lynn and I met Marsha Ingrao and had lunch in a Scottsdale restaurant. We talked of our interest in blogging and in photo challenges. Marsha and Cee Neuner share duties on a photo challenge called PPAC (Photographing Public Art Challenge). The definition of public art, for the purposes of this challenge, is loose to encourage the photographer’s interpretation.

Near the entrance to the First Lutheran Church in Fargo, North Dakota, a sculpture of a homeless person is laying covered on a bench. If you look closely, you’ll see by the feet that this is a depiction of a homeless Jesus. From Wikipedia here: “Homeless Jesus, also known as Jesus the Homeless, is a bronze sculpture by Canadian sculptor Timothy Schmalz depicting Jesus as a homeless person, sleeping on a park bench. The original sculpture was installed at Regis College, University of Toronto, in early 2013. Other casts have since been installed at many places across the world.”

For Terri Webster Schrandt’s Sunday Stills challenge theme this week, The #Future Is Ours, my wife, Lynn, and I are looking forward to a future that includes more cruising. Her challenge this week is to see “where the journey might lead.” I’ve been following Terri’s challenges for a while.

This image is really a “triple-dip”. Forgive this shameless plug, but regular readers of this blog know that on Sundays, I feature a photo challenge of my own. It’s called Cellpic Sunday, and it’s open to anyone who wishes to submit a favorite photo captured with a cellphone, drone, or other mobile devices. If you would like to join in on the fun, here’s my latest Cellpic Sunday post.

As this post is being written, Lynn and I were scheduled to be on a cruise ship in the southern Caribbean, sailing out of Puerto Rico. Our cruise line, NCL (Norwegian) offered to let guests move their cruise to a date when the pandemic is not quite so virulent. We are in the process of rescheduling to the NCL Bliss for an Alaska cruise in July. For Sunday Stills and for my own challenge-response to my own challenge, here’s a cellphone photo from my Samsung S20U. It’s actually two images merged in Lightroom into a panoramic view of the front-facing window in the observation lounge on the Norwegian Bliss.

Thanks to Tina for a great challenge that has introduced us all to some different photo challenges and allowed us all to join in on the fun. By the way, all of the images above are posted on my Flickr site in 2K HD, you can click on any of the photos to view the high-resolution image or you can view the entire album here.

If you stuck around long enough to read this or if this is your first visit to my corner of the blogosphere, I am inviting you to follow along on my journeys. I publish a Travel Tuesday post every week. On Thursdays, I post my challenge response to the Lens-Artists Photo Challenge (except on those weeks when I host the Lens-Artists Challenge about every two months when I publish on Saturday.) And, of course, there’s Cellpic Sunday each week.

John Steiner