2026 Critique Challenges

Communicate your vision (story) to the viewer by using the image to tell the story.

To me, photography is story telling. A photograph can convey a mood, record a scene, present a narrative, and evoke a reaction. Henri Cartier-Bresson discussed "the decisive moment".  Put simply, all the elements line up to create an effective image. Time, position, equipment, a photographer's ability to recognize and capture the moment are all wrapped up in a story telling image. Being in the right place, at the right time, with the right equipment, and the knowledge of how to use the skills and equipment.

Capture a COLOR image with NO COLOR (Only black, White & Grey). Take a COLOR photograph that only has WHITE, BLACK or GRAY in it.”  The challenge here is to find a mono-tone subject, take photograph in color, and have it look like a Black and White. 

Possible subjects: snow scenes, buildings, high key exposures, silhouettes.  This is a tough but fun challenge!! 

Any device outside the home that is public facing should be suitable. Look in common community places to find public clocks, this could include government buildings, public parks, university campuses, free standing units on downtown streets (often outside jeweler's shops), etc.   Think out of the box!  Add interesting elements!  A spinoff category might be shadows created by sundials capturing the time the image was captured.  [This assignment excludes watches, phones, laptops & tablets]

Person or persons in a public setting; they can be posed or candid.

 An "Unusual Crop" photo challenges the photographer to move beyond conventional framing and present a subject in a fresh, unexpected way. Rather than centering the subject or capturing it in its entirety, the goal is to use intentional, creative cropping to tell a more compelling story — isolating a detail, creating tension, or suggesting something larger outside the frame.

Strong entries will demonstrate that the crop was a deliberate artistic choice, not simply an accident or oversight. Think tight abstractions, bold geometric shapes cut by the frame's edge, or a single detail that speaks for the whole.

Wabi-sabi is a Japanese philosophical and aesthetic concept that finds beauty in imperfection, impermanence, and incompleteness. It is the art of appreciating things as they are—faded, cracked, or weathered by time—rather than striving for flawless, manufactured perfection.

Wabi: Refers to rustic, subdued, and tranquil simplicity. It is about living modestly and finding joy in quiet solitude or natural, unpretentious objects.

Sabi: Refers to the beauty that comes with age and the wear of daily use. It celebrates the unique patina, rust, or texture a physical object develops over time.

What I will be looking for is the beauty in the way you have captured the subject.

I will also look at the way you have composed the image. Do you have control over your composition?

I often compare the psychologies of painting and photography. I call painting, “additive”, in that one starts with a blank canvas and adds only what is necessary. In contrast, photography is “subtractive” because one starts from the existing, chaotic world which has to be pared down to only what are the necessary elements. This will be a test of that.

Strive to embrace simplicity, imperfection and impermanence while retaining a certain dignity and beauty. I’m sure this is easier said than done!

Find a Veteran, or something military related.  No wrong answers!

Negative space in a photograph is the empty or uncluttered area surrounding the main subject (positive space), often used in minimalist compositions to create focus, balance, and emotional impact. It acts as "breathing room," drawing the viewer's eye to the subject while adding a sense of scale, sophistication, and narrative depth.  Common mistakes with negative space in photography include creating unbalanced compositions, having distracting elements within the "empty" space, making the subject too small or disconnected, and using unintentional or unmotivated emptiness, all of which prevent the negative space from effectively supporting the subject and telling the story. You should ensure the negative space enhances the subject, rather than making it feel lost or the photo feel purposeless. 

Minimalist photography focuses on extreme simplicity, using minimal elements, ample negative space, and strong composition to create powerful, uncluttered images. Key principles include isolating a small subject within a large frame, utilizing, geometric shapes, bold colors, or monochrome tones to eliminate distraction. It is applied across genres like landscape, architecture, and street photography. Look for fog, mist, or uniform lighting conditions that naturally simplify scenes. Use lower or higher camera angles to isolate the subject from a messy background. Use long exposures to smooth out water or sky, removing texture and creating a dreamlike feel. Use tools to clean up distracting, elements and enhance, contrast. 

To put it simply: Minimalism is about simplifying the composition and Negative Space leads the viewers eye to the center of interest. Using minimalism and negative space in composition are tools that are near and dear to my artistic heart! It’s a tool that can be used in all types of photography. It’s our job as artists to guide the viewer’s eyes when they see our images. 

 Through the Looking Glass - show us images that are looking through... This can be a literal looking through from outside to inside, from inside to outside. Make sure your viewer can see the "looking through" nature of your image. Or this can be more creating new images with refections or the abstract of a gaze that is looking through. Be creative, bend reality, show us something that we haven't seen before. Use reflections and framing.

She recomends looking at photographer Arno Rafael Minkkinen's work for ideas