Online Communities

One very good way to get inspiration and feedback is to participate in an online photographic community. There are zillions to choose from, but I’m only going to mention a few that I’m involved with.

  • Photo Friday: Each week, a new photo assignment is posted. Your mission is the creative interpretation of that assignment. Votes are also collected for the previous weeks assignment for a "Noteworthy" award. Competition is tough; I’ve only gotten one noteworthy image.
  • Thursday Challenge: Another weekly themed assignment.
  • Photosig: A photography display and critique site. You can upload your photos for critiques, and critique other people’s photos.  You can learn a lot by critiquing photos other than your own, and be inspired by some of the wonderful photography on this site.
  • Vazaar: A very high quality theme and critique site. Only 20 per cent of the submitted photos are featured on this site, and competition is fierce. Users can also request critiques of their photos, and the system encourages active participation in the process.
  • Onexposure: An arts project and photographic community. Only the very highest quality images are displayed here, and all photos are screened by editors before being published. Browsing the published images is an excellent source of inspiration.
  • Naturescapes.net: A site for monthly articles, discussion forums, critiques and shopping for photographic supplies. Many professional nature photographers frequent this site, and are very helpful in the forums.

There are many, many, many more sites to choose from, and some may suck more time out of you than you would like. So choose wisely, join a community, and create art!