A Favourite Photo (of your own) ?

Dale.

Dale.

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Dale.
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I was thinking about this earlier, out of all the photos I've ever taken, what is my favourite one. Not a top 10 or top 5, my absolute favourite, that I have taken myself.

It's a very difficult exercise to pick one ....... try it, it's challenging.

I love landscapes and I love wildlife. I don't really get the chance to pursue landscape photography as I'd like to but hopefully that will change one day. So for now, I'd have to pick a wildlife image. For those of you who know me, my choice as a favourite might well be a suprise, given my passion for Kingfishers.

I think though I have chosen and as of today, my absolute favourite image of my own that I have taken would be my Wren On a Bullrush. It has done well for me in competitions, even winning me a bronze medal at the SPF digital image championship competition last year (2023). I've also printed it on fine art paper and it currently sits in a bespoke, hand made frame (that I built myself), on our living room wall.

The thing is, it's my favourite and until today, it never occured to me that it was. Another thing about it is though, I have a benchmark in my head now, something to aim for again and try to top it. That said, I know the image might not be for everyone but as it stands for me at this moment, this is the one I would keep if I had to delete all the others.

So, do you have an ultimate favourite of your own? If so, tell us about it.

For reference and context ....................


The Wren. by Dale, on Flickr
 
Lovely golden tones and I can see why it was well received in competition.

Looking at your Flickr................you indeed have some beautiful landscapes including the 'high key' ones on the two rowing boats on the misty waters (y)

PS for my own absolute favourites, none but a number that I have been well pleased with & about for differing reasons.
 
I had some favourite wildlife photos but I haven't done wildlife for several years and now concentrate on 'street', in it's widest interpretation.
There are a number that I like but only one that comes to mind regularly, and that came from a visit to the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.
A cleaner was working down the rear staircase and she and her equipment just seemed to blend nicely into the scene.
I took it on my little Ricoh GRiii and was very pleased with the way it handled the low light.




The Cleaner by Bristol Streets, on Flickr
 
Mine is almost certainly one of Mrs Nod's eyes. It was snowing gently so we headed up to a local viewpoint. She was wrapped up in a wooly hat and scarf with just her eyes showing and I took a snap using the built in flash using the F65's anti-red-eye setting. Probably because I was so close, there was no sign of red eye when I got the print back. Unfortunately, the neg was scratched when the film came back but the print doesn't show it.
 
It's a lovely image Dale, one to be proud of. I wouldn't know where to start with mine as I shoot a reasonably wide range of subjects. I'll have a ponder and post again should I actually draw any sort of meaningful conclusion!
 
My personal favorite in years is this image, it's a former miss UK taken in an old castle tower, on a day out shooting for fun It wasnt set up, she went over to look out the window and I liked the shadow. I told her to stay there and shot a few versions, this was my favoriteIMG_9628xxx.jpg
 

Riding the skinny by Lewis Craik, on Flickr

This is the one that came to mind, the photo has turned out well, but it also brings back good memories of a great day my son and I had together a few years ago. It was the hottest day of the year, but we managed to ride 2 mountain bike trails, with an ice cream stop in the middle. This was taken on my trusty X100V.
 
This is probably my favourite photo not because of the photo itself but because of what it meant at the time.

Took this a few years ago over the pandemic of my youngest. She had been studying for months for her transfer test to get into grammar school and was working through some test papers and this is the moment she found out that all of her hard work had been wasted because the transfer tests had been cancelled which meant her choice of going to a grammar school instead of a high school had been taken away from her. All worked out in the end and she has done well at the school she ended up at but at the time she was absolutely devastated.

Was pure luck as well I had the camera handy because I was looking through some photos I had taken of our dog, just as the email confirming it had hit my wife's inbox.

Abbie.jpg
 
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Some lovely work here, with impact and stories going on, thanks for sharing.

I do of course have family images that mean more to me than my Wren image from a sentiment point of view, a few of my daughter as she grows up in particular. They are of course, priceless.

I watched a DVD last night, about Vivian Maier. She was a prolific photographer, taking thousands upon thousands of images on film. She had some stunning work and only become well known after her death. I wouldn't want to pick a favourite out of those, they all had impact and story. It's part of what got me thinking today, as my 'portfolio' if you can call it that, is a fraction of the amount of work she produced.
 
Not too hard for me.
Nothing great as a photo, but I like it, was a good friend until she died (not long after this photo) and one of my first portrait photos, from then portraits became one of my favourites.

This is a scan of a not very good (damaged and creased)

lee2.jpg
 
In the seventies we were at the East of England show ground. Wifey, me and my Olympus OM2n. This little bus whizzed past and the Kids are having so much fun!
One of my many favourite shots :)
Kids on the Bus s.jpg
 
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trying to pick your favorite photo is like saying whats your favorite child...like you say its very hard to do, i do like to reflect on stuff ive done, not just with photography but life in general, its a great thread Dale it gets you thinking , im into long exposures at the moment i find the whole process very calming and theraputic but todays favorite is one of my grandson, he full of life, 100mph he never stops, never shuts up...but then he crashes and can sleep in the strangest of places, here he is after a hard days play, covered in snot crashed out on the couch dreaming of motorbikes, technicaly not a great shot ive just cropped the top of his head, but its one i go back to regularly and just smile at the memory, i may change my mind and pick another favorite tommorow, but today its this one

sleeping small.jpg
 
It is an interesting subject. When entering photographic competitions you have to remove your emotional attachment and concentrate on the quality of the image and relevance to the subject. But deciding on your favourite photo allows personal emotions into the equation. I have been looking back at some of my favourites and many of them have a personal element that others viewing them could not appreciate. The ones that aren't emotionally charged are mainly what I would call crafted images in that they had some element of creativity, not just a lucky snap like this one that my wife took on her phone bless her...


Smiling Sunflower 2.jpg

:ROFLMAO:
 
One of my most favorite images if not my most favourite. I was out in the forest around lac Montbel , Aude, S. France photographing wild orchids, I knew of a location that had one specific one I wanted to get a image of for a large print. As I walked along the path I heard a rustle ahead of me so I stopped and brought the camera up to my eye checked the settings via the viewfinder and waited for a few minutes - this little one walked into the space between two trees by the side of the path about 10yds ahead of me, he was nibbling on the leaves of a shrub and then stopped and looked directly at me for about 30 seconds then went back to nibbling as he wandered off into the forest again. I felt very privileged to have had this encounter and to have been trusted by a truly wild deer - and to get the shot :)

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I think if pressed this is probably my Favourite photo*** of my entire catalog.

Not because it's necessarily the best shot I've taken - or even the best shot i've done in this particular genre. It's a little more cerebral than that. This shot is pretty much the first of this style of still-life that I managed to shoot, from concept, to drawings, to initial setup, lighting, re-staging, re-lighting, fine tuning the composition, shooting, and getting into the digital darkroom for the final tweaks in a single session. Everything I'd done beforehand had been a much more long drawn out process, taking days, weeks, and on one particular occasion over a month to get it to look how it did in my minds eye. This one, by coming together as it did, marked the fact that in my own head, I'd reached a level of confidence with the tools and props that I could get things 90% right straight out of the prop-box (and fridge)....

Still Life with Wine and Walnuts by The Big Yin, on Flickr





*** While I say it's my favourite Photo - there are many more images I have that are more meaningful emotionally to me - generally of Loved ones no longer with us, but to me they're not really about "the photo" they're about the memories - which are wonderful, and happy, and uplifting, and sad, and painful, and all those emotions stirred together - the actual "image" is almost incidental - its purely a memory trigger - a Proustian Madelaine if you will, and honestly, I rarely share those images with anyone who doesn't share the same memories of the person.
 
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haha ... well, my photo is a bit weird I know ... but I have a special memories about this shot .. this is the first shot taken on digital camera ever after I decided to become photographer :D .. yes, wait a minute .. I will tell you how it was .. back in the day I had some digital camera, it was Canon 400d and I was using that for to document our vacations mostly .. I was not linking myself to that I am doing a photography .. I was just guy with the camera who was occasionally shooting images ... Long story short: One day in summer 2013 I decided that I will become a photographer, no idea why - just out of nothing, so I've bought a second hand D7000 with famous Nikon AF-S 35mm f/1.8 DX and literally this was the first shot (or among a first shots) that I took with the camera and also the first shot ever that I post-processed (in Adobe Lightroom Classic and Photoshop on my wife's computer - she's graphic designer) ..

it's just a snap taken on our garden - but of course after composing - probably 10-15 minutes after I unpacked my used D7000 with 35mm f/1.8 lens
 

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Outside professional capacity, for my own personal enjoyment. (I need to print this out, took it on the A7R3 so it can be printed MASSIVE)

I went to Matsumoto for 1 night and in the morning i dragged myself out of bed to the castle to catch the sunrise. I set up at a 45 degree angle to the castle, and then a swan showed up, and moved closer and closer to me.

8uwgGNe.jpg
 
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I'm keen on photos that tell a story. Whenever this one pops up on my screen, I think 'I wish I'd taken that' - then realise that I did.

I was showing someone at work some street photos, and they saw this one and said ‘oh – I thought you were going to show me your pictures’. I said ‘it is my picture’. I don’t think they believed me.

I also used it (retrospectively) in a 'Political Photo of Nature' project.

This is all about politics using nature as a lever. Foxhunting is seen as a class issue, or alternatively a town v country matter – the foxes themselves aren’t uppermost in the minds of the pro and anti lobbies.

The Labour Government after their landslide in 1997 brought in the foxhunting ban as one of its first acts. They didn’t really do this to benefit the fox, but to please (and thank) their electorate. David Cameron was re-elected in 2015, and part of manifesto pledges was to hold a vote on re-introducing foxhunting. However, the vote was dropped on the day it was due to be held (the day of these protests), and the only reason for doing so was not some sudden conversion to the cause on Cameron’s behalf, but because he feared that he would ‘lose’ the vote (even though it was going to be a free vote). A purely political decision to save face.

To me this showed the weakness of the man as a political leader, in that as soon as his position or authority was challenged, he backed away – he pulled the vote rather than lose it. Looking back now, it was a pointer to his subsequent behaviour over the Brexit referendum. He only held the referendum as he arrogantly thought he would easily win it – when he lost he scurried away and immediately resigned rather than face up to, and deal with, the consequences of his actions.

In many ways the protest was purely political as well. It would be fascinating to know how many participants were really concerned with protecting foxes themselves, or were they involved more on a principled / class-based stance? Which would be the very definition of political really – an ideological argument using nature as its tool.

From a photographic point of view, there are also some classic photographic strengths in this image – such as capturing the ‘decisive moment’, without the media there, the image would be far less powerful, and the flare smoke dispersed pretty quickly. It’s also very descriptive – you can place the time and event precisely.

Fight for the Fox --12.jpg
 
Oh this is difficult and for me it depends which way I go with this. Photography has been a hobby for well over 50 years now, do I go for a nice photograph, a memory or even an emotion? Film or digital? I do still look at my film pictures and my favourite might be one I haven't taken, me as a boy with my family on holiday maybe? Or the picture which got me really into photography? I know which picture that was. In more recent times, digital times, I have maybe a dozen flower shots which would need to be gone through to see if any make it onto a shortlist. Maybe a dozen or so of Mrs WW, some posed and some candid snapshots in the original meaning of the phrase. Mrs WW sat on the bed looking at her phone or on the beach just a few minutes before I proposed? I take a lot of pictures on days out, some with people in them as a main element in the frame and some more scenic but the problem with the more scenic ones is that I've suffered from stress and depression for decades and a picture without a loved one as a main element, believe it or not, can bring back memories and emotions from times when I was in a darker place, probably alone and out walking and taking pictures and even a pretty picture taken on a more recent happy day if "empty" can evoke those old feelings of emptiness, solitude, depression, despair, pointlessness.

So I thought I'd decide based on this... If the house caught fire and I couldn't reach my albums, computers or back up disks and had to just grab a picture which would I grab. Well. None of my pictures can be recreated as the moment is gone but I could take similar ones assuming that the "thing/place/person" in the picture is still here. My mam isn't still here so I can not take another picture of her. Pictures of her are therefore truly irreplaceable.

This one I have printed and framed so in my house on fire scenario I could grab it. It's a crop from a larger picture which was just a snap shot and as the background was messy I had to try and remove it and as I'm not good at processing there are issues which are obvious. In the printed picture on the wall they're not too distracting though. So this is my choice. She was growing her hair so it'd be long enough to tie back with a ribbon but sadly she didn't live long enough to see that little target achieved.

Margaret. 1929-2023. Free from pain and suffering may you RIP. Thank you for caring for me through all of my troubles. Whilst I'm alive you will be remembered and you will be loved.


1-DSC04652-R1.jpg

Her necklace contains a little felt pad and the idea is that you put a drop of soothing smelly on it. The message on it reads "I love you to the moon and back." It was a birthday or Christmas present from me. Mrs WW has a very similar one.
 
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Here's a more recent film fave of mine. It's not because it is sharp or well exposed, or processed well (as you can see). It's because my original concept of what the shot would show worked well. A couple of rolls were used up in making a near convincing double exposure. It took considerable effort for a competition entry that otherwise, I would never have attempted...it was fun.

GaliaC.jpg
 
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Gosh! Favourite? This is a difficult one. But a strong favourite, probably to me my most evocative, is this old film photo (shot on my Rollei 35LED in the early '90s,) is this. The gentleman is Norman Howe, now sadly no longer with us. He was a former senior IT boss and good friend. We shared many walks, both short and long, in Yorkshire and Cumbria. As a boss he was firm (very!) but fair; as a friend he was the best. I remember him fondly.

Norman Howe by Stephen Lee, on Flickr
 
This is an old shot I took nearly 40 years ago on slide film. Its of the dredger Clearway which was a steam boat hence the smoke. It is whitehaven harbour with the west pier in shot. I borrowed a 135mm lens from my mate which I used for this on my Olympus OM2sp.

Clearway by Alf Branch, on Flickr
 
This got me looking through my pictures .... and what I really like is candid street people, and their facial expressions. I found two I really like, both featuring 3 people. Not everyone's cup of tea perhaps. No points for technical ability, but one for opportunism.

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I can't think of an all time favourite photo. It's a bit like what is my favourite piece of music it changes constantly.
 
I posted one in here earlier - but I have taken another one that may well become my favourite. My small pub-based photogroup set ourselves a theme of 'Monochrome - in a Film Noir Style'. I've never done this sort of photography before, so it was highly interesting. Instead of a street photo which was my initial aim (I'd planned to go to Lancaster one evening, the right foggy/misty night came around and I was already to go - but ended up taking a neighbour to A&E), I went for a set photoshoot instead. I've done neither set / scenesetting nor portrait photography before. I was lucky to find a willing model (my brother-in-law) and an old garage with stuff (clearing out the father-in-law's house). I added the smoke in photoshop later - as he's not a smoker.

I think it's one of the most 'professional' photos I've taken. Well pleased with it.

I gave my sister-in-law a framed copy, with the words 'would you trust this man?'


Section 7 .jpg by Bodian Photography, on Flickr
 
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My favourite shot was this Banyan tree image I took very early in my digital photography journey. Nearly 10 years ago, it was the last time I had seen all the family in one place for my sister's wedding in Hawaii. When I look at it I remember my now grownup daughter is hiding behind the tree with her friend after an unsuccessful attempt at climbing it. The rest of the 20 odd family members walking behind me on the way down to the beach. It was a great day and Its a shot I really love even if it makes me a bit sad missing how close we all were before scattering to the wind around the world.

It was also the day before I decided to never be a wedding photographer as a job, I had been drafted into the role for the ceremony and reception (on the basis that everyone in the family was very impressed with my macro photography...:facepalm:) I didn't have any experience with people togging until that truly stressful day. It all ended up ok with a lot of shots I am quite proud of but never ever again, god know what I was thinking saying yes in the first place.

Shade of the Banyan Tree by Ryan Bailey, on Flickr
 
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My the most favourite photo of all times is for obvious reason this recursive-photo-acronym (photo in the photo) .. it's very very personal and perhaps a bit NSFW, that's why I give link ... it's the first ever photo of .... of, you will see if you won't be afraid to click on the link .. are you scared ? you should be !!!
 
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I have an older photo taken 25 years ago with my first really good (2.1 megapixel) digital camera (Sony MVC 98D) of a train in the North Carolina, USA Transportation Museum. It's one of the steam engines that get used for the train ride around the perimeter of the museum property (which is an original railroad service shop and yard that was abandoned by the Southern Railroad following their switch to Diesel). This shot is straight from the 2.1 megapixel camera with no editing.

The second photo was taken a little over a year ago in my studio with one of my Canon 77D cameras. The only light is a Godox SK400 with 7" reflector and a 10 degree grid (camera left) to keep the light controlled to about an 8" diameter at 4' distance from the roses and not modified, except for size and resolution. to make it fit this site's requirements.

The third photo was taken more recently in my studio using my Canon 90D camera. Again no modifications, except for size and resolution to fit the site requirements. Again, only one light, a Godox SK400 with 7" reflector and 30 deg grid about 4' from the rose located camera left.

I keep enjoying these and looking back through my thousands of shots to view them again and again, so they must be a bit special to me. So I have now printed all three in 8 X 10" size to hang them in the hair/makeup/break area of my studio. I've been doing various forms of "Still Life" shooting this past year whenever the studio isn't being used for anything else. Good lighting for these has required more precise and carefully adjusted lighting than even portrait shooting.

Charley
 

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Most favourite? Probably not this one overall but of those from the last few weeks it's the one I am most likely to recall taking. I was watching a swan on the cut at reasonably close quarters and wondering how to make a worthwhile photo out of it. At that point I think it took umbrage and decided to confront me. I was 'running' backwards when I took it.

Mute swan, Marsworth.]
 
The one that I have selected is not for artistic or emofional reasons, but for the work and time that I put in to get it. The story starts with a casual mention by a colleague that he had seen a photograph of a local church with the sun setting directly behind it. I checked the viewpoints with a notepad, pencil and compass then researched the sun positions using information posted on the U.S. Navy Astronomical website. I had to guess the elevation. It appeared that there were five days in July, weather and cloud cover permitting, when the sun should coincide with the church tower. I had five months to wait, but fortunately my shift pattern did not interfere with my plans.

On the third day the cloud cover was not preventing a clear view and all I had to do was predict the exact place that the sun lined up directly behind the church's two windows. Easier said than done with a tripod. Then there was flare to be considered given that I was using the 300mm end of a Sigma zoom lens. Anyway, it would have been easier to photoshop it, but here it is...

Wentworth Church Sunset Scan.jpg
 
A very interesting question and be I’ve not considered. I’m not sure I have a favourite standout photo of all time to be honest, except one of my wedding photos but this wasn’t one I took obviously.
 
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