Monochrome Challenge
When scrolling through Instagram, I recently came across a German photographer by the name of Tom Bitterlich. (He takes beautiful pictures by the way, so definitely check him out!)
Around the time I discovered his page, he posted a collection of shots, that really got me: Cologne Red! It was accompanied by the following caption:
Btw if you’re stuck creatively just give your self a little challenge on your walks.. for example just shoot red/blue/shadows/etc.. it’s a great way to get your creativity flowing again.
Of course, I had heard of this idea before, so I did not give it much thought and instead enjoyed the carousel of beautiful pictures. But a few days ago, out of boredom, I snapped a picture of a yellow assistance button on my commute. This made me think back to Tom's post and caption and I had the idea, to make my own little challenge: Shoot yellow!
But why might a photographer even need a challenge in the first place?
The short answer to this is: To change perspective.
Any kind of artist can feel stuck from time to time and photographers are no different. We might think that the place we live in is boring, we're always seeing the same people and places. This problem really has two obvious solutions: Shift our environment, or shift our perspective! Both of these are of course incredibly fun, but shifting your perspective has two key benefits: It does not cost anything and it can massively benefit our photographic eye in the long term.
Why does this work?
Even if we don't notice it, we all have a soft spot for something specific when taking photos: Some photographers might prefer shooting interesting places, others interesting people, one might like busy, bustling spaces while another one prefers vast, open, minimalist shots.
A challenge like only shooting a specific shape or color forces us to get out of our comfort zone and shift the ways in which we see the world and search for subjects. Objects, places and scenes we might have discarded as rubbish yesterday are suddenly interesting and the hunt for our goal opens up new possibilities and helps us stay alert.
And the best thing? When repeating this with different challenges, our general perspective eventually broadens and we might even discover new motives, scenes and opportunities we might have discarded even just a few weeks earlier.
My yellow challenge
As mentioned at the beginning of this post, shooting a series in yellow was not an intentional decision. It rather was the result of two factors coinciding, one being Tom's post on Instagram and the other being the casual snap of the assistance button at the tram stop. That photo reminded me of the challenge Tom Bitterlich did and I started looking around, discovering the guidelines and the yellow car passing by. I continued for a few days, shooting anything yellow I encountered. While some shots worked, most didn't, but it resulted in a series of ten pictures that I feel are worth to show!
These pictures of course aren't groundbreaking and far from being my best work. But that never was the point! The point of such a challenge is to change our perspective on the world around us and get us out of our comfort zone.