Towards the end of last year, I met a local photographer and film maker, Wayne Sables.
We’d met at a networking event and had a great conversation and quickly arranged a follow up 1-2-1 meeting to find out more about each other and how we might build a mutually beneficial relationship going forward.
Wayne was coming towards the end of a 365 day photo challenge he’d set himself and this was the impetus for me to trade in some old, unused, gear and get a compact camera that I could carry around almost all of the time and challenge myself to get more creative in my photography. I wanted to get back to the basic love of image making for my own pleasure (not to say that I don’t get pleasure from the work I do, however).
Fast forward a little and Wayne has launched a 30 day Photo challenge for January 2026 and is inviting contributors to take a photo every day, to follow a brief he sets, and submit them to the group. The challenge isn’t just for established photographers and it’s open to everybody who has access to a camera.
I’ve set myself a few limitations for this project and I’ll only be using the compact camera I bought (a used Leica D-Lux 7) and spending no more than 15 minutes shooting the image(s) and a similar amount of time editing them.
I’ll be adding the images to this blog over the month as a record for all to see. There’s also a Facebook group where we all share our images and there are some great photos popping up!
Andrew Lyons
Day 30 "Your choice"
Very busy day today, so not so much a “your choice” more a “grab what you can” kind of photo.
I was at a seminar in Sheffield this afternoon and found myself outside the station on my way home.
So a sort of hybrid street/night/leading lines/b&w effort today.
Day 29 "Perfectly imperfect"
Last year, I built a desk for my home office/studio out of scaffolding poles and boards as a little project.
Just next to my left arm, there’s a small knot in the wood, less than a centimetre across. It’s a little bit loose though, and can be pushed up and down though the board, with a satisfying click, and I often find myself toying with it as I’m sat here.
I had planned to do a a comparison, but in the end settled on this single image.
Day 28 "Night time"
Very quick and dirty edit on this too. I did try some B&W conversions, but as my last night shot was B&W I messed with the colours instead.
For those of you that might be interested.
ISO 3200 (This camera’s max’)
Day 27 "Colour"
Well yet another drab, dreary day outside, so little chance of anything particularly colourful, so a studio shot it is then.
This was the third subject I’d shot this morning before I decided to go with it.
Minimal editing in Lightroom, with a slight vignette around he edges to focus attention to the centre.
Day 26 "Street scenes"
I have to agree with Wayne that street photography is a genre that’s particularly suitable for B&W images.
I’d done some street photography with people for another of the challenges and so decided on something a little different. I also decided to post more than a single image in a little “Photo Essay”.
I live in Dinnington, and it’s fair to say that the “town” has never recovered after the pit closures. I can remember when it was a bustling shopping centre, with all manner of different places to get things.
Now, it’s just got charity shops, Turkish barbers and vape shops and lot’s of dereliction.
It’s been like that for years and I can’t see it changing while Rotherham council continue pursuing their vanity projects that look good on paper, provide lots of back slapping opportunities for the politicians, but provide little benefit to real people.
Sorry for the rant and I’m not normally a political animal, but scenes like this really sadden me.
Day 25 "A frame within a frame"
Well, another dreary, dull day today and certainly not one for venturing very far with a camera.
I have to admit that I drew some inspiration for today’s shot from one I’d seen earlier in the challenge so please excuse my slight plagiarism.
I think the rain on the car’s wing mirror about sums up today.
Day 24 "Music vibes"
Although I love going to see live music, my own talents are sadly lacking (in the extreme) so no musical instruments for me to call on.
As I tend to consume most of my music while driving I thought a shot of my car’s screen would be appropriate.
I chose this track to show, as I’m going to see Gary Numan later this year, which will be the third consecutive year I’ve seen him.
Day 23 "Silhouettes"
As I sat at my desk this morning I saw this ornament on a shelf close by and thought that the head would look interesting in profile.
In the end, I opted to keep a little detail in the ornament so it was a little more easily identifiable.
Day 22 "Lens flare sunsets"
Ok, I admit defeat. As most of you have probably realised, I’ve tried to take a new photo every day to fit the brief, rather than searching an archive of thousands of photos to find a historical image that suits.
I nearly gave up entirely until a few minutes ago when I remembered a sunset on a beach in Goa at Christmas in 2023. Still took an age to find it, however, as it was on my phone, not my PC.
A few tweaks in Lightroom and here it is.
Hopefully, normal service will be resumed tomorrow.
Day 21 "Faceless emotion"
Something of a challenge, but that’s what I relish. A chance to get the grey matter ticking.
The challenge says “faceless” not headless, so I reckon this fits the brief.
Have you ever felt the emotion of being chained to a digital world, when what you really want to do is get outdoors into the countryside & fresh air?
Some limitation imposed by attempting a self portrait that I’ve attempted to mask in editing, so this is more of a proof of concept than a finished photograph….
Day 20 "Bird's eye view"
I combined the two restrictions and got a “Birds eye view” of my destination this way
Day 19 "Layers"
I had initially thought of this idea but wasn’t too sure if it might be a little predictable. Anyway, I went with it in the end.
I was going to duplicate the layers in Photoshop and rearrange them similar to yesterday’s challenge, which involved around 16 layers in Photoshop, but it seemed to detract from the impact of the original, so I left it alone…
Day 18 "Circle symmetry"
I had originally taken numerous images of a Glencairn glass with different coloured lighting to arrange in a single ring.
In the end though I decided to just use one original photo duplicated numerous time to create this composite image.
Day 17 "Furry friends"
I don’t have a pet right now and life events and routine mean that it’s not really something I can consider at the moment.
This is a paw print of her as a keepsake.
Day 16 "Glint & glamour"
Lots of thinking about this one today, along with a few tries of different subjects.
In the end I opted for a candle that I had to hand. Placed it on a black backdrop and added a coloured light to illuminate the front of the glass holder.
The end image is a result of a fair bit of trial and error in Lightroom, playing with levels mainly
Day 15 "Hope"
Quite a simple post from me today. This little tag means a lot.
A simple gift that proved to me that life can get better from the darkest of places.
Day 14 "Letters in nature"
An interesting one today and I had a plan to find natural phenomenon that resembled letters and found a couple of examples on my way to a meeting this morning.
It was then that I saw the sign in the lay by and I thought, there it is. Literally, letters in “Nature”!
Cropped a little to focus on the sign and adjusted the levels slightly and that’s all.
Hope you like it.
Day 13 "Clouds & Sky"
Well the weather really didnlt fancy playing ball today did it?
I stuck my head out of the back door to see if had stopped raining as I really need to clean my motorbikes and saw that the sun was valiantly trying to break through.
I under exposed the shot in camera to concentrate on the sky and not the houses and then adjusted levels in Lightroom
It looks more like the sky at night really, but it’s not
Day 12 "Black & white drama"
I drive past this shop on a daily basis but it really caught my attention a few weeks ago, on a foggy night, when the floodlights cut through the gloomy evening.
I’d taken a couple of alternative images this morning while in Rotherham, but wanted to see if this subject would work, and so had to wait until it got dark before I could find out….
In the end, it was the right decision.
Day 11 "Food textures"
Very little to say about this.
A single, colour changing bulb, off camera left. Some ambient light to lift it a little and graduated linear mask from the right to accentuate the shadows.
Day 10 "Bokeh magic"
Lots of opportunities, some which worked and some which didn’t.
This is one that I think worked of the recently opened Leah’s Yard, which is home to Pete McKee’s gallery amongst others.
Quite a simple edit in Lightroom really to correct the verticals (one of my pet hates), crop to a more pleasing aspect, and applying a pre-set develop action.
Day 9 "Negative space"
Another BOGOF from me today, along with a bit of explanation.
Negative space is something I use quite a lot in my commercial work. It’s great when a client wants to use the image in a meme or add text or graphics to it, as it leaves space for them to do that.
I had this concept in mind when I saw the brief for a number of reasons.
The closer shot is the original image, but I felt that it didn’t have enough “space”, so I “cheated”.
After my normal post processing in Lightroom, I exported the image into Photoshop, where I took advantage of the “Generative Expand” tool. This is an AI powered tool that works the opposite way to cropping an image. Instead of making it smaller, the user expands the image to the size they want and AI fills the edges in.
Whilst I shy away from full blown AI image generation, this type of AI now makes photoshop and other editing programs behave in the way that the public always thought they did. Everybody used the phrase “Oh, just Photoshop it after”. It was never as simple as that though and often required far more work to fix in post processing than it would do to get it right in the first place.
What do you think of this type of AI “enhancement” ?
Day 8 "Leading lines"
A BOGOF offer from me today. Two for the price of one, purely because I can’t make my mind up which one I prefer.
“Leading lines”. One of the most well know and well used composition techniques in photography, where the lines lead the viewer’s eye into the picture. Normally I’d have had the lines leading to a point of interest, but that didn’t pan out as expected.
The shopping trolley shot was my initial plan for something a little different, but I’d been at a meeting this morning and noticed the fencing that I quite liked. I
Day 7 "Self portrait"
A bit of a challenge for somebody like me, who’s not keen on being in friont of a camera. Limited time also presented a challenge on this assignment, hence being a little late in posting this.
I’m not 100% happy with the outcome of this for different reasons and that’s enough said!
Day 6 "Hygge comfort"
What a better way to spend a cold winter’s night than in front of a roaring fire with a dram of your favourite single malt…..
This felt more like a commercial product shoot as the props were staged slightly making use of my single malt collection.
There’s a Scottish theme running through the shot, as the candle is from the Burrell Collection at Pollock Country Park, which is well worth a visit (and it’s free).
Leica D Lux 7 iso640. F2.5 1/6. Tripod mounted.
Day 5 "Reflections"
Here’s my effort for day 5.
I cropped the original image into a “panoramic” image. I seem to be going through a phase of liking widescreen images.
Then played around with the levels before then applying a Lightroom pre-set for the teal look.
I like the way that not only do you get the reflection in the mirror, but you also get the reflection of the mirror’s lights in the lens.
Leica D Lux 7. 1/250 F2.8 75mm (full frame equivalent).
Day 4 "light & shadows"
Whilst it didn’t fit with my preconceived idea for this challenge I think it fits the brief.
Leica D Lux 7. 200iso, F2.8, 1/80 second. Edited in Adobe Lightroom
Day 3 "Joy in motion"
On seeing today’s theme, my very first thought for the topic was headlight trails at night. I soon began to think, however, that I’d shot that sort of image before, albeit some years ago and decided to try and come up with another idea.
This morning I was in Sheffield shooting some behind the scenes images at a rehearsal for a short film being directed by a friend of mine.
Some of the cast were waiting on a settee . I asked them to move around, and hoped for the best.
Hand held. Settings were F16, 6 seconds, ISO 200 (long story, don’t ask). Post processing in Lightroom.
Day 2 "Texture"
The second challenge was about texture.
I had an idea in mine when I saw the brief, but that changed. I was initially going to shoot the wall of my garage at home.
After being confined to the house for a couple of days because of a cold, however, I decided to venture to Roche Abbey. I thought that the rocks and stones would be a great fit for the assignment, but in the end this weathered old gatepost caught my eye.
Day 1 "A worm's eye view"
For this image I only ventured into my garden. There was an old fence panel that had blown down a couple of weeks ago that I hadn’t got around to taking to the recycling centre and I thought it would be a great subject for this initial challenge.
My phone doesn’t have a flip screen so it was a bit of trail and error, not being able to see the screen before pressing the shutter button. I wanted to get some sort of leading line in the image, but in the end I thought that this was the strongest of the half a dozen or so that I shot.
A wide/medium aperture gives a shallow depth of field with only the centre part of the fence panel being in focus.
Very basic editing in Adobe Lightroom classic to straighten and crop the images a little (remember the trial and error part of shooting and to tweak of the levels, but that was it.