I’ve been taken photography as a “serious hobby” in the past 4 years, give or take a few months. Within that time, I’ve managed to publish a few images from my underwater adventures in local printed media- specifically geographical and scuba diving magazines. Recently, a picture I took while mountain biking in the Alps in 2007 have reached the cover of a free edition of “Big Bike” Magazine, and has been printed in the thousands.

This proves a point- even if you’re not a commercial or professional photographer, being at the right time and the right place can get your photographs printed and published for the world (or at least a few thousands of people) to see. What then, makes a time and a place right? I’ve given it some thought and here are my tips on how to get your images published and printed:

1. Photograph things you love. My published photographes all came from areas I like, my hobbies. I think that when photographing an object or situation you’re connected to, you will effortleslly bring in good energy to your photography.

2. Photograph a lot. Once you’re out there, taking planned and well staged shots with high quality equipments is great, but don’t forget the occasional snapshot. In the bottom line- more photos mean more options, and with everything digital, any limitation on quantity is only virtual.

3. Share your photos. Whenever I’m on a vacation, if I take pictures of random people or of crouse friends I’m out with, I always try to take the time later to sort and share the images with more people. It’s fun, most people will appreciate and enjoy a good photo of themselves, and in turn will remember you. Just as the case with the image shown above- Joseph Pauly, photographed in this image, sent me an e-mail asking if he can send the image to Big Bike Magazine for print- over two years after it’s been taken. Another way of sharing is online, through popular platforms or more humble ones, such as The Wide Lens.

4. Enter Competitions. Online, local, by theme or reigonal- if you find a competition that looks like fun to enter, do it! You might just win something and get good recognition (and prizes). Competitions can promote your work greatly, as they are often coupled with printed media covering the results.

5. Offer your work. Most of us have a theme we like to photograph, go online and look for organizations, companies or magazined that you think might be interested in your work and send them some samples, they might refuse- but you’ll definetly not get a yes without trying.

If you want to publish your photographs here on The Wide Lens- follow this link.

It’s been a while since I posted a proper post exclusive for flower photography. This time, the season set me to focus on a specific species. The Cyclamen.

Blooming in forests and woods anywhere between December and all through March, Cyclamen spread out into vast carpets of pink and white.

Although the overall impression is nice, getting in close to get the details is what I thought of doing as I came across a field of Cyclamen with my camera.

Most of the images I took felt much better with a 50-150mm lens, and an open aperture which created a nice focus and soft blurred background. All images taken with my Olympus e-420.

I post processed one of the images into black and white, and liked the result enough to get a printed 40×60cm version of it up on my living room wall.

Share your latest venture on photography- post it on The Wide Lens

Cathedrals are excellent photographic playgrounds. This time I got to visit and shoot in perhaps the most famous of them all, the Notre Dame cathedral located in Paris, France.

If I’ll try to define the common photographic attractions found in cathedrals, such as Notre Dame and others- these will be the objects that will always catch my eye: Stained glass art, the architectural scale of these usually very impressive structures, stone figures and art icons and of course- the general atmosphere of the cathedral.

I started taking pictures in the Notre Dame cathedral using a tripod, as lighting conditions are far from ideal, and I wanted to avoid very high ISO settings and the accompanied “digital noise”. For whatever reasons, I was prohibited from using my tripod, making the job of capturing the architecture of the cathedral very difficult.

With, I turned to the objects in Notre Dame I could photograph more easily, this series features one image from the outside, a snapshot I took with my pocket camera, and two shots from the inside, trying to demonstrate some of the unique features and atmosphere that can be found in the Cathedral of Notre Dame.

The legendary hunchback, unfortunately, remained out of sight.

Have you photographed famous cathedrals in the world? post your story and photos in The Wide Lens

Thanks for Ian Mackie, who runs a fantastic photo blog titled The Art of Adventure for sharing these images which he took from what’s almost his back yard.

“We hear ‘eat locally’ quite often these days, but sometimes it’s difficult for landscape and adventure photographers to stay close to home when the great outdoors are beckoning. Fortunately I live in Seattle, where adventure can be found literally out my back door. Here are some photos from a half-day sea kayaking trip around Blake Island in Puget Sound. All images were shot hand-held (mostly from my sea kayak) with a Canon Rebel XT, Canon 17-85 IS and polarizer.”

Is your “back yard” a photography heaven too? Send in some images so we can see.

On July 15th a unique form of Slope Style biking competition took place in Avoriaz, France. Aimed to push riders to their limit while displaying big-air capabilities, 360’s, back flips, drops and gaps- this event has been literally upgraded.

Taking advantage of the rooftop of the local tourism office and a few restaurants, the course was built in a radical way. Bridge constructions and truckloads of dirt were used to form a crazy run, where jumping off the roofs has been acknowledged for the first time as an integral part of competitive biking.

The local tourism office had granted me with a press pass, as I will cover this event on an Israeli mountain biking magazine, and possible some other resources- that was very helpful in getting these images:

Photographed an extreme sports event? Publish it on The Wide Lens