My Word with Douglas E. Welch

There are many rules, guidelines, suggestions, and ideas around what makes a good photographic composition. Every person has their own particular aesthetic and way of seeing, and it can be difficult to find your way through all the information to a concept that works for you.

However, there is one simple tip that may be the easiest and quickest way for you to improve your images. It’s free and doesn’t usually require you to buy anything. All you need to do is stop, think, and make a different choice. What is that choice? The choice of changing your point of view.

Receding water levels in Spain’s Valdecañas Reservoir has exposed a stone monument dating back to between 4,000 to 5,000 years ago.

Unusually warm weather produced drought conditions across much of Europe this past summer, including Spain. The lack of rain, while a headache for farmers and gardeners, has resulted in the complete re-emergence of an ancient megalithic site known as the Dolmen of Guadalperal, as reported in The Local.

Get ready to count some birds, because Audubon’s Great Backyard Bird Count starts this Friday, February 14, and runs through Monday the 17th. This is a beginner-friendly event, even easier to join than the Christmas bird count.

You don’t even need a backyard. Just find a place where you’re likely to see some birds. This is a great time to visit a local park or wildlife refuge. To participate, count birds for at least 15 minutes “in as many places and on as many days as you like.” You’ll keep a separate checklist for each outing. In addition to noting the types of birds you see, make sure to count (or estimate) how many individuals you saw. Two cardinals at your feeder. 20 geese on the lake.

A Post By: Hannele Luhtasela-el Showk

It’s the easiest thing in the world to take a photo. You aim and press, and you’ve captured a moment, which in time will turn into a treasured memory. But did you know that with just a little bit more effort and barely any time, you can turn those captures into something more? Something that offers the subject the respect it deserves. Something that is a pleasure to look at even before the shimmer of nostalgia is sprinkled onto it by time, and something you’ll be proud to share.

With these five basic steps, you will notice an immediate improvement in your photos. Once you’ve started giving it just a little bit more thought, it’ll become a natural part of your photography.

Let’s begin!

Today the Library of Congress added another way of sharing some of its timeless collections with new audiences on diverse social media channels. We’ve joined several other cultural institutions to make selected rights-cleared images available on the Unsplash free stock photography website. Founded in 2013, the Unsplash site contains more than 1 million free high-resolution curated photos furnished by a community of more than 150,000 photographers. 

In July, the channel launched Unsplash for Education to reach out to the student and teacher community. Several other cultural institutions besides the Library have joined in the effort—from federal agencies such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the United States Geological Service to fellow libraries like the British Library and New York Public Library, to other exhibitions spaces such as Birminghams Museum Trust and Museums Victoria.

For decades, Alan Lomax traveled across America, the Caribbean and Europe, with a recorder and a camera in hand, trying to document traditional folk cultures before they disappeared.

Lomax was, in fact, the most famous American folklorist of the 20th century — the first person to record blues greats Muddy Waters and Lead Belly, the man who took down the oral histories of Jelly Roll Morton and Woody Guthrie, the chronicler of religious rites in Haiti and “ring shout” rituals from the Sea Islands off the Atlantic coast.

In his notebooks, Lomax documented his encounters with performers, his extensive travel and his collaborations with famous figures such as Pete Seeger, Zora Neale Hurston and his folklorist father, John Lomax. The Lomax family, friends and colleagues transcribed many of the performances and interviews he undertook during his years of fieldwork — including his stint as a Library employee from 1937 to 1942.