Congratulations to Jared Eckstein of Grand Prairie, the winner of the Flickr Photo of the Week contest!  The subject of brainstorming is a one-inch tall clown figurine that scares Jared’s wife. She’s not alone, Jared. She is not alone.

Jared follows last week’s winner, JDAC.

If you would like to participate, all you need to do is upload your photo to to our Flickr group page. It’s fine to submit a photo you took previous to the current week, but we are hoping that the contest will inspire you to go out and shoot something fantastic this week to share with Art&Seek users. If the picture you take involves another facet of the arts, even better. The contest week will run from Monday to Sunday, and the Art&Seek staff will pick a winner on Monday afternoon. We’ll notify the winner through FlickrMail (so be sure to check those inboxes) and ask you to fill out a short survey to tell us a little more about yourself and the photo you took. We’ll post the winners’ photo on Wednesday and Gini Mascorro will read your name on the air at the end of her daily arts calendar.

Now, here’s more from Jared:                          

Jared Eckstein
Title of photo: brainstorming
Equipment: Nikon D60 with Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8
Tell us more about your photo:
Being a long time film user and darkroom junkie, I decided to make the plunge into some more modern gear earlier this month.

When I started using the digital camera, I wanted to make use of automatic everything. After a few days, I missed the smell of film chemicals, the feel of a wet negative between my fingers, and the satisfaction of reusing cameras once loved by someone else long ago. With the same spirit of experimentation cultivated in the darkroom, determination kicked in and the brainstorming began. I got my tripod, a thirty cent 1″ clown figurine from Thrift Town in Oak Cliff, and built a room for him out of old matboard. With the help of a fluorescent desk lamp, I took 14 images of different exposures (the D60 can’t bracket) and threw them into Photoshop to make my first HDR image.

This is the result at one of my first purely digital ambitions, and I’m pleased. It’s much different than most of my other cameras that are 40+ years old, but good. My latest images are also on my blog at nullanroid.com where I practice the delicate art of digital-film coexistence.