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Poetry and Photo Prompts: Doors & Passageways Photo Play

By Julie Matkin 46 Comments

Poetry and Photo Prompts: Doors & Passageways Photo Play

As we begin a new year I’m delighted to introduce an ongoing Photo Play opportunity that will encourage you to explore our monthly poetry themes in a visual way.

I’ll be here to help you push your interpretation of the themes. This isn’t about camera techniques as much as it’s about “seeing”. We’ll work together (and play together) to develop how you see a subject and choose to photograph it. That can be as simple as where you stand and what you include in the frame, the most basic of all photography principles.

Looking out into the sunlight

To start, we’re looking at Doors and Passageways, which can make for interesting photos even taken in the most literal way. Walking through any town or village you’re likely to find interesting subjects. I’m hoping we also can take that a little bit further and look for a photo play on the potential of the new year, represented by openings or paths that give just a hint of what may lie beyond.

Door in the corner

When you’ve found your subject, take time to consider how you’re going to compose the image. Think about these questions:

– Do you want to get up close so you fill the frame with just the door – or a part of it?

– Is there anything interesting around the door or opening, that you’d like to step back and include to help tell the story?

– If you’re photographing a pathway, are there strong diagonal lines you can include to lead the viewer’s eye into the frame?

– How can you use your angle of view to limit what’s visible in the distance or through the doorway?

If you can’t decide between two possible approaches, shoot both and compare the images afterwards, thinking about what difference the composition makes to the mood of the photo.

Post your “photo play” on your blog, Flickr, or Pinterest account, and leave the link in a comment on this post. Some photos will be chosen for feature at Tweetspeak Poetry and all will be posted on our Pinterest Photo Play board. Deadline for submissions is this Thursday. See you back here soon!

Photos and post by Julie Matkin. 

NOTE TO POETS: Looking for your Monday poetry prompt? On Photo Play weeks, it’s right here. Choose a photo from the post and respond with a poem. Leave your poem in the comment box. We’ll be reading. 🙂

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Sometimes we feature your poems and photos in Every Day Poems if they’re a good fit. Thanks for playing with words and photos!

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  • Photo Prompts: DOORS & PASSAGEWAYS PHOTO PLAY 2 - January 20, 2014
  • Poetry and Photo Prompts: Doors & Passageways Photo Play - January 13, 2014

Filed Under: Blog, Door Photos, Photo Play, Photography prompts, poetry prompt, Themed Writing Projects

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Comments

  1. Donna says

    January 13, 2014 at 8:52 am

    OH I LOVE THIS!!! I can’t wait to see what develops! 😉

    Reply
  2. Maureen Doallas says

    January 13, 2014 at 9:12 am

    They Always Played Music

    Remember the music,
    how the light could be

    blinding on sunny days,
    how from not so far away

    the figures against the wall
    always seemed larger, eyes

    straight ahead, boring in
    on the newly made shadows

    as faces appeared in every
    window, wanting to watch,

    and then not. The knocking
    that it was time was never

    hollow. It held the surety
    of nothing but this one fact:

    They always played music.

    Reply
  3. jdukeslee says

    January 13, 2014 at 10:17 am

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/30931640@N03/11929182765/

    Doorknob. Original hardware, 1902.

    Thousands of times, my hand turned that knob. The room on the other side of the doorway knew all my secrets, and it heard about every dream — and the dreams of how many girls before me? And I wonder if we all slammed the door shut, hard against a mad world … or if the others let it creak shut on old hinges.

    The house is empty now.

    Reply
    • L. L. Barkat says

      January 13, 2014 at 10:50 am

      Empty. But the memories full.

      Awesome doorknob.

      Reply
  4. Elizabeth W. Marshall says

    January 13, 2014 at 10:18 am

    Oh joy. Expectant here. Good things in store for this I know.

    I am slipping off to create an offering.

    Reply
  5. SimplyDarlene says

    January 13, 2014 at 10:21 am

    Ohhweee. I’m thrilled – not just for the opportunity to submit an image, but to get feedback and insight.

    And these doors. Country doors. Even one with orange twine. I feel welcome.

    Thanks TweetSpeakers!

    Blessings.

    Reply
  6. jdukeslee says

    January 13, 2014 at 10:21 am

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/30931640@N03/11929632734/

    The Third Floor, childhood home.

    This is the passageway to my best childhood fun, … and my worst recurring nightmare. I took the steps, two by two, to play after school with my Holly Hobbie dollhouse up on the “third floor.” But in the nightmare, I can’t descend the steps, because three creepy old ladies are blocking the door.

    I’m 41 years old now, and still have that nightmare. And in the dream, I’m six, with a Holly Hobbie doll in my hand.

    🙂

    Reply
    • SimplyDarlene says

      January 13, 2014 at 10:23 am

      miss jdl – that image is all kinds of awesome.

      Reply
    • Donna says

      January 13, 2014 at 11:46 am

      Wow this is such a cool photo… and your comment tells such a story. Haunting. I’d love to read more. The image reminds me of a staircase from my own childhood, long forgotten. And who could forget Holly Hobbie! 🙂

      Reply
    • Will Willingham says

      January 13, 2014 at 11:59 am

      Love this shot. So much that could be happening there…

      Reply
  7. jdukeslee says

    January 13, 2014 at 10:27 am

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/30931640@N03/11929450323/

    Mom and daughter, in the barn door.

    They worked out their differences, and are on speaking terms again. But I can’t — for the life of me — figure out what they’re saying.

    Reply
    • L. L. Barkat says

      January 13, 2014 at 10:51 am

      oh my, oh my. I totally love those sheep!! 🙂

      Reply
  8. Laura Brown says

    January 13, 2014 at 12:13 pm

    The Hard Way

    If I were
    . one foot small
    I would use
    . those bolts like
    a climbing wall
    . inch myself up
    grasp the rope
    . sound the bell
    ’til one inside
    . showed up to
    bear me through
    . that door that
    was clearly open
    . the whole time

    Reply
    • L. L. Barkat says

      January 13, 2014 at 1:50 pm

      oh, this is clever in the best of ways! 🙂

      Reply
      • Laura Brown says

        January 13, 2014 at 1:55 pm

        Thanks! Can someone teach me how to indent lines successfully?

        Reply
        • Will Willingham says

          January 13, 2014 at 2:21 pm

          You could try to use

           

          (repeat the   for each space but WP isn’t very agreeable about blank spaces, so it may not work. 🙂

          Reply
          • Will Willingham says

            January 13, 2014 at 2:24 pm

            And I’m finding it very amusing that my code is working, and won’t show what I’m trying to tell you…

            Anyway…

            You would, with no spaces in between even though I’ve put them here so WP won’t treat it as code, type the following for each space:

            & n b s p ;

          • Laura Brown says

            January 14, 2014 at 12:55 am

            Testing,
              testing,
                1 2 3

    • Elizabeth W. Marshall says

      January 13, 2014 at 2:40 pm

      I thought the indentation was by design. Love this. Love the format just the way it is. And the words are triumphant.

      Reply
    • Marty says

      January 13, 2014 at 7:26 pm

      Love this.

      Reply
  9. Elizabeth W. Marshall says

    January 13, 2014 at 2:06 pm

    Invisible

    Stacked up neat or placed in winding rows
    Marked and dotted on a trail
    Like Dominoes, wave on wave
    Of curvaceous highways
    Roads, row on row of
    Tree-lined sidewalks
    Of sanitary suburbia
    Equidistance between each planting
    No
    Not the doors through which
    I go
    Or have shut
    Passed through the threshold
    To another side
    No
    The doors through which I slip and slide
    Are not stacked up neat or placed in winding rows.

    Each one invisible to the human eye.

    Reply
  10. Monica Sharman says

    January 13, 2014 at 4:18 pm

    Across the street from my house. The 4-wheelers in ATVs ignored the sign and kept going up, ruining the neighborhood favorite trail, so a neighbor built the fence.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/monica-sharman/11935862074/

    Reply
    • Monica Sharman says

      January 13, 2014 at 7:15 pm

      Forgot to mention, thanks for the learning questions, especially the one about strong diagonal lines!

      Reply
  11. Monica Sharman says

    January 13, 2014 at 4:22 pm

    By a cross-country skiing trail. So tempting to disobey the sign 🙂

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/monica-sharman/11935427755/

    …and my favorite door photo, at the home of a friend who let me use her home as a weekend writing getaway. Taken when I woke up that first morning:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/monica-sharman/5279025517/

    Reply
    • SimplyDarlene says

      January 13, 2014 at 7:14 pm

      iLike the cabin.

      Reply
  12. Marty says

    January 13, 2014 at 7:26 pm

    There’s been this nudging…and now I realize it was really the sound of a door opening and an invitation being offered.

    http://www.whatmartysees.com/2014/01/going-through-door.html

    Reply
  13. Heather Eure says

    January 14, 2014 at 12:37 pm

    Here’s one I took a while back of an old, one room school house near where I live. Apparently, that was still a thing up until the 1970’s in some rural areas.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/114361327@N03/11941122345/

    Reply
    • Will Willingham says

      January 14, 2014 at 2:52 pm

      Cool shot — are those the original colors? Really like it.

      Reply
      • Heather Eure says

        January 14, 2014 at 9:47 pm

        Thanks! The yellow was drawn out with filtering, but the red finish from the door is original.

        Reply
  14. Julie Matkin says

    January 14, 2014 at 12:47 pm

    It’s so fantastic to explore these words and images with you all – so many different perspectives!

    Reply
  15. S. Etole says

    January 14, 2014 at 1:20 pm

    I added a set here:
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/45405642@N08/sets/72157639770242985/

    Reply
    • Will Willingham says

      January 14, 2014 at 2:51 pm

      Really beautiful, Susan. So glad to see you here. 🙂

      Reply
      • S. Etole says

        January 15, 2014 at 10:52 am

        Thank you. Looks like fun.

        Reply
  16. Richard Maxson says

    January 14, 2014 at 4:28 pm

    Image: http://theimaginedjay.com/?page_id=545

    Hinge

    Before this, the flames of Autumn
    gave themselves unnoticed;
    the mountains burned each year;
    fur and fowl hurried at their havens
    to endure the ash of winter,
    as the door of winter opened.

    So swung seasons from fair to fire
    to ice, burrow and lair, thatch
    of hair for thick and thin abiding—
    the countryside unbroken.

    What is the swing of a door?
    How is it made, in time or space?
    Reason came and brought a word
    that joined the mountains to a hand.

    Fire fell when the oak was driest,
    a flame shaped to a way for going out
    and coming in from snow,
    a solitary haven, a hinge
    to something wild and holy.

    This then, a door to yesterday,
    but more than that, hewn and shaped
    and bored, a hidden blaze,
    ambiguous, at best, a wilderness
    in a wilderness once blessed.

    The shavings and the dust,
    a must to start a fire,
    to keep them warm, and warned,
    perhaps were they, to keep it close,
    controlled inside the wonder of this.

    Reply
  17. SimplyDarlene says

    January 16, 2014 at 12:56 am

    Here’s my submission.

    Thanks!

    http://simplydarlene.com/2014/01/15/in-out/

    Reply
  18. nance.mdr says

    January 16, 2014 at 12:22 pm

    image and words
    http://nancemarie.blogspot.com/2014/01/january-16.html

    Reply
  19. Patricia @ Pollywog Creek says

    January 16, 2014 at 3:35 pm

    Living in the boonies as I do, I simply haven’t had the opportunity to take this challenge, but I did create a Doors and Passageways flickr set with a few photos from my archives. They include a rusty door, a door I label new patch on old wineskin (a new aluminum door on the shanty house where my husband was raised), a door that’s apparently been broken into, and the door of the first house my husband and I owned over 30 years ago that we found a couple of years ago with “abandoned” notices taped to it. http://flickr.com/gp/pollywogcreek/467129/

    Reply
    • Sandra Heska King says

      January 16, 2014 at 6:01 pm

      Love these. I especially like that rusty door, and I really, really want to go inside Mango Bay–and the ice cream shop.

      Reply
      • SimplyDarlene says

        January 18, 2014 at 7:15 pm

        I like the shanty screen door best. It feels so real and ordinary. Then I read your description. Imagine how real it is for you…

        Blessings

        Reply
  20. Sandra Heska King says

    January 16, 2014 at 5:57 pm

    Linking up some doors and a little poem here:

    http://sandraheskaking.com/2014/01/doors-passageways-photo-poetry-prompt/

    Reply
  21. Marcy Terwilliger says

    January 16, 2014 at 11:38 pm

    Doors from the pass,
    Wide and thick
    Metal plates,
    Slide the bar
    Now it’s locked
    in place.
    Big white,
    round knobs
    to turn the
    door.
    No one lives
    here anymore.
    Childhood home,
    So full of
    sweet memories.
    Now all that’s
    left is a field
    of concrete.

    Reply
  22. Marcy Terwilliger says

    January 17, 2014 at 3:39 pm

    Thick old doors
    that have no names.
    How they cry out in pain.
    One hundred and fifty years old,
    as they hear the wrecking ball.
    Knocking on doors was
    different that day.
    Tears spilled down like rain.
    Earth shook from all the pain.
    The house in pieces,
    nothing remains.

    Reply
  23. Elizabeth W. Marshall says

    January 17, 2014 at 4:11 pm

    Warning, there are chickens involved 🙂 🙂

    http://www.wynnegraceappears.com/2014/01/17/A-Door-To-A-Home

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. When Your Calling Frightens You | Jennifer Dukes Lee says:
    January 13, 2014 at 12:10 pm

    […] Submitted in community with Michelle DeRusha. Photos submitted as part of Tweetspeak Poetry’s photo challenge.  […]

    Reply
  2. Hinge | The Imagined Jay says:
    January 14, 2014 at 6:21 pm

    […] Made Cabin Door Hinge photograph Written from TSPoetry Photo Prompt – Doors and […]

    Reply
  3. In? Out? | SimplyDarlene says:
    January 16, 2014 at 12:36 am

    […] . This door series was inspired by the creatives over at TweetSpeakPoetry. . photographic prompt doors and […]

    Reply

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