Our Picture This! assignment for this month was "Wavin' Old Glory," and readers responded with a host of images that speak to the profound connection we all have with this powerful symbol. Many of the images spoke to the sacrifices of our men and women who have served in defense of our country, something that cannot but remind us of our brave troops serving...

This month's Picture This! assignment was Patterns in Nature. Readers responded with a glorious selection of design, form, and color derived from plants, rocks, and animals. While the debate over so-called "Intelligent Design" and evolution may stir some to emotional rhetoric, there's some respite in simply marveling at and enjoying the visual pleasures...

This month's Picture This! assignment, Found Montage, will not be running. The photographs submitted for Picture This! were sent from our collection point to review a few days before Hurricane Katrina struck and never arrived for review. After extensive efforts at tracing the review package we can only conclude that the package was lost within the chaos of the storm and its...

Our Picture This! assignment for this month was Background Blur, creating a sense of dimension in the photograph by playing a sharp foreground subject off against a blurry, or unsharp background. Readers sent in a wide variety of subjects, from flowers to statues to birds and carnival rides, all using this time-honored technique. Many used telephoto lenses to enhance the shallow...

Telephoto lenses are great for bringing distant objects closer and giving you "tunnel vision" that isolates parts of your personal field of view. They also have an added benefit, a visual trick most commonly called the "stacking effect," where a series of subjects each distant from one another are brought in much closer visual contact. This compression of...

Every color has an association, and each of us reacts to hues and their shadings in different ways. This month's Picture This! assignment was Blue Moods, and readers sent us in an amazing set of images that conveyed the range of emotions this most evocative color creates. While many relied on the cold side of this color in winter scenes, others found their blue mood in the...

There's an adage in photography that if you're not sure how to deal with the light just turn 90Þ from the source and shoot away, taking advantage of the way light shapes the subject as it streaks along a plane. Our assignment for Picture This! was directional light, and readers responded with images that played with light in many imaginative ways. As these...