A new month, a new challenge!
I’ve decided to go in a totally new direction with my photo prompt challenges. Starting today (Monday), at the beginning of every week I will post up a picture that I feel has a story is living in. Then the following week (Monday) I’ll post that story, pick a new photo and start it all over again.
While this is more of a challenge being issued to me, all of you are more than welcome to play too. If you feel a story speaking to you from the image (and you have time!), by all means please share it with us. If not, maybe next week’s picture will, so no worries, no stress, no deadlines, remember the object is to have some fun!
Guidelines (not rules),
- Have fun. No stressing allowed! If you get stressed I’ll be forced to find you and challenge you to a pillow fight! (I am truly awesome at pillow fighting so beware)
- Write the genre that the picture tells you to. You hear mushy, then write mushy. You hear mystery, then write mystery. And if by chance you hear Alien-Zombie-Werewolf-Apocalypse, I really really want to read that story!!!!!
- Word count. Hmmm? More than 1 and less than 1,000,000 will be fine. Seriously let the story decide, they usually know long to be. But if you need a firm number, not more than 1500 words should work well.
- Post a link to your wonderful story in the comments below, and I’ll list any on the next weeks posting.
- Oh yeah, have fun. Yes I’ve said that already, but its worth saying again!
So without further delay (or puns, or jokes, or…) here is the very first “Picture This” photo prompt.
…
The picture was taken by my very talented friend Sara Hannaford, and I thank her very much for allowing me to use it for a story. When I first saw it, I could tell there was a tale hiding somewhere inside it.
Even now the voices are starting to speak to me from it, so I’m going to have a chat with them. Happy wordsmithing friends, and I look forward to reading what ever comes out of the picture.
Cheers!
Fictional Campfire 
Nice challenge, Ken. You have made it so easy and unpressured, I just might try this. This particular picture doesn’t speak to me, but maybe by mid-week I won’t be able to stand it anymore and will have to write a story based on this pic 😛
I LOVE your new background. How vibrant and beautiful it is!
Hi Sandra,
Here’s hoping that someone or something speaks to you. If not there will be another photo next week. As for the background, every campfire needs a light show too 🙂 . Good to hear from you again!
Excellent picture prompt-there’s definitely a story here. Thanks, Ken!
Thanks Selena, isn’t it a great picture?
Thank you Ken for using my picture!!! I’m glad that you can see a story within!!! I’m really looking forward to reading the story that my picture helped to inspire you!! By all means, if there is ever another one you would like to use, let me know, and feel free!!!
Sara
Thanks again for letting me use it! This morning the voices became clearer so I’m starting to write the tale now 🙂
This picture reminds me so much of a place my friends and I would go often when I was young. It was a railroad bridge and looked so much like yours. Below, about 30 feet was water that came in from the lake around the corner. McKenney Bridge was what we all knew it by.
What memories. Thank you!
Hello Ken!
Been busy and distracted. Too many interesting things around and in the end I do nothing about anything :-(. I like you new challenge. I hope at least one of the pictures will speak to me in the coming weeks. I am sure to visit here to read everyone though.
I suffer from the same problem! I like to think that the story finds you when the time is right, so I’ll see if can find one that wants to talk to you 😉
I like the new look of your blog too!
Here’s my story, Ken. thanks for the great prompt!
Broken http://wp.me/s1jTcx-broken
Wow! Very sad story, you could feel the pain in the words. Great story, thanks as always for joining in!
Fabulous picture!
🙂
I’m loving the picture as always -lovely choice; there is a story there but do I have the time to write it -only time will tell… 😀
Oz, if it happens that’s great, if not oh well! Either way you have heard to story inside the photo, and that is a gift in it’s self.
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Yay, I found time to write something for your prompt! Here it is:
Great story Billie!, thanks for joining in and very glad that you found some time to tell this story at the campfire.
I enjoyed this “other” world, and the way you describe it makes me wonder if there is other stories waiting their turn to cross one of the bridges and escape too. I’m not sure if it’s because of the title, but the wolf-man from the third bridge looked like Clint Eastwood in my mind’s eye.
Hi Ken,
I wandered over from Billi Jo’s blog and thought I’d stop by to see who the ‘other guy’ is who also has photo prompts 😉 First, have to say I LOVE the background photo you have, gorgeous.
I love photo prompts and couldn’t find any out there so decided to do my own. I’m not sure how I missed yours and how it managed to take so long to find you. I think I might participate once in a while, if you don’t mind.
Hi Indigo,
Glad you wandered over, so welcome to the campfire. Now I’ll have to wander over your way to check things out too 🙂 .
When I was in college I took animation. During classes the teachers drilled into us the importance of telling a story with just images. Photo prompts seemed natural to me, I usually can see a story in the image, so I figured others might too. Glad that you found me, and you are welcome to join in any time a picture speaks to you.
Cheers!
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I think the picture spoke to me!
http://wp.me/p11HTF-mt
And it told a wonderful tale too! Thanks so much for joining in.