About a year ago my friend Craig was telling me how uninspired he was about his photography. He had his new 1D Mark III and was telling me that there wasn’t much to shoot. I challenged him to a friendly duel. I told him there’s always something to shoot and told him to grab his camera.  We walked outside to a dreary drainage area and I proposed the challenge: 5 minutes in the pile of rocks, my iPhone vs. his fancy camera, may the best man win.

The scene of the photo challenge, just a pile of rocks in a parking lot.

As we shot I encouraged Craig to look for pattern (that’s easy in a pile of rocks), unusual point of view, rule of thirds, texture, line, form, etc.  Here are my results from worst to best.  Remember, these were all shot with an iPhone in about 5 minutes.

My shadow.  It’s not very original but I couldn’t resist.

Dried mud.  It’s a bit out of focus but I like the texture.

Tree from below.  Check out that blue!  The iPhone doesn’t have great white balance.

Rule of thirds from a nearby wall.

This is my favorite.  Some dead leaves on concrete.

Well there you have it. You can find a photo just about anywhere you look.  Now it’s your turn, take the 5 minute challenge.  Go out to your parking lot, back yard, park, etc and make some photos.  Post the URL to your shots in the comments section.  Let’s see what you’ve got!

Click here to see Criag’s photos and read what he had to say.