This week I wanted to share another monotone photograph that was taken back in college. At that time, there were active weekly contests on the AccessPhoto.com forums, each with a theme to guide the entries. The theme for that particular week was “patterns,” so I decided to head over to the library’s stacks to see what I could come up with. I brought along what was at the time my brand new Canon EF 85mm f1.8 lens to give it a thorough testing in different conditions also. Happily, both the lens and the photograph that it produced were well accepted. It is a lens that I continue to use often today, especially in low light conditions such as concerts.

The above image was originally shot in color, but like the sunset I felt it just worked better in this blue tone. All of the books were different colors, easily distracting ones eye to bounce around from place to place. In the singular tone, it is simplified into the light and dark contrasts, and helps the eye not get so lost with one single focal point in order to take in the whole image.

If you have not done so, give monotone colors like this a try on some of your own photographs. Save it as a different file name, and look at both back to back. You might be surprised what it can do to the feel of the image!