my mind to join photo contests when this month ends. I'm looking forward to it because I know the experience comes with some sibling love and hopefully, a bit of luck. :D


Which brings me to remember that that won't be the first time I'd be joining a photo contest. The first contest was in college, and in retrospect, I had absolutely no inkling as to what I stood up against being that I didn't have any formal background on photography (still don't). The results were based purely on gut feel and playing around with whatever pixel range and lighting I had at that time. The cam I used (which wasn't even mine to begin with), wasn't even branded! and it was supposed to be a 7.2 mp but I later on found out it was close to just a 5.-something. I didn't even know that the small tulip sign on the cam stood for macro. Haha.

All those didn't matter though, as I was one happy member of the clicking crowd. It was only towards the end of the event that I found out that my  rivals were among the best in Baguio and the Philippines and the world, most probably  (some of them were photographing for the PDI Northern Luzon Bureau. My goodness!).

Here's a handful of the photos I salvaged from that wonderful initiation:

[It was for Camp John Hay but I forgot what the name of the event was or even the theme. I also don't remember which of the following I turned in (there was a maximum of 5 photos for each contestant but I only submitted 3).

I also forgot what captions I came up with since these are bordering on the melancholic and the event was supposed to promote Camp John Hay as a haven for stressed out vacationers. It's not likely that these images promote something "gay" or "fun" or anything like that.]



Of course, I didn't win (haha). I ended up somewhere in the middle and that was good enough for me, I tell you. It was such a memorable event for the clueless first timer that I was and I'm wishing for more of these spur-of-the-moment days.