One photo a day in October 2011–Day 7

I was expecting today to be one of the more tough days of my challenge as I was going to be busy almost all day with very little time for getting out with my camera.  But in the end it was a lot easier than I thought it would be. 

At work we have a water cooler but it was out of water this morning and I wanted a cold drink.  So at 9AM I headed over to the Students Union shop to grab a quick drink.  I took my camera with me hoping to spot someone quickly. And as I walked out of the building where I work I saw the perfect subject standing there.  He looked a fantastic character with a lived in face, just the kind of person I was looking for. And then the cherry on the cake – he was only smoking a blooming pipe! I couldn’t believe it how lucky I was but would he say yes?  Thankfully he did and he looked very flattered to be asked.

So let me introduce you to the magnificent pipe-smoking man (surely a candidate for pipe smoker of the year):

Part of me wishes I’d asked him to hold the end of his pipe with his right hand but apart from that I am very pleased with the portrait.

One final thing – I had intended that all my portraits this year would be taken in landscape orientation rather than portrait (in 2009 I took the majority in portrait orientation after taking the first two in landscape).  And I did originally take a photo of my pipe-smoker in landscape but the composition didn’t work with the pipe so I had to take another in portrait.  I intend to make a mosaic of all the photos from this month at the end of the month, like I did last time, and I wanted to avoid having photos in different formats.  So I am a little disappointed that I’ve messed up my plan so early in the month but the photo I’ve taken is worth it I think.