Citizen of Photography has chosen another of my pieces to offer as a limited-edition print. I’m not sure what’s going on there, but the pool of images on offer – it’s up to 25 now that they’re in their fifth week of operation – has a number of repeats from the same artists.

In any case, I seem to have become their go-to American grainy-black-and-white film guy.

I try to pay attention to the flood of news from and regarding photographers, Web sites and various contests and promotions that I receive through a dozen channels – e-mail, Twitter, Facebook, Google+, etc. – but most of it barely registers. A Twitter item caught my eye a few weeks ago, alerting me to the impending launch of a new site called “Citizen of Photography“. I checked it out and was immediately taken by the concept. In essence, their plan is to take digital submissions from anyone, using any camera, and winnow down the best to a curated few. That selection is then offered for sale as a limited edition of ten prints, at a reasonable price.

I signed up, and on July 1, I received a message letting me know I was on board and the site was open for submissions. Through most of July, I followed my usual pattern of procrastination and let the weekly informational messages pile up in my inbox. Late in the month, more was revealed; for the first two months, early contributors will have some exclusivity, with only 5 images posted per week, and after the first month, a reception and showing is to be held at London’s West Bank Gallery, featuring the first rounds of prints.

The final message came in as I was vacationing at the Grand Canyon, so I set a reminder to look into contributing when I returned home. I had a few images in mind to send along, so I followed their advice and set myself up for Dropbox transfer. Once I got into it, I decided on a dozen – a mix of color/B&W and styles – to contribute. What could it hurt? I had no idea how they’d execute their vision, but it seemed like a low-risk opportunity to gain a little exposure and maybe sell something.

I hadn’t expected to hear anything (especially not right away), but a couple of days after submitting I got a note asking if I could provide a higher-resolution version of “King without a Crown”. It’s a murky self-developed frame from a toy film camera (the blackbird, fly) – soft, fuzzy, and sprocket-holed. They’d selected it as “one of our top images” anyway, but it could not have been printed very large at its uploaded size. I thought, “Well, maybe there’s something to this.” I dug through my poorly-organized negatives, hoping that I’d been good about sleeving it. Luckily, I had, and I pushed up a scan at twice the original resolution. I got a nearly-immediate acceptance note and waited for the August 1 launch date.

It’s a little early (even for the UK-based site), but the live site is up. As promised, the photo is one of an eclectic bunch of 5:

I like the presentation, and that they appreciated the quirkiness of it:

When a photograph puts a smile on your face it’s very difficult to ignore. The Citizen of Photography team got so much pleasure in discussing the merits of this shot we simply couldn’t ignore it for inclusion on the site. Taken using a Superheadz Blackbird Fly on Hollywood Boulevard, Gary has brought a touch of humour to CoP towers with this effort. Printed on Fuji Crystal Archive gloss to create a rich, punchy finish.

It’s not one that I’d figured for a pick, but it does tend to draw notice. It was a lucky shot with a dodgy camera. We’ll see what it can do.