Well, I don’t know if it’ll catch on – and I’m sure there are people in marketing who’ll tell me the term doesn’t sound round enough or green enough to be a bona fide buzzword, but that hardly seems relevant when you’re waving a digital camera around clicking in the general direction of shapes and colours that might look nice (even if only by mistake). I don’t know what you do with your digital camera – but I like to phroto.

Now, while I have no intention whatsoever of turning The Wireless into a phrotoblog (catchy term #2), I thought while it’s new and briefly hip (in at least 3 other people’s opinion – I did a rather unscientific survey), I’d pop a few more phrotos up here.

Bear in mind that I have a Gmail account and therefore around 1Gb of mail storage at my disposal. Please feel free to send me your favourite phrotos.

These ones were taken while driving at night in the rain (he said, stating the bleeding obvious):

This is a better example of that bendy thing I was talking about yesterday:

And a couple more daylight phrotos for good measure:

Click to enlarge any of these phrotos.

I’m starting to think there should perhaps be some phroto guidelines. Actual rules seem to go against the whole phroto ethos (inasmuch as such a thing could be said to exist).

Think of these as springboards into new and interesting ways of using your digital camera rather than a set of boundaries:

1) No using the viewfinder or the screen to line up shots;

2) Phrotos are for everyday activities and journeys – you don’t have to go anywhere special;

3) Hold the camera straight and still, by all means – but only by accident;

4) You should not be looking in the same direction as the camera when the phroto is being shot;

5) Phrotos can and should be taken from unusual heights if possible. Hold the camera down by your knee or up above your head;

6) If taking phrotos while driving, accident avoidance is your number one priority;

7) Taking trick phrotos – behind your back, under your leg (and so on) – is to be encouraged;

8) A good phroto is one that contains a surprise, a new way of seeing a familiar object or scene, one that has an accidental composition that just kind of works or one that just kinda looks cool;

9) There’s no such thing as a bad phroto. Out of focus shots are merely ‘non-representational’ phrotos. Also, low-res is part of the deal. Phrotos should be no more than around 100kb;

10) 90% of everything is crap. Keep only the best 10% of your phrotos.

Your suggestions for more guidelines please…