I just took a look back to see when my first post on this blog was; it was
December 19th 2008. I am a bit late for a birthday blog post but oh well I really didn't get things rolling in earnest until the first of the year anyway with the photo a day project. But I thought this was as good of time as any to talk about my experiences with the project, the blog, photography and my plans for next year.
The photo a day project has been really great for me. I am sure, if you have been following me throughout the year, you have seen my excitement at the stuff I really liked, my struggles on days when I just didn't feel it and everything in between. All in all, however, I have learned a tremendous amount about photography and all things related to it this year. I have made some great friends on flickr which I wouldn't have had the opportunity to find otherwise and I have enjoyed the project a lot.
The project itself has ups and downs, as I am sure most endeavors like this do. The rules I imposed on myself were that I had to shoot, edit and upload the image on the same day each and every day of the year. This resulted in a lot of days, when I wasn't super motivated, uploading images I
wasn't very proud of. But, other days, it resulted in me uploading some of what I consider my
most creative work of the year because I looked, thought and tried until I got something interesting. Without the project I would have never done that.
That said, a year of this project is enough for me. I have developed a habit of taking photos with my camera. I have also developed a habit of mentally framing photos without it. These are good habits to have and will serve me well in 2010. My photography projects for 2010, one of which I have already talked about here, are: Holiday/This Day In History Photos and Seven A Week.
The Holiday/This Day In History project is a simple concept. On many or most days I will be posting a photograph that depicts, represents or otherwise is associated with events for that day in history or the Holiday associated with that day. The idea is that there isn't a calendar day that doesn't have a Holiday or some interesting event/fact associated with it. My project is to find those tidbits and make a photograph telling the story. My thoughts at this point are to find the obscure stuff; as I think it will be more fun and interesting. At this point though I don't have any idea how I am going to setup these scenes or what I am going to do. Stay tuned and I hope you enjoy it. Also, feel free to join in the fun, I have setup a
flickr group so that others who want to participate with me may do so. There is no obligation to do a photo on this theme each day or anything -- just as often as you feel motivated to do it and it doesn't require any special equipment. A point and shoot camera will be fine or even a cell phone cam. The point is to be creative not to make perfect photos.
The next project is a seven a week project. This
group is really just an extension of my photo a day group from 2009. Many of the more active members of that group are participating in this one. I am excited that my friends from last year will be working on a project together again this year. I had sworn I wouldn't do another 365 this year but the rules of this one are a little more palatable. Essentially I will need to take seven photos in a week. It doesn't matter if they are all taken on Monday or if they are taken one a day or whatever. Just seven a week. I don't intend to be as obsessive about this project. I will be posting them to the blog, of course, but I will not be numbering them and absolutely keeping track of the number posted or anything.
I also hope to be able to do a bit more work with portraits and maybe even second shooting a wedding or two. I would really like to get more experience with the wedding thing to see if it is something I would enjoy marketing and doing myself at some point. The portrait sessions I have done thus far have been a lot of fun. I find myself gaining a lot of confidence and I really enjoy the reactions of the 'clients' when they see what we were able to create together. To that end I have setup a proper
website and
pricing list. We shall see what 2010 brings on this front. I am under no delusion that I will be a full time professional photographer by the end of 2010 or anything. But I would really like the opportunity to explore this a little more.
Beyond the photography projects I intend to become more active and involved in social media. I have a
twitter account that I actively post links to my photos, I do the same for
facebook and I have this blog, obviously. But I don't do much more than lurk beyond this. I am planning to pick out several relatively active blogs and become involved in the community on each of them. I am also planning to take my twittering to a new level and dedicate some time each day to reading, responding and re-tweeting. My objective here is to not just lurk and not just promote my own stuff but actually get involved with the communities.
I hope all of you who see this have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year :). Please continue to follow my posts after the photo a day project is complete. I expect you will find I post slightly less often, still several times a week though, but I hope I make up for the less frequent posts with higher quality ones. Thanks again for reading this and for following me throughout the year it really helped to motivate me that people were looking at what I was doing even if many of you I didn't know your name or anything about you.
