52 Week Project - Week 3

Blaketown Sunset - "Red". Samsung S3

Week three of the 52 Week Project and the subject is 'Red'.

The more perceptive of you will realise that I'm a little (lot) late with the third installment - it's actually more like week 6!

No excuses - but I'm also not going to beat myself up about it either. I have had a few people join me on this project (thanks Bryn and Grace) a little late, so I've stopped to let them play 'catch-up'. We are probably back on track now - and anyway, who said that the 52 weeks of the Project had to be consecutive?! :-)

Is my contribution this week really red? Or is it more orange? Or maybe Orangey-Red? There's definitely a big spike in the red channel of the histogram (if that's anything to go by) - and that's good enough for me.

This is actually another phone shot, taken a few evenings ago when I just happened to be out to witness another glorious West Coast sunset (more on that next post). If not for this chance encounter with a beautiful sunset, I probably still wouldn't have a 'Red' image?

I can tell already that the 'creative' component of theses projects is going to represent the biggest challenge to me. Why is that? Am I not a very creative person? Do I not think very creatively when it comes to photography? Or have I got into a rut from 25 years of shooting? I guess projects like this are designed to get you thinking more creatively than you otherwise would have to if you concentrated solely on landscapes or portraits (not to say that you can't or shouldn't be creative with either of those subjects).

Have I been 'creative' in my interpretation of 'Red' as a subject? If I'm honest with myself, then 'no', I haven't been. I've just taken a shot of a beautiful sunset that just happens to have red tones in it (lucky for me). That's not to say that I wasn't thinking about other ways I could interpret the colour red - because I have been, a lot. In the end though, nothing really sparked my interest, and the above shot was taken and posted almost out of sheer desperation.

And maybe that's also what these projects/challenges are good for. Exposing weaknesses. Shaking us out of habits and ruts. Blowing the cobwebs, slowly but surely, out of the creative corners of the brain. If I can achieve that this year, then the challenge will have been worth it.

52 Week Project - Week 1

2017 is here - so it's 'that' time of the year. The time to make those pointless (maybe) New Year's resolutions that you will break before you're even through January. Most of us do it every year - and most of us don't follow through on any of them...

So this year, instead of making new year's resolutions, I thought I would just make a new year's commitment. Isn't that the same thing? Isn't it just semantics? Maybe. Only time will tell. But this time around, my wife and I have made the same commitment; to be more intentional in being creative this year. For me that means a photography project, and for my wife it means more quilting projects. We are going to try and help each other with this commitment - and it will also mean being a lot more deliberate with our 'spare' time not being taken up with mindless activities like watching TV.

Confession - I'm hopeless when it comes to photography projects. Last year I decided to make portraits on medium format film of notable people in my town. Never happened. In 2012 I had an idea for a project - 12 cameras in 2012. I'd shoot every month for a year with a different old film camera, and turn the results into a book. What a great idea! Never happened. And then there was my pathetic attempt at a 365 photography project. It lasted about two weeks before I was so stressed from having to take a photo every day that I vowed and declared to never attempt a 365 project ever again! So I'm not going to.

But what I am going to do - which I hope (pray) is a bit more achievable, is a 52 Week Photography project. One photo a week, on a particular subject, designed to get you thinking creatively. More achievable than a 365 project? I certainly hope so. And added together with my new year's commitment to be more creative, I'm hoping that I'm on to a winner?

Selfie. Samsung Galaxy S3 with SketchGuru app. (Print filter)

I found a 52 Week Photography project on the web at Dogwood Photography's website, which outlines the subjects for all 52 weeks, and looked achievable (on paper at least). It's broken down into three main areas that keep repeating; portrait, landscape and artistic. Week 1 is a Self Portrait.

SketchGuru App (halftone filter)

While waiting for my wife to get some groceries, I decided to do my first weeks project sitting in the car. I have a few photo apps on my phone that I've never used, so thought this would be the ideal time to give them a go. One app in particular - SketchGuru - looked promising, so I fired it up, pointed the phone back at myself, and had a play. I had a lot of fun, and it was a great way to kill half an hour while I waited in the car!

So that's week 1 under my belt. Only 51 more weeks to go! 😊  Hopefully I can stick at it for that time, although I'm sure there will be some weeks that will be touch-and-go. I'm feeling pretty good and relaxed about it at the moment though, and actually pretty excited about this year's creative possibilities. I will post my 'final' shot for the week, every week, on this blog. So if nothing else, that should give me 52 posts on the blog for 2017! If I make it to the end, it will be great to look back on a year's worth of photography challenges and the images that this will produce.

Do you have any photography projects on the go for 2017? Are you interested in doing the 52 Week Challenge that I'm doing? The great thing about the 52 week challenge is that you can start it at any time - not just at the start of a new year. I've just done it that way so that it falls neatly within the same year. But you don't have to. If you're keen to do the same project, click on Dogwood Photography's name and a link will open that will take you directly to the project page. I'd love to hear from you if you start doing the challenge - or if you are doing something different? Drop me a line in the comments section below and let me know.