Project 365: First Week Down!
I have embarked on this journey again. I have decided to document my everyday and share it with you. I successfully completed my project last year and I plan to print all the photos to create an album.
At the beginning of last year's challenge I had no real plan or idea as to what I'd hoped to accomplish other than picking up my camera everyday and sharing a photo a day, but it became much more. This challenge pushed me creatively, I learned new techniques and looked at a scene differently, asking myself how can I photograph this and give it a different perspective. From day one up until day 366 my photography has grown a lot, my style has evolved and I got a better understanding of how and what I want to shoot. Best of all I was able to create memories for my family that we will be able to look back on. I was hesitant to do it again because some days it did feel like a chore or I felt what I had photographed that day was not share worthy, but I came to realize that not every photograph had to be amazing and that I shouldn't be doing this project to please others. So taking the pressure off I decided that I would do it again because what I gained from it last year was worth it.
This time I plan to keep up with the blog, but I will post once a week instead of every day. So expect a blog update every Sunday. You can follow me everyday over on Instagram to see the latest.
If you'd like to see photos from last years challenge you can check them out in the Archives, link below.
Day 1: New Year, New Day, and New Adventures!
I hope you weren't getting tired of seeing my photographs every day because the new challenge begins. I wanted to start the new year off with a little outdoor adventure with the kids. They had a great time and so did I, running around and climbing rocks at Garden of the Gods Park. We even played photo tag, a game my kids came up with.
Day 2: Morning Light
They have the best window light and a great view of the mountains that only I appreciate...lol!
I'm apart of a few different Facebook groups and some have themes or prompts. I'm not very good at following themes, but simple ones such as morning light was pretty easy. We were playing in her room and I always love the light that comes into her room and it was actually clean so this scene seemed perfect for the theme.
Why I chose B&W? I always edit in color first even if I think a photo would look better in black and white, with this photo I thought I would just keep it as a color photo, but I was a little curious how it would look in in b&w and I loved it more, it was very contrasty which is what I look for in b&w photos.
Day 3: Beautifully Framed
Originally for this photo I was going for a details shot of her hand wrapped around the back of the chair and as I was photographing the hand she looked at me through the opening and it turned into this instead. I try to find different shooting perspectives so that I am not photographing the same thing everyday even though I may be photographing the same subject, so with a little help from my girl this photo turned into something more than I was trying to achieve.
Day 4: First hike of the new year with our hiking friends. We were maybe a little insane hiking in 20° weather, but it's always a good time!
I'm apart of a great community called Hike it Baby, they have branches all over the country and I've met some great women being apart of it. Some of them are more hardcore with their adventures than I am, but so inspired by them. A small group of us decided to get together for an easy hike at Palmer Park and we chose the more open trail, Mesa Trail. The sun was shining at the beginning, but it was still around 20 degrees out! I'm from Texas so I'm not a cold weather person, but I know that I can't hide in my house everyday during the winter months so I have embraced and taken advantage of the city that we live in! So many trails and opportunities to get outdoors with friends and family.
My daughter is usually my hiking buddy and she loves when we go hiking with our friends and she was doing really well at the beginning, but the more we hiked it seemed like the colder she got. The sun was coming in and out at this point, more in than out. As she got colder, the more she begged for me to pick her up. Now carrying a 34lb, 4 year old can be challenging especially when you are not prepared to carry them. I didn't have my Onya soft carrier that she surprisingly still fits in so a regular hip carry was all I could do. We took breaks so that she could walk, which she was not happy about. Luckily as we were heading back to the cars one of the Mom's had a sucker and that turned her misery around and gave my arms a break. They were sore the next day though.
Day 5: "I Woke Up Like This" Getting in the Frame
I have been inspired to take a self portrait once a month. My resolution this year was to be in the front of the camera more so here is the first attempt. I'm one of those people who does not like to get in front the camera often and my hard drive is filled with thousands of photos my children, so this year i will #getintheframe. This was taken early in the morning after waking up to a snow day and finding out my son didn't have school. I knew this was the only calm I was going to have the rest of the day.
I wasn't sure which version I liked of this one, so I asked a few of my photography friends and b&w won the vote, but the color version was close. Some people have asked how I accomplished focus. Fortunately my camera has wifi so I was able to use an app to connect to my camera and control the camera that way.
Day 6: Anyone else's kids act like they have no home training and play in the clothing racks!? Every time it never fails...lol!
This day we played hooky from school. We went coat shopping instead, so random. My thought was, they had a 2 hour delay and it was Friday, that's all.
I had to capture this because this is what happens every time we go to a clothing store, both of them play in the clothes racks. I do stop it, but that doesn't stop them from doing it again the next time.
This photo was taken with a wide focal length. I love shooting wide because there is a uniqueness that it can bring to a photo
Day 7: Watching football gets pretty intense, especially when your team is playing in the playoffs
I had to get this photo of my husband watching his team get closer and closer to losing the game. The tensions were high in our household. Unfortunately his team did lose, but he said this photo put him in a better mood. Football is serious business.