Photo a day challenge - Two months
Another year and another attempt at this challenge. Today was the 63rd day of taking photos 63 days consecutively.
When I had attempted this challenge last year with my X100T, I struggled during the autumn and winter periods because Melbourne is in two states; bone dry cold with gale force winds or pouring down rain. My excuse for not going out was that my X100T wasn’t weather sealed.
Well this year I have two secret weapons; a weather sealed X-T2 and the PhotoBlog365 calendar.
So far, I have enjoyed capturing a nice summer with blue skies. I’m glad to say that the first two months has been a very productive and creative in my photography.
The theme calendar has been very helpful for those days in which I’ve gone out during my lunch break with no idea on what to shoot. The daily themes have become that tiny spark in triggering my the creative thinking.
For example the following photo was taken on day 18 in which the theme was C is for... and in Melbourne C is for Coffee;
On the other hand I’ve struggled to find the time to get out of the office. As a full time worker, the only free time I have is during my lunch breaks. This means that I can’t venture out too far away, as I need to get back in time. Thus I keep walking the same places/streets and finding interesting compositions has been really difficult.
Some days I feel like I’ve cheated by taking shots with low depth of field at f1.4 on my XF-16mm. Does this show that, technically I’ve learnt what will make an interesting picture ?
Challenge yourself
There is a reason why its called the 365 day challenge. It’s hard to take an interesting photo everyday to share with the world. To challenge myself further I’m not using the ACROS film simulation on the X-T2 or converting my photos to black and white.
Also, as a night owl, I find it hard to wake up early and to keep the ‘challenge yourself’ going I made it one of my goals to wake up before sunrise to catch the golden hour.
That being said I’m not a morning person yet and I need to do more of this.
Don’t do too many things
I need to just go out to take a photo and try not to hit two birds with one stone. Some days I will have errands to run during my lunch break, which eats into my photo time giving less time to look around for amazing compositions.
Street photography
I find that taking pictures of people walking along the street and making them interesting is hard. The resulting images feel like they’re not telling any story. There are already plenty of photos out there of people looking angry because someone is taking their photo.
The way I’ve used people in my pictures has been as a secondary element using them as motion.
Forcing creativity
There has been a few days in which I’ve left the whole taking a photo a day challenge to the very end of the day.
Creativity takes time ! I need to stop doing this.
63 days down only 302 days to go.