Photolga: 2014

Friday, January 31, 2014

Self Portrait - Frozen Lake

It is my goal to take a self portrait a month. On the last day of January I headed to the lake and took this photo. I rushed thru it due to a commitment and really couldn't get good focus. But I did try!

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

New Project

When I finished the 365 photo project, I planned on taking and posting a picture a week. But, as the days were going by, I realized that I was finding hard to plan days to take photos. What I know is that wherever I go I take my camera and also always have it handy in the house. So, I have decided that instead of taking one photo a week, I will post photos as I take them whatever the date. January is William's birth month and I have taken lots of pictures of him, so I will be posting those here.

January 8th, 2014 William's 7th Birthday
William had a busy day. He went to school and Cub Scout Meeting. So, at the end of a long day, we took him to Abbeez for dessert.

Monday, January 6, 2014

Day 365 - Reflections on my 365

When I first started this project on January 1, 2013 I knew very little about photography. I had owned my Canon Rebel for less than a year and only had a very basic knowledge of it. At the end of 2012, I heard about a 365 photo project that might possibly help me learn and practice my photo skills, and that's what prompted me to do it.

When I first started, I:

- only took pictures in JPEG,
- only used Aperture Priority mode,
- didn't know a thing about shooting in Manual Mode,
- used "Picassa" to edit my photos (yikes!!!).
- had no clue about self portraits (Before this project it NEVER occurred to me to be in front of the camera and/or photograph myself),
- didn't own a tripod, a cable release or a remote shutter.

While doing this project, I:

- began to shoot in RAW,
- learned how to shoot in Manual Mode through a tutorial I found in Click It Up a Notch,
- took a Lightroom class at a local photo store and now use Lightroom as my main editing program,
- learned to be more comfortable with self portraits. I reluctantly did it the first time, but made that a regular part of the project.

So overall, this project was a very positive one. There is still a lot to learn, but I'm so pleased with everything I have learned so far. I would love to continue taking and posting a photo a day but I don't have the same amount of time I had before. I now have a job!!! I work for Ted Morton Photography. I feel very lucky to be working in a field that I really like.

I was planning on starting a 52 week photo project the first week of the new year, but it has been very busy so far. So, as soon as I get started I will post it here.

The only thing I wish I had done different in this project is to have spent more time documenting my kids' lives and learned more about taking more portrait photos in general. So, I think I will include more of those in the new project.

I would like to thank all the 365 online photography friends I met through this project. I don't think I would have ever completed it without their frequent positive comments and support.

Although there were many photos I wasn't very proud of in this project, there were some I liked a lot. Here are some of my favorite ones: