Keith's 52 Week Photography Project - 2015

My photography project for 2015. After doing a 365 photo a day project last year, I decided to try something different this year. Each week, I'll choose a theme (or ask friends and family for suggestions), and I'll take photos that pertain to that...

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Week 11 (3.12 - 3.18.15) - Circles

Week 11 of my 52 week photo project. The theme I went with for this week is "circles". I had no idea what to shoot as of this morning, and honestly no ambition either. It's been a long week already. I barely even thought about a theme for this week, and never picked up my camera until this morning. I was up early this morning, and decided to start walking around with the camera to see if something would come to me. As I started to take pictures, I immediately felt the stress start to melt away. Noticed that a couple of the shots I liked had circles as the main subject, and decided that would be this week's theme. Coming full circle, realizing what really matters, and letting the rest go.

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Week 10 (3.5-3.11.15) “Doorways”

For week 10, I chose “doorways” as my theme.  I spent a good part of the week in Washington, DC for a conference, and found plenty of cool old buildings with interesting doorways.  The weather was great for the most part, so any time I had a break from the conference, I’d go for a stroll and see what I could find.  Got a few strange looks from passers by as I stood there taking pictures of doors, but oh well.  The biggest challenge with this subject was trying to frame the doors so they were level.  Just about every street or sidewalk was slanted in some way.

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Week 9 (2.26-3.3.15) "Glass"

For week 9, the theme I chose is "glass".  I was struggling to come up with something to focus on for this week.  It was too cold (and dark) to come up with much outside, so I started wondering around the house, looking for something of interest.  I noticed a couple of glass objects that I thought might make interesting subjects, and started to shoot.  Joan came up with another good one, and I was off and running.  Really pleased with how this series turned out.  This is another week where I feel like this project (and last year's 365) have really helped me develop as a photographer.  Seeing things from different perspectives, and thinking more about lighting and composition.  Feels good to keep pushing myself and trying new things.

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Week 8 (2.19-2.25.15) - "Toys"

On to week 8 of my 52 week photography challenge.  This week, I chose to focus on toys.  Our kids are grown up now, and one is even off to college, so there aren't a lot of toys laying around the house.  I remember when they were little, and you couldn't take 3 steps without stubbing your toe or stepping on some small (always sharp!) lego piece.  But there are still a few holdovers in the basement, or stuffed in drawers, and spending some time photographing them brought back a lot of memories.  The Curious George jack-in-the-box was always a favorite of both kids.  The neighbor kids love it too, and it's great to see them smile and laugh as he pops out of the box.  

Time goes by way too fast, and this little assignment was a melancholy reminder that we need to appreciate what we have in the moment; time marches on, but make sure to spend some time having fun along the way.

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Week 7 (2.12 - 2.18.15) - "Love"

For week 7 of my 52 week photography challenge, I chose the theme "love".  With Valentine's Day falling right in the middle of this week, love felt like an obvious choice as a theme this week.  Everywhere I looked, there were symbols of love, from glass hearts to fresh roses.  My favorite shot of the week is this first one.  I got the idea to take a photo of me and Joan, and I wanted it to show how in love we are.  Really happy with the results.  The final photo for this week is the Valentine's night dinner we made for each other - staying in and cooking our own meal was much more romantic than any of the dinners out we've done over the years.  

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Week 6 (2.5.15 - 2.11.15) "Fog"

For week 6, the theme I chose was fog.  Woke up Saturday morning, and the warm temps combined with the snow to create this ethereal look to everything.  So I grabbed my camera, and spent a couple hours driving around the countryside looking for interesting views.  The theme turned out to be apropos as I spent most of the week in a fog myself.  Sometimes you need to just keep moving forward, even though you might not see where the next step will take you, eventually you find your way back to clarity...

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Week 5 (1.29.15 - 2.4.15) "Road Trip"

For this week's theme, I decided to document my road trip with Jim and Jon to Iowa City to watch the Badgers take on the Iowa Hawkeyes in a B1G basketball game.  Had a great time hanging out with the guys, and getting to see a bit of Iowa City and the University of Iowa campus.  Sampled some local brews, and ate so much deep dish pizza at Wig & Pen's that we could barely walk out of the restaurant.  Oh, and Bucky won easy.

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Week 4 (1.22.15 - 1.28.15) "Kitchen"

The theme I chose for this week is Kitchen.  I decided to look for common, every day objects around our kitchen, and shoot them in a way that hopefully made them more interesting.  I ended up with four photos for the week.  The first is 2 forks - just a simple photo, of really mundane objects, but I like the contrast of the silver on black, and the tight focus on the tines.  The second is a martini glass.  I started taking pictures of it because i thought it looked interesting, and then I noticed that it looked a lot like an alien.  The third is a bottle of wine - just like the label and all of the colors, contrasted against the wood table.  Finally, a grater - again, just started taking pictures of it, and noticed that when shot from a certain angle, it looks like an old robot from some old sci-fi movie

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Week 3 (1.15.15 - 1.21.15)

For week 3, I chose "Smoke" as my theme.  Throughout my 365 project, I had always intended to try my hand at smoke photography, but never got around to it, so I thought I'd spend some time trying to figure it out.  I read some tutorials, and it seemed fairly straightforward.  Went out to the store and bought some incense, and set everything up downstairs.  Started firing away, and after some experimenting, I started to get some good results.  

The whole process of trying something new, starting to get the hang of it, and then working on the photos in Lightroom was very cool.  This is why I wanted to do this project and the 365 last year.  To push myself, and to learn more about photography, and to share the results with family and friends.  This one in particular got me excited to do more.

Here are a few of my favorites from the week:

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Week 2 (1.8.15 - 1.14.15)

For week 2, I chose "kids" as the theme.  As of Sunday afternoon of that week, I still hadn't come up with anything that I was very excited about as a theme.  We had a bunch of friends over for the Packer playoff game, and there were quite a few little kids running around.  Then it hit me, and I grabbed my camera, along with one of my favorite portrait lenses, the Olympus 45mm f1.8, and started snapping away.  Kids are awesome.  They love getting their pictures taken, and they have these incredible, infectious smiles.  I got more pictures than I could use, and had a blast taking these.  

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Week 1 (1.1.2015 - 1.7.2015)

New year, new project.  I loved doing the 365 project last year, but it was also a lot of pressure and work.  As I started to share the photos, primarily on Facebook, I was surprised by the interest so many people showed.  People would stop me at work, at the club or at a store to tell me how much they loved the photos, and how much they looked forward to seeing more.  It was very gratifying, and at the same time, a bit scary.  Could I really keep this up for a whole year?  Many nights, I'd get a reminder on my phone around 8:00pm to take a photo.  I spent a lot of time wandering around the house, looking for something interesting to shoot.  It was challenging a lot of nights.

But that was part of the plan.  I wanted to do the project to push myself to get better at photography.  It's been a passion and a hobby and an escape for me for a long time, but I would also end up not picking up the camera for long stretches of time.  This would force me to spend more time doing something I loved, and hopefully, I'd improve my skills along the way.

Eventually, the project became a big part of who I am.  Even on the nights when it was a challenge, I still enjoyed it.  So when the calendar flipped from Dec. 31 to Jan. 1, it felt very strange to not have to take a photo.  So strange, that for the first 7 or 8 days of January, I still took a picture every day.  I just didn't share them.  I had already decided to do the 52 week challenge instead, and I had my theme for the first week - cold.  The weather that week was below zero most of the time - even the high temps were below zero a couple days, so it seemed like an appropriate theme.  

I think on Jan. 8 or 9 I got the reminder on my phone to take a photo, but ended up getting distracted by something, and never did take a photo that day.  It was weird to wake up in the morning knowing that I had ended my streak, but it was also a bit of a relief.  

Anyway, here are the pictures from week one - cold.  By the way, it was actually too cold to go outside and shoot for most of the week, but I did manage to get out for a couple of quick sessions.  Looking forward to a "hot" theme later in the year!