365/365/ Honesty

(One to completely embarrass my family.)

Here's the shorter version if you're just passing through:

It's my blip-year celebration today. 365 photos in 365 days. It's been tremendous fun and not at all what I was expecting.
I still don't always hold the camera straight, and the title - Off Centre - that I thought up in a hurry 365 days ago, when I had absolutely no idea about photography, still works very well for me!

....................

The slightly longer version:

I'm 43 in a few weeks and there's no use pretending otherwise. So here I am, first thing this morning, straight out of bed and unedited. No warts, but plenty of "an' all". (I wish my fringe wouldn't do that though!). I've done more than my fair share of worrying, frowning and crying in the past 4 years - not to mention thinking, studying and concentrating - and haven't had much opportunity to lift the corners of my mouth with joy recently. My brow lines have become heavier and my jowls have slid down.
(I'm also shattered and have awful period pains, but you probably didn't want to know that)

Over the year I've become more and more interested in the art of taking a photo rather than what happens to it afterwards and really don't like to edit at all if I can help it. I do have Photoshop elements but have not learned to use it and have yet to be convinced of its usefulness.

Sorry about the legs (I realise that some members of the general public would like to think that women over forty don't actually have legs) - it's the first time I've used the self-timer on my camera and I was more worried about getting my head and shoulders in the right spot in 10 seconds than whether to straighten my nightshirt.

Not only has a bookcase collapsed so I currently have nowhere to put all those books but we're in the process of re-decorating, so lots of things have been shoved across the room.
:o)


......................


The lengthy version:

A photo-a-day for a year (well... minus one day because it's a leap year!)

Here's my first line on my first day:
"Day 1. My first ever blipfoto. Don't go expecting quality. You won't find it here! "

My blipfotos started as a kind of self-indulgent diary. I already had a blog but it didn't seem the right place for the daily minutiae of life. I didn't think the photo mattered really to begin with, but by the third day I had dug out an old camera and stopped using my phone for pics.

In a week I was thinking about composition, light and colour, and in just ten days I was getting experimental and thinking about how my photos would look to other people. I started to make more effort, get more choosy, go further afield, make decisions about where to go depending on the light and the weather, and where "the shot" might be.

Three weeks into blipping I began to set up shots, and not always simply snap a moment, but sometimes stage it or create it.

I became an amateur photographer.

22 days into blipping I took this: http://www.blipfoto.com/entry/1400538
I'd discovered the importance of natural light, of patience, and, most importantly, of how the camera sees things differently from us.

I started to look at shapes and reflections. A month in I defined my efforts as "dabbling in photography" and was still coping happily with a pocket-sized camera. (Looking back, the old Canon Powershot A430 does great little close-ups!), but 2 months in I was finding disappointment in my tiny grainy, landscapes and frustration with light-settings. I wanted more control, more fiddle-ability.

I wanted a camera that worked for me and worked with me, but more than that I wanted a fix of visual creativity regularly and I stopped being able just to look at something with my bare eyes. I began to "get" it: why other people liked taking photos, why my dad had been so keen on taking photos and even though he was dead I began to feel closer to my dad and understand his interest a little better.

I began to notice little things and appreciate them, I began to notice ugly things and appreciate them, I began to need life to be less perfect gradually and saw less point in editing photos and more point in taking honest photos that were good for what they were and not what they weren't (I know what I mean!). In the last year, I've become more interested in wildlife, in the seasons, and even paid our garden much more attention as a result. Every morning I wake up and look at the sky and wonder if I'll get a photo today. I look at messy clutter in the house and wonder if the mouldy cups from Gemma's room would make a good photo instead of swearing at her, and I wonder if all the wires hanging out of the drawer in the sideboard would look better if photographed in monochrome rather than thinking about tidying them up.

I've stopped trying to pretend a bad day, or a crap day or a dull day are something they're not. I've stopped trying to pretend I'm coping when I'm not. It is what it is. If I'm low then why take a photo that says otherwise (unless I'm being deliberately ironic).

That honesty is something I think a lot of people are scared of. People find others' honesty uncomfortable, embarrassing even. People want to see you looking good, coping, being cheerful, finding positives. People with problems are awkward, inconvenient, they might even require support or sympathy when you can't be bothered. Most people want to be surrounded by convenient people.

Somehow we don't seem to greet people with the line, "Boy, am I having crap day!" or "Whoopee - there was a peacock butterfly in my garden today!" But on blipfoto we can do that. Not always with words - sometimes with pictures and sometimes with both.

I've meandered again, haven't I?

I've not sure if I've found myself yet (I'm not sure I'm even find-able!) but I have enjoyed a year of experimentation and discovery and the chance to focus more closely on things (in both senses of the word). Some days I blip for me, some days I blip because I know people like to look at pictures of where we live, some days I only blip because I know if I miss a day it will get easier and easier to miss more days, some days I blip because it's the only chance I get to be creative, some days I blip because I have something to say, some days I blip because a lot has happened here and I want to record it.
And on occasion I actually think I might have taken a half-decent photo and I want to share it.

Taking photos regularly is a great way of taking more notice of the world around us and escaping from fairly unnecessary obsessions that most of us have. It's also a marvellous way to slow down and relax. I'm so glad I've done this.

So. My new year's resolutions:
Read camera manual that came with camera and that I've had since March, and learn to use my camera properly.
Read digital photography book, that I've had since April, and learn what else I can do with my camera that I haven't discovered yet.
Think about learning to use Photoshop.
Try to do another full year of blipfoto.
Find things that make me laugh so my facial muscles lift back up a bit.
Don't shove thumb into chin like that in photos - it looks weird.
Eat more chocolate.