Projects

With Thanksgiving last week and school projects this week I haven't had much time for blogging. I did come across some photos over the break, however, that got me thinking about using self-assigned projects to improve your photography. The links below take you to two sites where photographers have given themselves a personal project, and then created some amazing images to meet the project constraints. The first I saw for the first time over the break, and is a photographer who has taken images of Glacier national park over 100 days. The other is the well know project by Jim Brandenburg, where he only took one photo a day for 90 days. Both display some great shots from these photographers.

Chris Peterson: Glacier National Park

Jim Brandenburg: Chased by the Light

Self assigned projects are an excellent way to improve your technique and get interesting shots. More importantly, they help you to see a subject in new ways, and lead to more creative and innovative shots. For instance, you could assign yourself to take as many different photographs of a single tree as possible in 30 min., or lock yourself in a room in your home for 15 min. and take as many pictures in that time as you can. I have given myself a few projects in the past and have had varying degrees of success, but I have always come out of the experience having learned something about photography.

A good book that I have found for developing personal projects is Freeman Patterson's "Photography and the Art of Seeing." It is written more like a workshop than an instructional book, with suggestions every chapter for personal projects. I found many of the projects to be useful, but some of the photographic techniques to be less so. If you use it as a tool to develop personal projects, you should be able to get something out of it.