Minor Personal Project

A few days ago I started a small personal project that will really only have relevance to myself, and only in the future.  I started taking a single picture a day on my camera phone.  The quality is low and the idea is hardly original but since I'm doing it for myself I'm likely to keep it up.

False Starts
I have failed a few attempts at "Project365" both on this blog and on Twitter.  I think the reason for that is I was doing it to try and keep up with some other persons idea.  Participating in "Project365" just didn't feel like it was mine.  I felt like there were standards I had to live up to.  The idea never held my interest very long and I always quit.  My ideas are important to me and if I was just doing something massive and bandwagon-y like Project365 my heart wouldn't be in it.  That platform worked for other people just fine and produced fantastic results for the creative types.  I just never got caught up in the frenzy.

That was a particular blog-centric version of the daily picture idea.  Others have been more successful in different ways.  Several people created videos using pictures taken of themselves over the course of several years.  My favorite video was from a man who walked across China for a year and created a great video made from pictures he took of himself daily.


The Longest Way 1.0 - one year walk/beard grow time lapse from Christoph Rehage on Vimeo.

Plan of Action
So far my project is nothing so grand.  I've been doing it for about a month and my pictures have been of the cats, Ashes and myself.  That works for me though.  It's my life at the moment, just the residents of my small basement apartment.  The best part about this project is I don't have any standards set and no plans for it to go anywhere.  In fact I doubt anyone will ever see these pictures.  I've never been a photogenic person which meant not many pictures exist of me over the years.  I'm changing that now.  I'll watch my life evolve from... this, to something really great.

Motivation and Inspiration
I was motivated into doing this by the Polaroid chronicle of one man's life from 1979-1997.  After his death the Polaroids were uploaded to the internet and left there for others to come across.  If you haven't seen this website I would advise a look since it's pretty incredible, Photographs of That Day.  I found the story so fascinating that I started taking pictures myself.  I've been using my cell phone and will routinely try to archive the photos.  I'm about a month in at this point.  Cell phone pictures don't have quite the impact as Polaroids but it's the best way for me to make certain I'll do it daily.  For me.