And next year's words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
Little Gidding
T.S. Eliot
This year I once again started the Capture Your 365 and all went well for the first few months where I took a photo each day. However, I found I was starting to lose interest in the prompts for a few reasons. One was that many prompts did not really fit into my day easily and I didn't always have the time needed to explore the creativity required to get the shot. Secondly, I felt many of the prompts were repeats from last year and it didn't always appeal to me to redo these prompts. But mainly I think there were many other things happening in our lives competing for my time and the daily photo was starting to become a chore rather than an enjoyable experience. In an attempt to overcome this I started to not post daily, but rather whenever a prompt or an event called for a photograph - then I would take some shots and upload a photo or two.
I have really enjoyed the experience of doing this project over the past two years. I believe I have learnt a lot about photography, composition, perspectives, ways of looking at subjects and some new photographic techniques. I still have not moved to shoot in manual mode, but I am using aperture priority and shutter speed priority with a little knowledge behind me, something I didn't have when I started the project. The other area where I feel I am slowly developing new skills is in post processing, particularly using Lightroom and Perfect Effects 8. I am also using my iPhone camera with various apps a lot more than I used to which has expanded my photographic creativity.
This will be my last post. I believe the time has come for me to move in new directions and not spend so much time doing a daily photo - which involves taking a lot more than one photo. Usually multiple shots are taken from all different angles using different apertures and sometimes different lenses. Next is the processing of multiple photos to choose the one I like and finally writing up the blog post. I'm sure I will still be taking lots of photos but they will be more relevant to what I am interested in, when I'm interested and importantly what is relevant to me. Thank you so much for joining me on this journey, and thank you to those who commented on my photos. It's been a great experience.
In 2015 I plan to get back to my painting, as well as continue to improve my piano skills by working towards my Grade 8 Piano for Leisure exam. I am hoping to be injury free this year so that I can achieve a few of my running goals I missed out on this year - starting with a relatively easy 5.5km Resolution run on January 11. My ultimate running goal is to run a half marathon distance and ideally do the Gold Coast half marathon, but we'll see how I go through the year. There are also a few academic goals I am aiming to achieve which will take quite a bit of my time as well.
This photo was taken last Christmas but it is one I really like and it is the one with which I will finish this blog. So here's to you! Wishing you love, heath, happiness and the very best of everything in 2015!
Love
Valmae