I am just giving an update on my photo project this year ten months in. I gave myself four photography habits to try to bring some creativity into my hobby this year.

1. to carry a high quality pocket camera with me in my pocket every day.
2. to take several photos each day.
3. to post each day on instagram.
4. to print a black and white image each week.

Well some have worked out better than others.

• I do carry my little Ricoh GR III almost everywhere I go. It has become a good companion, easy to grab from my pocket for quick shooting. A couple of downsides…it has to be in a cloth pouch to stop dust getting inside the lens, which slows down the ‘drawing’ time. It picked up a nasty dust spot on the sensor which took a hoover nozzle to eventually remove! It is a wide angle lens, so I can’t get close ups of people. The big upsides are the incredible black and white images I get from this camera🙂

• I have definitely taken way more pictures each day, some on my GR and others on my iphone. I have changed from trying to take great pictures to learning to see better with my eye and documenting my days.

• I managed about six months of posting daily on Instagram. To be honest that has been the hardest habit. There was a pressure to post something different each day, when many of my days are either at home or at work in the house of prayer. There is the pressure of hoping for ‘likes’ to my pictures. People respond to images of people much more than my more arty or mundane shots, even though I like posting black and white images best. Also I have found that one definitely runs into creativity blocks or ruts after a few months of a project. What fresh ideas can I have, and what fresh angles can I take from my daily walk? I have taken pressure off myself, and am now posting just when I feel like I have a nice image to share.

• Printing photos has been fun. I have hung a bunch of them on clips and string in my small study and bought an album to put in at the end of the year. My tally in my Apple photos section is 102 black and white images so far this year. I have been on a lag in printing images, and am just catching up.

Anyway I am still having fun in my photo journey of 2022. Here are a few of my black and white photos in recent months. Will post a link to them all at the end of the year.

Thanks for reading this 🙂

Black and white Ricoh GR III