In the past year I participated in the daunting 52 Weeks Self Portrait project. You have a year to complete 52 self portraits- one a week.

Week 4: Celebrating Canada Day

I took on this mammoth project last May after deciding that I needed to push myself in a direction I didn’t want to go. I had big plans, high hopes and lots of ideas/images floating around in my head.

Week 7: With my copy of For the Love of Light

The main reason behind the project was me wanting to improve how I shoot portraits and for some reason, I chose to practise on myself. I actually found the project really hard for a number of reasons.

Week 18

• I don’t like looking at photographs of myself.
• I found the time constraint really hard to keep up with (I DO NOT know how the 365ers do it). I struggled to get them shot through the week and often ended up shooting them on Sunday afternoon, right at the last minute.

Week 21: Roid Week

• I was very critical of the choices I made and was never happy with the resulting shots. Instead of pushing me to try something else, I just got frustrated and realised I didn’t have enough hours in my day to shoot what I wanted to shoot.

Week 22: Shot looking straight at a window. A lot of my shots were done here.

A year later, I did actually finish the project, well sort of…I missed 1 week due to illness and another week went missing on a roll of film somewhere. With all the moaning and groaning along the way, I did learn how to use a remote properly, did learn more about how to work window light and where to position someone indoors when shooting their portrait.

Week 48: With a little help from Kelly, the human tripod.

If you do decide to take the project on, it will challenge you if you let it. I could have very easily just shot the same shot every week with a point and shoot, but I tried to get more out of it than that. Here are my tips from things I learnt over the year:

• Shoot digital- waiting around for film to be developed or losing a roll can really slow you down. I did shoot a few Polaroids and I think these may be the exception to the rule. In fact, my favourite shot ended up being a Polaroid right at the end.
• Buy a remote. I couldn’t have done it without one.
• If you want those baby blues (or browns or hazels) to pop, stand yourself in front of a window with good light and fire away. One trick I picked up was to shine a little torch near your eyes, so that the camera will pick that point up as the focus. Hit the remote to find the focus, pull the torch away and hit the shutter button. It works!
• Try and shoot early in the week. Leaving it till the last minute causes panic and stress. I often did not manage this one.
• Take your camera with you wherever you may go, you never know when a good opportunity may strike.
• If you get sick of your face, shoot another body part like your hands or just chop your head off for some variation. I ended up calling mine the “Piece Me Together in the Puzzle” project as I often just shot a piece of myself.

Week 45: I learned that my crooked smile is part of who I am and my dark circles look much better in Black and White hehe

I am glad I got to the end and didn’t give up, even if I did miss 1 week. I doubt I will ever take on something like it again. The time constraints are what got to me mostly. I shoot better without restrictions.

Check out the whole set here and many more in the 52 Weeks pool on flickr.