Hi Friends! I’m so excited to ring in the New Year with you. I hope you and your family celebrated with lots of love and joy. If you are like me, you might be super motivated right now and dying to start a new project. So, I thought I would give you some ideas for fun photo projects you do throughout the year.

Project 1: A Photo Journal for the Year

Creating a digital journal of your year is a great fun photo project option, although it can also be a serious time commitment. There are different ways to go about it, too. Some people love the idea of a 365 day project (you can find some examples here). Just grab your smart phone, create an album on Facebook, and start shooting and uploading. The goal is to add one photo to your album each day, and you’ll end up with a mini snapshot of your year. Need some accountability? It’s free to sign up for the 365 Project!

Like the idea but not sure if you can really take a photo each day? Try a 52 weeks project instead. One photo a week uploaded into an album. This is a great option if you want to curate things a bit more and not feel the pressure of having to find something to photograph each and every day.

Project 2: Pick a Theme and Go!

This is one of my favorites photo projects. Pick a theme – it can truly be anything you love, and spend the year photographing that one thing. When Covid started and I couldn’t photograph clients, I photographed their toys instead. My clients dropped off their child’s favorite toys for a professional photo shoot. Now I have a whole series of toy sessions!

This is one of my favorites. Pick a theme – it can truly be anything you love, and spend the year photographing that one thing. When Covid started and I couldn’t photograph clients, I photographed their toys instead. My clients dropped off their child’s favorite toys for a professional photo shoot. Now I have a whole series of toy sessions!

Are you really into fresh flowers? Go for it. Sports? Yep – it’ll work! Festivals? Take a snapshot (or lots) from each one you attend. You can go with a general theme or get really specific. Whatever works for you. I love macro photography, so I’ve spent a lot of time lately photographing tiny things close up. Another great option is to choose a color – check out Pantone’s 2022 color of the year here for inspiration. Then only photograph what you see in that color. There really are no wrong answers here.

This is a great project to also encourage you to think about design and create a wall collage of your beautiful work when you are finished. Check out this gorgeous collage in all pinks and purples by my friend Heather Larkin. Check out her instagram for more of her work.

Project 3: A Year in the Life

Have kids? This one is perfect for you! I actually offer this as a professional session to my clients as well, so just email me (teena@teenawhitmore.com) if you are interested in this one. It’s lots of fun and a simple way to get started with photo projects.

Have you noticed yet how quickly time flies? As the saying goes, the days are long, but the years are short. When you have little kids, they change so quickly that sometimes they are hardly recognizable from the beginning to end of the year. Especially around that 4-6 age span, and of course, during baby’s first year. So, photograph your kids, family, dog, cat, pony, whatever, once per month. When you aren’t focused on trying to get a shot every day, you can take a little bit more time with planning and come up with something really special.

Project 4: A-Z Challenge

This one is a no-brainer! L is for Lighthouse. There are two great options here – either photograph something that starts with each letter of the alphabet (could even make it more of a challenge by also picking a theme), or, try to find all the letters of the alphabet out there in the real world! Check out this Pinterest board for some fun ideas – you can even make your own little still life like the “W” pincushion!

Well, I hope this gets your creativity going and encourages you to get out there and see things differently. Are you planning to do a photography challenge this year? If so, I’d love to hear about it! Personal projects and challenges are a great way to improve your camera skills, even if that camera is a smartphone. So again, Happy New Year and start working on those challenges!