I was flipping through my photos from 2008 the other day on my laptop and realized just how few pictures I’d taken this year. Granted, it’s still a decent number of pictures - probably more than 8,000 year to date - but I’ve been remarkably consistent with when I take pictures: on weekends and special occasions, etc. One of the biggest reasons that I picked up a camera was to capture the moments of every day life around me, something I have not been doing as of late. This has left gaps in my records of 2008, and unfortunately I can’t go back in time, not yet at least. I was amazed to discover how rarely I took pictures during the week. I know that working two jobs for most of the year didn’t leave me a lot of time to do incredible and fascinating things worthy of photography, but that’s just an excuse.

And just like that - no more excuses! I’ve decided that I’m going to do two things every day: tell my wife that I love her and take a picture. Why take this challenge? Because if I carry my camera around with me (almost) everywhere I go then I’ll learn and grow as a photographer. I’ll have to adapt to different situations and locations on the fly. And as the old saying goes: practice makes perfect. Practicing every day means having faster reflexes and being able to capture events naturally as they unfold in front of me, instead of cursing under my breath after I miss another fantastic photo opportunity.

This is a challenge that I’m looking forward to. It won’t be easy, but hopefully I’ll be able to come up with something different to photograph every day. To look at albums that I’ve posted recently check out my photography website:

http://fromtheopenroad.fotki.com/

Any suggestions or ideas on how to get the most out of this challenge would be greatly appreciated!