P365 - Day 161 a million little photos (10/06/2011)

On the weekend I finally finished taking photos for the Art House Cooperative's A Million Little Photos:  Photomobile project, which I signed up to in February.

I posted about this project when I received my camera in March, and then spent the best part of two months wondering what on earth I was going to take photos of.

I chose the theme ‘In Progress’, which seemed like it wouldn’t be too hard, but when it came down to actually taking the pictures, I had no idea what to do. The only thing that really came to mind was building sites, but I didn’t think taking 27 photos of buildings in progress would make for a very interesting project.

As a result the camera sat on my dining table for over two months, while I waited, with increasing desperation as the weeks went by, for inspiration to hit.

Eventually I realised I was just going to have to get out there and do something or I’d miss the 15 June deadline for the photos to be postmarked.

Until I actually started taking the pictures, I hadn’t fully appreciated the challenges involved with taking photos with a disposable camera, when I’m used to a variety of more sophisticated cameras, with zoom functions and the ability to focus and expose for the available light. Another thing you have to remember is when you look through the viewfinder, the image that the camera lens sees is slightly down and to the left of your view, which does make a difference when you're used to shooting exactly what you see with a digital camera.

I’m used to a little beep that tells me when something in the scene is in focus, so holding up a camera and basically going ‘click’ felt really really strange.

I put the camera in to be processed yesterday and got the photos back today. Overall I wasn’t exactly thrilled with them, but there wasn’t much I could do about it. 

You had to use the disposable camera, with all its limitations – which I guess was the whole idea of the project – so what I got was what I got. I could see a few where the flash would have come in handy, and a few where I tried to get too close. Since I couldn’t crop them, I tried to move in close to eliminate distracting backgrounds from the picture, only to end up with something that was out of focus.

Anyway it’s all done now. I dropped the photos in the post box on my way home and they are now winging their way to the Brooklyn Art Library to be a part of the project. I guess I’ll find out a bit later on which photo or photos they thought were worthy of inclusion.