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I don't know if anyone else has a attempted or has a 365 project running but since I have one well on its way, I thought I'd share some thoughts about it.

First of all, on how I got started. I have no fancy story about this. I simply decided one day to try. I didn't really even have a serious intention to finish it. As it was just something I did on a whim the starting date was a bit less conventional (April 10th), most of these projects starting on January 1st. Part of the motivation was moving to a less familiar camera system as I moved from Canon DSLR to an Olympus µ4/3 and I wanted to thoroughly familiarize myself with it.

As an experience it's a bit hard to summarize it. I can honestly say that I've taken some of my favorite photographs during this project as well as some of my least favorites. Sometimes inspiration comes out of nowhere and sometimes other things take precedence and I've found myself desperately trying to come up with something to shoot at 11:30pm. Sometimes I've found myself well prepared and having more than adequate time for a photography session and the results are crap none the less. So has my quality remained constant. Absolutely not.

Would I recommend starting one? Absolutely yes! I've grown much as a photographer and as an observer of my surroundings during this project. It may show in the pictures only very intermittently but I have done some commissioned projects during the project and the experience gained during the project has been very valuable. Foremost I've learned to be more alert and quicker to respond to an opportunity. Lesson learned mostly with my adventures in the mysterious and fascinating world of street photography. Stealth has been one other of the valuable lessons learned during those adventures. Regardless of the fact that it's a major undertaking which if you have personalty like me will give you more grief than pleasure, I wholeheartedly recommend it. It's a few minutes of your day for a year and you'll learn things about yourself and your photography that you didn't think existed.

To summarize. My word of advice to anyone who's thinking about it. Don't think, just do it. Take it one day at the time and don't expect too much. Getting that masterpiece of photograph every day is a goal you'll probably never be able to reach and constantly being disappointed of your performance will kill your motivation quickly. Take it as it comes and don't look back. Don't try to reach the end but instead set some kind of milestones you at least want to reach. When I started my first was making it through the first month, then making it to triple digits, then half way and as a result I'm now on my 280th day. Now I have no excuse not to finish.

I have to level with you 365 project will not be always fun and it is mentally consuming but when everything falls into place it can be hugely rewarding. Some days you'll end up with dozens of good photos. Finally, carry your camera with you all the times, chances are your daily photo will find you without you having to go out to look for it. Then do some planned stuff every now and then for a change of pace.

If you're interested in starting a 365 project and have any questions about it, don't hesitate to ask. It'll be my pleasure to help you get or keep going if I in any way can.

If you're interested in following my progress I try to post photos in my project blog on a daily basis and update my thread in Fan Creations here at Asuki weekly.

Hm, I may want to give this project a shot myself. Maybe make myself and album on my page for it or something. Perhaps using this thread as a palce to link to the photos being taken.

So does the project jsut basically mean showcasing one favorite photo of yours you've taken each day? I guess explain it mroe to me.

The "original" form of the concept was taking a picture featuring yourself daily for a single year starting on January 1st. One of the later versions is the so called creative 365 project which was the formula I opted for.

It's basically as you described. It's a form of a photo journal where you end up with a photograph for each day. The rest is pretty much up to you. If you want to pick a theme, by all means do so. I personally didn't want to restrict myself too much so I opted to not confine myself to a single format.

Oh one more thing. As for places to showcase you photos I'd recommend something like Flickr, 500px or Google+ (Google+ has HUGE photographer community, it's probably the only group of people that have really adopted it.)

Here in Animesuki I'd recommend creating a thread in Fan Creations sub-forum. It's a bit quiet nowadays but they're not going to kick you out for not posting anime related stuff. You might also consider posting some of your better work in the Photographs thread in General Chat. It probably gets a bit more exposure than your Fan Creations thread will but I for one prefer not to post all the crap I've produced along this project there.

Edit: Hmpf... Seems I've really neglected this group for too long. It seems that posting images in social group threads has been allowed, which has gone unnoticed by me. I do feel a bit silly now. Sure you can post your photos here as well but since it seems that very few people follow this group at least for now I thing you're still better of with the options mentioned above.

I'll giove a few of those a check before I decide whether I go forward or not. thanks for the listing.

Okay I'm done with my 365 project. Here are a few thoughts I shared about it in my project blog.

Thanks for the write-up. I've heard that if you can make it to day 90 then you have a very high likelihood of being able to finish the entire project. Supposedly it takes 90 days to form a habit; thus, anyone getting started should be aware that the first 90 days (approximately four months) will probably be the most difficult to stick to.

I can see how these types of projects would be good for people who want to do more photography but perhaps can't bring themselves to get up and get out with their camera. I guess I never really saw why it would be useful for anyone else, though. Just as an example, I always want to go out and take photos, but my major limitation is time. Sure, perhaps I could use a 365 project to prove to myself that I do have the time to take photos, but what good would it be? I enjoy photography in part because it forces me to slow down and take in the world around me. If I'm pressed to find a photographic opportunity and then process it before midnight it somewhat defeats one of the joys of photography. (But that's just me griping about a lack of time and a desire to do more photography...)

If nothing else, it's a major showing of willpower. To be able to do something every day for a year, even when you don't feel like it and can't think of anything new or creative? I think it's very impressive.

The project helped me to discover new approaches to photography. I've found that I do my best work under pressure and deadline. It worked for me with this project for a while. Since loosing my job and thus having much more time for photography the quality started to decline quite drastically.

Anyway looking at the stuff I ended up with I find myself with quite a bit of stuff to draw inspiration from. So even as I intend to cut myself quite a bit of slack with photography for a while and the end result not perhaps being what it could or should have been, I'm just as inspired with photography as I was before I started, perhaps more.

I've now directed my creative efforts towards a subject I'm far less familiar with. I started writing a sci-fi novel. I've tried creative writing a few times before but this time I've got a good feeling about the subject matter and genre I've chosen. In fact I've already over two days come up with more than in my previous attempts over several weeks.

However no worries, I'm not abandoning photography or this group. I still have quite a bit of photos to sort and process from my trip to French Riviera which I'll be posting to my FC-thread as soon as I'm done and once the weather around here improves a bit I'll hit the ground running with my camera again.