It originally started out with the project “365 Days” , a year-long creative Flickr self portrait project started by Flickr member, Chris Maverick. It’s a wonderful idea. However, I cannot imagine having the self-discipline to do a self-portrait each and every day, for a whole year. Nor the motivation, for that matter.
Others share my thoughts. Therefore, someone started the group “52 weeks“; a project where you shoot and post one self-portrait every WEEK instead.
Missing you, by Marius Waldal
Even this requires a great deal of self-discipline, but it is achievable (for me). And there is another reason I prefer this: I imagine the quality of the portraits will be higher, as you have more time to plan and execute them.
One of the beauties of self-portraiture is that you always have a model at the ready! And you don’t need to feel self-confident when asking your model to perform certain tasks or acquire certain postures (at least if nobody’s watching!).
Doing self-portraits will teach you loads about portraiture and probably a few things about yourself as well. Also, I found it quite interesting to brainstorm ideas for self-portraits. Some of them will likely not be implemented, but some of them I’m really looking forward to try out!
Abandoned, by Marius Waldal
8 tips for a successful 52 Weeks project
1. Brainstorm ideas – Before you start, brainstorm ideas for types of portraits you can shoot. I myself have jotted down more than 20 achievable ideas up front.
2. Save ideas for a rainy day – Sort out 3-5 easy-to-accomplish ideas and put them away. You save these for upcoming weeks where you will either have little time to do something fancy, or little motivation. This will increase you chances of actually succeeding. Because if you fail one week, you have lowered the bar for allowing yourself to fail again. And if you do, you might lose motivation completely and throw in the towel. And you won’t be happy about it.
3. Get a smooth start – Sort out another easy-to-accomplish idea and choose this as your first-week portrait! When you begin such a project, your motivation is high. Getting a good start will solidify this motivation, while a poor start can be a killer.
4. Get moral support – If you’re already on flickr, talk to some of your contacts and tell them about your upcoming project. Explain that you are a little anxious about the whole thing and that you need their support! If they are good at encouraging you in the beginning, your confidence will build much more quickly!
5. Be active on the 52 Weeks flickr group! – Be generous with comments on other photographers’ self-portraits. You can get some tips on how to do photo critiques in this article, but as a general advice I recommend being less critical on peoples’ self-portraits than on their other photos.
6. Collect ideas from other participants – As you browse the group, write down ideas you get when seeing what others have done. Try to make your own twist on the idea. Just copying an idea from another is also ok, but it is polite to write in your description that you were inspired by another user and include a link to that photo.
7. Keep brainstorming – Every other month, sit down and brainstorm for new ideas. Don’t be picky. Any idea is fine at this stage. Even ideas that seem far out may trigger other great ideas later on.
8. From ideas to plans – Every week, spend some time going through your ideas from tip #7 and see if you can mold some of them into real assignments that you can use in your project.
I will do this project now! Will you?
February 1st 2010, week 5, I will begin my 52 Weeks project! I look forward to it, and I will be writing something about it here as well.
How about joining 52 Weeks yourself? You know you want to… 
Have you done this already? Are you doing it now? Great! I would love to hear what you think!
If you liked this post, you may also like:
framedreality.com is founded by Marius Waldal, long-time photo enthusiast.