Day 20

Day 20:

This is me completely unedited. Straight out of the camera. Red eyes and everything. Long Day, Tired Mommy. 

This is me.

Day 19

Today I got to wander around down town and just take pictures. My amazing husband took care of the kids at home while I got to go shoot. (I have a homework assignment due on Monday so I needed to get pictures done.) It was really fun. It was awesome to just walk around with nothing in particular in mind. Just to look around and really see things.
I also wanted to work on overcoming my fear of taking pictures of strangers. I walked by this guy who was just leaning in a doorway. It was perfect. But I chickened out. I did take his picture but I didn't actually ASK to take his picture so in my mind it didn't count. I walked by that same doorway more than once. In fact I was down in that area for over an hour. I guess he just knew that he needed to stand there all day so I could get my nerves under control lol.
I finally decided I was just going to do it. He was across the street from where I was so I caught his eye and kinda yelled across the street "Can I take your picture?" He said "Sure, why not!" So I did.Then I yelled "Thank you!!" Turns out I was still way to nervous to actually go up and talk to him although I wanted to, I wanted to tell him how much I appreciated him letting me take his picture and what a huge accomplishment it was for me. This was the first time I've EVER asked a complete stranger if I could take his picture. The picture itself could have been better but I still felt awesome about it. Its probably going to be something I struggle with for the rest of my life but at least I took the first step. 

Then I went on to take my self portrait in an alley way lol

Day 19. Overcoming

Day 18

Reflections. 

Day 17

This is me after 4 hours at the dentist. I'm starting the process of turning into the Hulk.:)

I went to the dentist to get the impression done for a tooth I had a root canal done on two weeks ago (I had to have a deep cleaning before they did the impression) I also wanted a filing fixed because it was coming out. It was in my front tooth and it was becoming discolored and just generally embarrassing. (I have bad teeth and I've always been self conscious of them.) 

The dental assistant did check-up X-rays and they discovered that the front tooth had a lot of decay under the filing, which was connected to the tooth next to it. Plus the tooth on the other side had a small cavity in it. The dentist said with the amount of decay under the front tooth and side tooth he recommended having a veneer put on those two teeth. He said he actually recommended having veneers put on the front four teeth to make them symmetrical. 

I wasn't going to do it at first. We were just going to do the veneer on the front one and side one but then at the last minute decided it would be best to do all four. They will all now be straight and I actually shouldn't even need to get invisilign on the top!! YAY! I still plan to get invisilign on the bottom teeth at some point but that wasn't as concerning. 

I took pictures of the process but they are horrible. I look super scary so I'm not ready to post them yet. I have temporaries on Thank Goodness!!! I never would have left the dentist office looking the way I did lol. So in two weeks I should have greatly improved teeth!!! YAY!! 

At any rate here is my Hulk picture :)

Extra Credit Paper

This post isn't going to have any pictures in it. I'll come back later to post my picture for the day. 

In my business class, for extra credit, the teacher challenged us to take the Hely Gonzalez Challenge for two weeks and then write a paper about it. Because I had already made the decide to do this project it was easy for me to do the extra credit. The paper was due yesterday and this what I wrote: (Sorry it's so long) 

Hely Gonzalez came to our class as a guest speaker. He is a painter. Inspired by Michael Phelps, 2 years ago he decided to do a project called “No Days Off.” Phelps said that professional athletes train 6 days a week and take one day off. He decided that he wasn’t going to take that one day off. He trains all 7 days which is why he is the best athlete in the world. Hely decided to take that same approach to his work. Every day for an hour, he painted a self portrait, so as to accumulate over the course of one year, approximately 365 hours of painting practice. Once he completed that project he went on to start the Proof of Existence project. Basically he went out to the streets and asked everyone “If you had one hour to do something for yourself every day for one year, eliminating the option of not doing “it”, what would it be and why would you do it?”

 That night while sitting in class listening to him, I realized how much I would love to do street photography. This is one of my favorite types of photography but its the one that scares me the most. I have such a hard time asking people if I can photography them in candid situations. I realized that it is because of how uncomfortable I am in front of the camera. I love to take pictures but I hate having my pictures taken. I have horribly low self esteem. That comes across in my inability to ask people if I can photograph them. I automatically assume they are going to be as uncomfortable as I am and I project my insecurities on them. So instead of approaching people and giving them a chance to say yes or no, I skip the situation all together. I photograph buildings and the landscape and everything but the people. They may be included in the picture but they are not the focus. This is something I want to overcome. 

I've decided to take Hely's idea and make it my own. The only way I will ever be comfortable in front of the camera (and thereby be comfortable asking strangers if I can photograph them) is if I just get in front of the camera. A LOT. If doesn't matter if I'm not where I want to be weight wise or if my hair isn't the style I want or anything like that. I need to be comfortable with who I am before I can become who I want to be. For 365 days I am going to take a self-portrait. I've only set a couple rules for myself.

1. I have to take a picture every day.

2. It has to be taken on a REAL camera. Not a cell phone. 

3. It can't look the same as a picture I've already taken. 

I could take a cell phone picture of myself every day. That would be easy. I know what angle I look good in on the cell phone. I can see what the picture looks like as I'm taking it. That isn't a challenge. Plus every one of those cell phone pictures looks the exact same. Maybe a different shirt, or hairstyle, but the face is the same. I want to get past that. I want to be able to be comfortable with me and realize that I am beautiful on the inside and out. Some pictures will be simple straight forward self portraits. Some will be photo shopped. I will allow myself total creative license on these as long as they follow the three rules. I also decided to create a blog following my progress (www.365facesofme.blogspot.com). It would be easy to say I’m working on this project and just spend 30 seconds to grab the camera and quickly snap a picture. No one would know if it was horrible. No one would know that I put no effort into it. I would technically be fulfilling my own rules for the project but it wouldn’t be in the spirit of the project. By creating the blog it makes me accountable to actually create something every day. I now have to put thought into each picture. I have to take the time to decide what I’m going to do and how I want the picture to look.

I’ve completed 15 days of this project so far. Some days have been harder than others. Some days I just don’t feel like taking another picture of myself. There are days I wake up and I can’t even bear the thought of letting anyone else see what I look like. Those are the days that I make sure I take the picture. I know it would be easy to just skip a day here and there but I think that would be detrimental in the end. I think that if I allow myself to skip a day I will end up eventually giving up on the project. I don’t want that to happen because I can already feel growth. Even if its small growth I can feel it. I’m getting a little more comfortable in front of the camera. I don’t hate every self portrait. I have taken 454 portraits and I like 24 of them. That means I hate about 95% of them but it really is an improvement. Because I’m only on day 15 it does mean that I like more pictures than have been posted. I even ended up liking a couple where I am making a weird face.

In conclusion, I am grateful that I have started this challenge. I am excited to see where it will take me.

Day 16

Today was a long day. I wasn't feeling very creative tonight but I wanted to complete my challenge honestly so I took my picture. But I just wasn't feeling the picture at all. I decided to play around with the photoshop filters and see what I could come up with to change this from a boring picture to something more creative. I'm liking it a little bit more now :)

Day 15

I decided to play around with the flash today. I went through all of the pictures and had some that I really liked the way they turned out (which surprised me lol) I'm learning how to get the lighting right when working with flash which can sometimes be tricky. After going through all of the pictures, for some reason this one was my favorite. I love the burst of light. I love how you can see my face (even if it isn't perfectly lit.) The only thing I would change is probably all the fly away hairs. I promise I do brush my hair lol. 

Day 14

I realized today why I decided to make this blog. I could have just done this project and taken a picture every day and kept them on my computer. But by doing that it really wouldn't have mattered what the pictures looked like. I could have taken a crappy picture and the only person who ever would have known was me (and Jim :) ). 

By creating this blog it helps to force me to be more creative and not take every picture like this:

This is day 14. This picture took me about 30 seconds to take. And that includes the other two tries. One the exposure was off and the other was just a horrible picture. My eyes were half closed and it wasn't in focus. I liked this one but it looks like a cell phone picture.

I love that this project is helping to push me creatively. Even though it's hard some days to come up with a new idea, I'm loving it.

Day 13

Today I'm flexing my creative muscles lol. I found this knob in the kids play room and I asked my husband what it went to, then it dawned on me that it was for a lamp. Turns out it was the lamp in the playroom - go figure. So as we tilted the lamp down to put the knob back on I caught my reflection. I immediately thought "I know what I'm going to do for my self portrait today!!!"
It was a lot harder to take than I thought. Trying to get the camera to focus on the right spot. I couldn't look through the view finder because it blocked way too much of my face for a self portrait. So with trial and error this was the best I could come up with. Still pretty creative I think.
 If you look close I'm even smiling lol

Day 12

This is me on Day 12. This is not photoshopped at all. This is after a long but awesome day of shooting at the beach. I had a blast. 

I almost went to bed without taking a picture today. It's 12:38am. I was going to just say "no big deal, I'll just do it tomorrow" but that's not what this challenge is about. It's about taking the picture even if I don't want to, even if I'm tired or my face has totally broken out, or I'm not feeling creative. It's about just doing it. And that's what I'm going to do. I'm sticking with it because I love it. I want to love myself and be comfortable without having to photoshop out all my zits and everything lol. So here I am in all my tired, broken out, glasses on Glory. This is Me.

And even with all of that - I'm feeling pretty damn awesome. 

Day 11

Today I had a sinus headache which turned into a migraine But I'm sticking with the challenge lol.
So here is today's picture

Day 10

I'm still struggling with continuing with taking pictures because I'm not loving myself. I am feeling super fat. and I know I should love myself anyway but I prefer myself thin. So because of this you'll see I'm not taking full face pictures lol. I will get there though. I promise you and me.

Day 9

I was looking around on pinterest for ideas for self portraits (because seriously 365 is A LOT lol) I came across one like this and I fell in love with it. I decided to recreate it. The one on pinterest was black and white but I love the added red lipstick to an otherwise neutral palate. 

Day 8

I have to admit. I'm struggling with some depression right now. So I'm having a very hard time wanting to take pictures of myself. I decided to go with a more fun approach today to hopefully help overcome my mood. I started out with a completely different idea than this. I did my hair like I did in the 80s-90s lol. Unfortunately I didn't have any AquaNet so I just used regular hair spray. I put earrings in every earring hole that was still open lol. I think there were a total of 5. And I used the biggest ones I could find. The necklace is from a Halloween costume.
I wasn't thrilled with how they turned out originally because I couldn't get the focus right. I was using the remote and having a hard time. I decided to take it to photoshop.

I have to admit I actually love the results. 

Day 7

Today I decided to do something different. I wanted to add some movement into my picture. I set the camera up on. Tripod and set it at a slow shutter speed. Then I used a remote to trigger the shutter. While the shutter was open I shook my head back and forth. My oldest son helped to check the pictures to make sure my head was in the pic. Then of course he decided he wanted to help with the remote. Gotta love assistants lol.

I decided to start doing squats today to hopefully help with my weigh since I am getting really discouraged/depressed about it. Sigh. Lets hope I can see some changes sometime soon.

Day 6

I have to admit, today I woke up and took a shower and while I was getting dried off I was realizing (once again) how much weight I have put on. This is no way an attempt to fish for compliments. In fact Please do not message me and tell me that I look like I've lost weight or how great I look. We both know you are lying and I honestly don't need the stroking of my ego. Let me clarify that I don't mean for that to sound rude. I love getting messages and I don't even mind ones that tell me I look good but I am very aware that I've put weight on. I'm also aware that laziness and self control are both something I struggle with.
But as I was trying to figure out how to take my self portrait even though I was feeling fat and unattractive I realized that it's not going to change if I don't do something about it. Plus now that I've taken on this challenge I'm actually going to have to be faced with it EVERY SINGLE DAY. Whether I feel fat or thin, ugly or beautiful, sick or healthy, lazy or energetic, happy or depressed, I'm still going to take a picture. So I can either take control of my lazy self and you will get to see the transformation happen over the next year or I can continue the way I am going and you will get to see 365 pictures of me heavier than I want to be. Looks like I have a choice to make...

Here is today's picture. I had a shot in mind but on the way to my parents house, I decided to just play with the camera and the rear view mirror. Problem is - I wear glasses (I am VERY nearsighted) and I am right handed. So in order for this picture to work I have to #1 remove my glasses #2 hold the camera over my left eye and #3 take the picture with one hand held totally awkward as to not be in the picture.

I still think the picture turned out well considering I couldn't see a dang thing through the view finder lol.

Day 5

Today I decided to have a little fun and get a little more creative. I love how this one turned out.

I love red lipstick but I don't wear it very often because it isn't practical lol. It's fun to dress up a little every now and then. 

Day 4

Today was a rough day. To be honest I didn't want to do the self portrait today. Yesterday I had a crown break so I had to go to the dentist today to have it repaired. They did the x-rays and noticed the tooth in front of the broken crown was pretty messed up. So what started out as an easy trip to the dentist turned into a root canal. Needless to say I'm not feeling great.
I decided I was going to just have to get creative with my picture today. Because I feel awful and have not one ounce of makeup on at all. 

This is what I came up with. It's not bright and cheery but I'm not feeling all bright today. Hopefully tomorrow I'll be feeling better.

Day 3

This is day 3. The funny thing about this picture was my immediate reaction was. "It's a pretty good picture but it would be so much better if I took it to photoshop and smoothed my skin and got rid of my blemishes." I even opened it in photoshop. Then I changed my mind. This is me. No this isn't how I look when I wake up in the morning. This is after doing my makeup and hair. But this is me. This is how I look today. No photoshop. Still not bad :)

365 Faces of Me

On Monday night in my business class we had a guest speaker. His name was Hely Gonzalez and he is a painter. 2 years ago he decided to do a project called "No Day's off". You can see his work here http://helyomargonzalez.com/ He was inspired to do this project while watching Michael Phelps. Phelps said that professional athletes train 6 days a week and take one day off. He decided that he wasn't going to take that one day off. He trains all 7 days a week which is why he is the best athlete in the world. Hely decided to take that same approach to his work. Every day for an hour, a self portrait was painted, so as to accumulate over the course of one year, 365 approximate hours of practice painting. He completed that project and went on to start The Proof of Existence project. Basically he went out to the streets and asked everyone:
 If you had one hour to do something for yourself every day for one year, eliminating the option of not doing “it”, what would it be and why would you do it?

This is a quote from him "For the past year of my life, this question has been at the heart of my days, acting as the life’s blood this project’s philosophy: To do something for ourselves with a daily diligence and see what happens." He spent that year taking one hour a day to paint a picture of someone else. He went from asking "what is the meaning of life" to "what is my life's meaning?"

There were so many things that stood out to me in his speech. Here are some of the main ones 

• Don't put so much pressure on the fear of making a bad piece.
• The only bad piece is the one you don't create.
• Eliminate the option of not doing something.
• The thing you do most is the thing you become. 
• Share actual happiness instead of the desire for happiness. 
• Test your own limitations of what you are capable of and you'll be surprised. 
• No one wants to help out a slacker
• You have control over your work ethic.
• Maximize your own potential.
• Do it everyday
• Don't doubt yourself! You will be your worst enemy
• Find your reason to wake up in the morning
• Be responsible for your life
• Your life is the way it is because of choices you make.
• Be prolific - create work. Just work
• Don't beat yourself up. Pat yourself on the back.
• You have to take care of yourself before you can take care of someone else.
• Be the good version of you.
• Your input = your output every time. 
• The only opinion that really matters is yours and even that is just an opinion. 
• You'll meet some incredible people if you just go out and meet people.
• There's a strange hurdle we set up for ourselves "will other people accept my work?" If you think it is cool - someone else will think its cool.
• Be relevant to yourself. 

This wasn't all that he said but I don't want to this blog post to be forever long. Needless to say I was so inspired by him. I really would eventually like to get into Street Photography. Wikipedia defines Street Photography as a non-formalised genre of photography that features subjects in candid situations within public places such as streets, parks, beaches, malls, political conventions and other associated settings.

This is one of my favorite types of photography but its the one that scares me the most. I have such a hard time asking people if I can photography them in candid situations. I realized that it is because of how uncomfortable I am in front of the camera. I love to take pictures but I hate having my pictures taken. That comes across in my inability to ask people if I can photograph them. I automatically assume they are going to be as uncomfortable as I am and I project my insecurities on them. So instead of approaching people and giving them a chance to say yes or no. I skip the situation all together. I photograph buildings and the landscape and everything but the people. They may be included in the picture but they are not the focus. This is something I want to overcome. 

I've decided to take Hely's idea and make it my own. The only way I will ever be comfortable in front of the camera (and thereby be comfortable asking strangers if I can photograph them) is if I just get in front of the camera. A LOT. If doesn't matter if I'm not where I want to be weight wise or if my hair isn't the style I want or anything like that. I need to be comfortable with who I am before I can become who I want to be. 

On to my project:

For 365 days I am going to take a self-portrait. I've only set a couple rules for myself.

1. I have to take one everyday.

2. It has to be taken on a REAL camera. Not a cell phone. 

3. It can't look the same as a picture I've already taken. 

I could take a cell phone picture of myself everyday. That would be easy. I know what angle I look good in on the cell phone lol I can see what the picture looks like as I'm taking it. That isn't a challenge. Plus everyone of those cell phone pictures look the exact same. Maybe a different shirt, or hairstyle, but the face is the same. I want to get past that. I want to be able to be comfortable with me and realize that I am beautiful on the inside and out. Some pictures will be simple straight forward self portraits. Some will be photo shopped. I'm allowing myself total creative license on these as long as they follow the three rules.
Technically I started this project two days ago so here are my first two pictures. 

Day One

Day Two

I haven't done todays picture yet but stay tuned and I will post it later today.