8/365 Pink hyacinth

Hyacinths, though they're always attractive, tend to be one of the less compelling photo subjects to me.

I'm not sure exactly why, though I think it has to do with the fact that they don't have one singular bloom to focus on, and their blossoms are stacked vertically. It presents a challenge -- but that's the name of the game.

I'm pleased with how this attempt turned out. I had to get as close to the ground as I could in order to get a straight-on or even upward angle rather than the easy bird's eye view.

Camera: Canon 40D with 60mm macro lens, 1/125s, f/2.8 at ISO 100

7/365 Easy Sunday

Sundays always seem to be good days for general housework. I usually do all my laundry on Sunday, preferring to do it all at once instead of a load here and there during the week.

I also tend to make fresh hummus for my week's lunches, and hard-boil eggs for breakfasts.

None of this is terribly exciting, but there is a certain calmness that comes with routine.

If you're on the cynical side of the street, it means the weekend is coming to a close and the work week is soon to begin... but lately I'm staying on the more positive side and enjoying the routine.

Camera: Canon 40D with 430EX Speedlite, 1/125s, f/4.5 at ISO 400

6/365 Pink and peppermint

Prior to observing Earth Hour on Saturday, I got in the mood to bake, so I made pink peppermint cupcakes.

A couple of years ago, one of my girlfriends made the most amazing peppermint cupcakes for a birthday dinner, and they made such an impression on me that I've been dying to have them again.

I don't know how she made hers, but for these, I Googled "peppermint cupcakes." I expected it could be pretty easy to just adapt a typical boxed white cake mix (which is exactly what I was hoping to do), and sure enough, I found a recipe.

All I did was add 1/2 teaspoon of peppermint extract to the mix, along with some fuschia food coloring (left from my 4-H cake decorating days), and voila! They're by no means as good as the original inspiration, but they'll suffice for now.

I also substituted egg whites for whole eggs and applesauce for the oil. And how fun are pink cupcakes?

Camera: Canon 40D with 60mm macro lens and 430EX Speedlite, 1/125s, f/2.8 at ISO 400

5/365 Spring cleaning

Part of the outdoor spring cleaning ritual always includes clearing out dead or dying trees.

This one has been dying for quite a while, which was easiest to see in the summer when half of the branches were without leaves.

And now, seeing what the inside of the trunk looks like, you can understand why: it was on its way to being completely hollowed out by ants.

It was a Boxelder, which typically aren't very strong or long-living trees to begin with. Then, when you add a predator that speeds up the process, like an ant, it would only be a matter of time before a strong spring storm would fell it.

Camera: Canon 40D, 1/125s, f/5.6 at ISO 200 at about 6:30 p.m.

4/365 A different angle

As part of my mission to stretch my creative juices this year, I migrated from my "usual" style of flower photography for this shot.

I initially walked outside wanting to go for a silhouette photo, but in the twenty minutes I'd been inside, cloud cover moved in and chose not to cooperate.

To get this angle, I lay flat on the grass under the edge of this small magnolia bush, pointed my camera straight up at the sky, and was conscious of keeping some foreground elements in the frame for depth and interest.

My usual way would have included keeping those blurred foreground elements out of the frame. But this is different, and it stretched me, so I'll consider the mission accomplished.

There will be other days for silhouettes.

Camera: Canon 40D, 1/250s, f/4.5 at ISO 100 at about 6:30 p.m.

3/365 Sounds of the season

Sitting at my desk on Wednesday afternoon, I heard a sound outside that I hadn't in months.

A lawn mower.

If that's not a sound signaling the changing seasons, I don't know what is.

The landscaping crew was working right below my window, so I grabbed my PowerShot and got some overhead shots of their progress. They appeared to be trimming a patch of ornamental grasses. Since I haven't been at this job except in winter, I haven't yet seen what it will look like in spring and summer.

I definitely look forward to the changing view from my window.

Camera: Canon PowerShot SD1000 at about 4:00 p.m.

2/365 A disappearing sight

How long will it be before CDs go the way of vinyl records and cassette tapes?

I'm reluctant to let go of CDs. I enjoy going to the store, picking a CD from the rack, looking through the included booklet of notes, photos, and lyrics, and having a tactile copy of my music.

I do get home and import it into my iTunes for my iPod, but call me old-fashioned, because I've still never bought a single song through iTunes. I know you can burn a CD of your iTunes purchases, but it just doesn't seem the same.

On the other hand, I've completely embraced digital photography and don't mourn the downfall of film. I do have prints made of my favorites so that I can keep hard-copy albums, but I retain the vast majority in file-only form.

So I guess I'm schizophrenic when it comes to technology. I'm sure I'm not the only one out there.

Camera: Canon 40D with 60mm macro lens and 430EX Speedlite, 1/125s, f/2.8 at ISO 400, set on fluorescent white balance to achieve the purple cast.

1/365 A new year

Yes, it's the middle of March (wow, time is flying, but that's another subject altogether), but it's a new year for this project.

Year 2 of my Project 365 begins now! It felt strange to label this post 1/365, starting over in the single digits. But there you have it.

I've got some rough goals for this round:

• More portraits, including both self-portraits (which prove to be handy for experimenting with a patient, willing model) and portraits of others. I'd like to improve my working knowledge of both foundation poses and portraits that are looser and more creative.
• Continue to improve my lighting techniques and exposures, concerning both natural light and that I construct manually. I'm getting better about reading my histogram to get a better exposure at the scene of the crime, instead of having to adjust it later in Photoshop. And I'm all for needing less Photoshop!
• But speaking of Photoshop, I want to improve there as well.
• And of course, I want to continue to push myself outside of what the "rules" say a good photo should be. I want to play with longer exposures (like the photo in this post), different focal points, intentional blur... and just exercise my creative juices.

It should be a challenging, but fun, year!

I set up this shot by placing my camera on a tripod, using my remote trigger, and walking slowly while hanging over the front of the treadmill with trigger in hand. I played with exposures as long as five seconds, but I liked this 1/2-second exposure the best because it still shows some detail in my shoes.

Camera: Canon 40D 1/2s, f/5.6 at ISO 800

365/365 The grand finale

Take a look at the title of this post.

365/365.

That's right! I made it successfully through Project 365.

If you're a new visitor, or fairly new, welcome! You can learn about Project 365 -- and maybe become inspired to try it yourself -- at Photojojo. I'd also suggest typing "project 365" into your search engine of choice and perusing the listings that pop up. Flickr has a group devoted to it as well.

It's been an amazing year. I picked up my camera every day for a year, except for a week following my eye surgery, during which I realized it was a wasted effort when I couldn't see well enough to see the photo, let alone tell if it was in focus.

To cap off the year and the project, I'll share my personal top 10 favorite posts from the last 365 days, in chronological order:

79/365 A day of girlfriends, in person and on the silver screen. My second solo portrait photo shoot. I did my first solo shoot earlier in the year, in April, with another girlfriend. I consider both shoots to have been successful, but what makes the shoot on day 79 especially rewarding is I can look back and see my hands-on knowledge improve.

96/365 Second outdoor portrait shoot. And then came this second shoot. I was able to take what I'd learned from the first two shoots and stretch my boundaries for this one. Now I can't wait to see what I can do this year!

113/365 Fields of gold. Wheat fields in central Indiana. I love the monochromatic quality of this image. It consistently comes up as one of my favorites.

127/365 Rocky Mountain National Park. Ah, vacation! I had the chance to get some very different photos on this trip, and the mountains in this park were stunning.

169/365 Light up the skies over Indianapolis. Sky Concert, one of my favorite events of the summer. I photographed real fireworks for the first time, and I had an excellent seat to get photos of downtown Indianapolis. What a great night.

198/365 Fall bouquet. This sunflower has to be one of my all-time favorite flower photos (and that's saying a lot, because I have hundreds of flower photos). My mom loved it so much that she had a 16x20" print made for her kitchen.

261/365 Toys from Christmases past. A macro shot of this koosh ball is just plain fun. It's unlike anything else I photographed over the year.

311/365 Mouth-watering dessert. I didn't initially think that a photo of two bowls of ice cream would be in my top ten for the year, but there's something about this shot that I really love (aside from the subject). I like the composition, the lighting, the color... It's just a pleasing shot, and that qualifies it for one of my favorites.

313/365 Now THAT'S what I call snow. Twelve inches of snow, followed by a gorgeous, sunny day. A perfect opportunity for photos!

361/365 First spring crocus. And finally, a photo from this past week. I love this photo so much that I've made it my desktop background at both home and work, and it's my wallpaper on my iPhone as well. I love the foreground elements, the completely out-of-focus background, the color, the water droplets, the spot-on focus... lovely.

If you've been a devoted follower, I'd love to hear what your favorite posts/photos have been over the last year.

I've decided (and have been persuaded) to restart Project 365 and take on another year. I'd been wavering between another P365 or just making this a regular photo blog, but I chose to go with the former.

But now, I think I'll take Sunday as a day of rest -- a one-day break -- then pick up Year 2 of Project 365 on Monday.

Stay tuned...!

Camera settings for this post, 365: Canon 40D with 60mm macro lens, 1/500, f/4 at ISO 100 at about 5:00 p.m.

364/365 Maple buds

The first official day of spring, Friday was an incredibly busy day at work, to top off a very busy week in general, and I couldn't get out the door to head home until 6:00.

But when I finally made it home, before I shed my work gear for stretchy pants and fleece, I grabbed my camera and caught these buds in the sunshine.

They're new buds on a maple tree, which I noticed one evening this week. If you stretch your imagination, they kind of look like sea anemones hanging out on a branch.

How nice it would be to be photographing underwater life in a tropical location...

But I'm not, so I'll be happy with the first signs of spring.

Camera: Canon 40D with 60mm macro lens, 1/125s, f/4 at ISO 100 at about 7:00 p.m.

363/365 Test tubes and dry ice

I took a tour of a biological storage facility on Thursday, and I had the opportunity to take my camera.

I knew it would be a great opportunity to get some photos out of my norm. And I was right! It's not often that I'm around scores of test tubes.

I like that you can see the dry-ice fog rolling off the container near the middle and top of the photo.

It reminds me of being a kid, when my family would occasionally get steaks delivered on dry ice, and we would get to add water and watch the fog roll off.

And that will never cease to be cool in my book.

Camera: Canon 40D, 1/60s, f/4.5 at ISO 800

362/365 Fresh strawberries

One word: yum.

I adore fresh strawberries. They may not be in season in Indiana right now, but the ones I've been getting from the grocery store lately have been fantastic.

Of course, every fresh fruit and vegetable is fantastic after a long winter. And the taste isn't the only thing that's refreshing -- the vibrant color is a treat, too.

Bring on color!

Camera: Canon 40D with 60mm macro lens and 430EX Speedlite, 1/125s, f/2.8 at ISO 200

361/365 First spring crocus

If this sight stirred an excitement in me, then seeing the first crocus blooming makes me want to jump out of my chair and dance, singing "Flowers! Flowers!"

I won't, but that's how happy I am.

I challenged myself when I set out to photograph this crocus, because at the beginning of this project, in March 2008, I photographed the crocus in this same garden. So my challenge was to make this year's photo both different and an improvement, meaning my goal for this project would be realized: I bettered my photography skills in a year.

Here's last year's post, day 12, and photo:


On the first point, the two photos are different, so that's a definite success.

Is it an improvement? I like last year's photo, but it's underexposed (too dark), and I would probably compose (or crop) it a little differently now. By no means would I scrap it, though. The 2008 photo was done in the shade, so the lighting is different right from the start, but I have a more thorough understanding of how to get a better exposure now.

Overall, I'd say I rose to my challenge and produced a very different photo. Now if all the other flowers will hurry up and sprout, I could work on improving my view of them, too.

Camera: Canon 40D with 60mm macro lens, 1/125s, f/5.6 at ISO 100 at about 6:00 p.m.

360/365 Living vicariously

Dancing with the Stars is back for a new season, and while I'm thrilled that one of my favorite shows has returned, I'm less than enthralled with this cast.

What it does, more than anything, is make me want to get back out ballroom dancing. When I went to college, one of the things on my "must do" list was take ballroom lessons. Butler luckily offered ballroom as one of its available PE credits, which I took right off the bat in my freshman year.

It was completely addicting. Each semester thereafter, I went back for the Friday morning class just to participate. I miss it, but I haven't been able to find the right mix of challenging lessons, fun group atmosphere, and performance since then. I tried my hand at competition and didn't care for it.

So, until I find my own perfect situation, I'll continue to sit back and live vicariously through the contestants on Dancing with the Stars. Well, I'd be doing that regardless.

Camera: Canon 40D, 1/5s, f/5.6 at ISO 500

359/365 Fire scene

A huge fire tore through a condo development in downtown Indianapolis last week and several streets are still closed to traffic.

On Sunday afternoon, Mom and I ventured downtown for our next play at the IRT, and our drive home took us past the fire scene.

Yellow tape lines the block, and police officers are still standing guard to keep passersby from entering the area. We saw many people walking to see the damage themselves, standing on nearby sidewalks, pointing and chatting.

So of course I grabbed my camera.

We didn't linger any longer than the length of our stoplight. I will be interested to learn if the federal fire investigators turn up anything suspicious in the coming days/weeks.

Camera: Canon PowerShot SD1000 at about 4:30 p.m.