180 Posts Later : What I learnt by starting a Daily Photo Diary in 2021

People often ask me when I first began doing photography. The truth is, I don't actually remember. What I do remember is being in secondary school equipped with a basic smartphone, the Motorola Moto G2 which cost ￡120 at the time to be precise, and using it to take pictures. Whether it was sunsets, buildings, flowers, or my friends, I loved taking and editing pictures. Somewhere along the way, I became obsessed with pushing that budget smartphone to its limits and seeing what I could come up with.

I've come leaps and bounds on my journey with photography since that time. I got my hands on my first camera towards the end of my first year of Sixth Form and took it all over the world with me, developing a passion for portraiture and documentation in capturing images such as those in the slide below.

I decided to start a daily photo diary this year for a number of reasons.

One of these was an excuse to get to know my new camera system after switching from Canon to Fujifilm. I'll try not to bore you with details or technical jargon, but I started out with a Canon DSLR camera. It was nothing but good to me. I worked it to the bone, taking it to 5 different countries and learning everything there was to know using it. 

But it was to be a tale as old as time itself. Over time we grew apart, I found myself not wanting to use it. The camera's size and weight discouraged me from taking it out and about with me and I slowly fell out of love with it.

So, I made the decision to switch to a completely different system. Enter, the Fujifilm X-Pro 3. I bought this camera, in large part, because of its physical form. More capability packed into a smaller, more stylish body. This was a camera I could take everywhere with me, and since the start of the new year I've been doing just that.

One of the main reasons for committing to posting a photo every day was to ensure I was making the most of the time I have left living in Cambridge, a place renowned for its photogenic cityscape. In order to honour the commitment I'd made, I would need to cycle into town every day, make time for exploration, and walk routes I normally wouldn't.

Most importantly, I'd have to slow down and disconnect from the robotic routine of life as a Cambridge student, taking in my surroundings in a way I hadn't before.

It sounds odd, but prior to embarking on this challenge, I always found Cambridge a really difficult place to photograph. Yes, everything looks pretty - that's not up for debate. But it felt like everything had been done before, every scenic view snapped a million times.

When most streets in the city look like they've been plucked straight from a postcard, it can be hard to put your own spin on things and to capture them in your own unique way.

Hard, but not impossible.

If I was going to take a photo of Cambridge every day, I would need to notice new details, see it from new angles, and experience it with a fresh pair of eyes.

Take, for example, the iconic chapel of St John's College (pictured below) which can be seen from all over the city due to its domineering height. I managed to view it from different angles to those depicted on postcards as well as those experienced by people on the ground. This was the result of forcing myself to engage my creative side and explore new parts of the city I've come to call home.

In this regard, the act of forcing myself to consistently create beautiful images every day has done wonders for developing my creative eye and showing me what is possible when I put my mind to it.

I managed to overcome that limitation that I had previously set for myself by going back to basics and stopping to take in my surroundings. I don't mean to exaggerate, but it has been a genuinely beautiful experience. I've lost count of the number of times I've looked up at some of Cambridge's iconic structures and noticed a new detail, an architectural feature that had been completely invisible to me up until that point.

By making it a part of my daily routine, I've fallen in love with photography all over again and I'm going into the summer with a fresh passion and perspective for the creative medium.

Another deeply rewarding aspect of this experience was putting the social media learnings and techniques I've picked up during internships into practice. I got to see the value of creating and posting high-quality content on social media for various different clients during these placements, so practising this on my own photography page and seeing real results has also been really satisfying.

Paying attention to and documenting your surroundings becomes so much more important when we find ourselves living through periods of turmoil. Creating content for my daily photo diary helped me to notice the ways in which measures against pandemic manifested themselves in our daily lives and on the town itself.

I found it particularly interesting to examine Market Square, a site that is normally teeming with life, and the changes it experienced as the pandemic worsened. From being closed entirely to having a phased reopening, photographing this location (examples below) as well as the people whose livelihoods depend on it was a fascinating exercise.

So, 180 posts later, what have I learnt from embarking on this challenge?

1. Practise makes perfect.

I've found that it can take as many as 50 average-looking photos to get that one magical shot. The amazing photos you see online are the product of hours of practice behind the scenes that no one sees. Taking more photos in my day-to-day life has meant that I'm getting more and more shots that I'm proud of.

2. You reach your best self when you leave your comfort zone.

Learning to use a new camera system and committing to posting a photo every day was difficult at times, but it's brought out the best in me. When you embrace discomfort in the pursuit of growth, you achieve things you didn't think were possible.

3. Life won't come running to you, you have to chase it instead.

The mission to document life through a daily photo diary means, for me, meant going out of my way to seek out special moments. From sunrises and sunsets atop the tallest buildings to visually potent moments during the pandemic, life has rewarded me when I've made the effort to witness these moments and this is reflected in my photography.

4. Believe in yourself, the rest comes later.

Self-imposed limitations are the worst and are something I've suffered from throughout my life. Overcoming them to try new things unlocks so many opportunities, and I've found that I'm always more capable than I give myself credit for.

It goes without saying that these learnings can, of course, extend to life beyond photography too.

Ultimately though, I would say that the most important thing that I've learnt through starting a daily photo diary is that there is no such thing as a bad photo. I've pondered on this topic a lot in recent months, mainly because a great deal of the praise I've received for my photos of Cambridge from people is often either preceded or followed by a self-deprecating comment about their own photographic abilities.

I've come to realise that each and every photo you take is a digital window into the past, an everlasting snapshot of a moment in your life, another piece of the infinitely complex puzzle that is your lived experience.

Whoever you are, whatever you're doing in life, we should all be taking more photos.

You can keep up to date with my daily photo diary here instagram.com/capturedhr.