Video? Still Photography? What’s Happened to My Year Project?

First it was to be a 52-Week Project and then back to a daily photo project that picked up with 304 days left in the year. Now that “304-Day Project” seems to have died a slow death. March 22nd, Day 20 of the “new” project, was the last day I posted a daily image.  About six months ago. And that time coincides with my revised interest in learning more about storytelling, especially storytelling with videos. Yes, my interest in making videos seems to be getting in the way of my still photography!

Don’t get me wrong. I still love photography. I still love making cool images out of everyday things, of capturing beautiful scenes or simple gatherings of people. But I also get absorbed when I am learning something new. I’ve been actively recording videos for my YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/billbooz) since the beginning of the year, but I have also now gotten interested again in my original reason for even exploring video making: storytelling. I will continue taking pictures and, occasionally, sharing them. However, I will also continue making videos and, hopefully, making more videos that are of the storytelling kind.

Cameras - and that includes the little ones in our smartphones - today are amazing. What the average person with little interest in photography or video can capture with his/her smartphone or digital camera is sometimes breathtaking. What one can do with today’s cameras simply by applying a little bit of understanding of exposure and using the controls on one’s cameras is, likewise, astounding. That hundreds and hundreds of traditional journalists are turning to their smartphones to embrace “mobile journalism” (MoJo) or “video journalism” (VJ) is a rather shocking yet very exciting phenomenon.

It is a great time to be a photographer and it’s, likewise, a great time for photographers to explore video. Most modern cameras, even entry level cameras, come capable of recording video and often even have mic jacks to attach external microphones. My video obsession is slowly leveling out and I hope to get back to taking more still images more frequently.