31 minutes update one {blogtober day 9}

A photo takes just a fraction of a second to capture – in the photos below, it took 1/320, 1/3200, 1/2500, and 1/200 of a second respectively- and yet I’m counting it as my 31 minutes for 31 days project. The image might be captured in an instant, but I’m thinking and looking all day; “what can I photograph today that tells a story”. I don’t want to just blast off a round of frames in high speed sports burst mode and call it good enough. I’m looking for the little details that make me smile, that I want to record for future me. There’s so many unexpected corners of joy that accidentally fell out of my design, that I want to capture in this project.

Just over a week in, I’m loving this project. Here’s four favourites so far:

1. I want to capture LIFE, not real estate display home photos (though I also love those, and am very thankful our builders had professional photos taken, and shared them with us. This photo is exactly that, capturing the early morning shift in the kitchen as I prepare a birthday cake; something I have done at least 60 times since 2007 (and that’s just counting actual birthdays, and not the years I made multiple cakes for parties, or cakes I’ve made for other people). In this photo I love the mess, the warm glow from the copper pendants overhead, the darkened hallway beyond hinting at the early hour.
2. Instead of bedsides, we have pendants in the main bedroom – copper, to match the kitchen pendants, just the next size down. Our bedroom has a large north-facing picture window, and east facing French doors. Safe to say, the light in there is stunning. This particular photo was also early in the morning, as the light streamed in and the copper reflected back onto the northern wall.
3. Another magic morning light shot – this is on our front deck, and I am facing west. The doors on the left hand corner are those east-facing French doors in the main bedroom. I love the way the rising sun filters through the lights strung along the deck and create shadows on the wall. I also love this part of our house, a bit of a feature where the cladding on the rest of the house gives way to weatherboard; an echo of old farmhouses where the original brick homestead grows over the years by having verandahs enclosed with weatherboard.
4. My little corner; the arm of the lounge becomes a collection zone for the detritus of the projects of the moment…and of moments already past. On the morning I snapped this photo, I had just finished a cup of tea while reading my kindle. The night before,I had been sketching in my journal, and there was still a pile of yarn offcuts from weaving in the ends on some socks. Of course my crochet blanket was also shoved in the corner out of the way where I had been working on it in between the sketching as well.

I won’t share all the photos of this project – some are too personal, some are too identifying – but I will continue to update with my favourites as we progress, and of course in the end when I finish the project, I will share what I come up with to record the collection. It’s also inspiring me to shoot more, and I’ve got a few more projects tickling my brain that I need to make note of.

Now if only I could catch up my missing blog posts (I’m already two behind!) as quickly as I caught up on my photos!