When Maggie was born, I began the Maggie-A-Day project.

The concept is simple:
Every day, take a photo of Maggie.
Every day, post a photo of Maggie to my Flickr stream.

Here is today’s photo:

Here at the Big Bad Blog, we are trying to figure out what to make of this.

Is this a rousing success? That I’m still posting photos of Maggie nearly every day, eighteen months later?

Or does the fact that there are four months – over 120 days – between today’s date and the most recent Maggie-A-Day photograph constitute an embarrassing failure?

I choose the former; this is a project for which the delivery schedule is unimportant. It is creating a slideshow of beautiful moments from my daughter’s life, to look back on whenever I want a fit of nostalgia (or when she does). And the latter leaves me abandoning the project after documenting little over the first year of her life.

But I do need to remind myself of that; it is a qualified success. And it neither looks nor feels like a good omen for my creative reset. Things have been moving however. In the last half of April I have:

• Bought a new lens – nothing brings out the urge to play with my camera like new kit.
• Enrolled in the Photocritic Photography School
• Decided on my May “planned photograph” – Karen needs professional (or indistinguishable-from-professional-amateur) photos of herself for her business

All in all, a good start — I’m set for the first full month of my creative reset in May. I have a course to learn from, and a photograph to take.

And, of course, another month of daily Maggie sightings.

I received a text message this weekend:

Hey Steve, as you’re taking photos at the wedding would you be OK with coordinating your suit?

Wait a second, I thought, I don’t remember agreeing to be a wedding photographer.

Wedding photography is something well outside my experience. Obvious questions flashed through my mind: What kind of kit am I lacking? How do I be in all the right places without ever being in the way?

And then there are the questions I don’t even know to ask.

I wanted to do it — to see if I can stretch myself that way.
I wanted nothing to do with it — I’ve never had a desire to be a wedding photographer.

All that was combined, of course, with a big boat load of what the fuck? How am I suddenly in a position to fuck up my friend’s wedding?

It turns out that we’re all safe. They aren’t thinking of me as the wedding photographer, and aren’t depending on me to provide a visual record of what they’re probably viewing as the most important day of their lives. I’m just a friend with a camera who may or may not – but hopefully will – take a good photo or two during the event.

The whole thing got me thinking, though: what am I doing with this photography hobby of mine?

When I first started, I used to do things with my hobby. There were photo events, like the Shoot Experience, which led to creative shots like this:

Or weekends spent with friends shooting campy vampire movies, including a photoshoot, provoking photos like this:

For the past eighteen months, however, variety and creativity have disappeared from my photographs — they now consist almost entirely of the Maggie-a-Day project, and occasional photos from events I attend, where photography is of secondary concern. My photography has grown stagnant.

So it’s time that changed. And here, on the Big Bad Blog, I’m declaring it.

I have set myself two monthly photographic goals:

#1: Improve. Every month, I need to do something for which the aim is to improve my skills as a photographer. A class, a tutorial, a meet-up with other photographers from whom I can learn, reading a book … something.

#2: Create. Every month, I need to purposely create a photograph outside the Maggie-a-day project. This could be combined with my monthly improvement — for instance, most classes or tutorial involve taking photos. It could be a contest entry. It could be something from my own imagination that I try to execute. It could be taking photos at a friend’s wedding. But it must be planned, purposeful photography, rather than simply deciding to include my camera as I head out the front door.

There will be collateral. Looking for new ways to share my photos, and connect with others. More frequent blogs featuring my photography. I’m hoping that it will influence my creative process sufficiently to lead to a (partial?) re-imagining of what I do here at the Big Bad Blog.

Excitement.

Madness.

Good times.

Your intrepid blogger has been working on his Maggie-A-Day project for some time now. Some days it feels insufficiently creative — for instance, checking out this levitation-a-day blog makes us feel inadequate.

Creatively.

Image origin unknown. Found at FFFFound.
Webcomic is Chuck and Beans by Brian.

Meet the world’s first vending machine, which dispensed holy water. I’m trying to think of a witty line that would declare vending machines to be a religious conspiracy, but cannot.

I have clearly been away from this morning coffee thing for too long.

(Little Red Riding Hood is attacked by the Big Bad Wolf in the photo above, by Shlomi Nissim)

A quick reminder of readers of the Big Bad Blog who are also users of Facebook — everything you share with Facebook is shared with the general public, no matter your privacy settings.

Here at the Big Bad Blog, we often wonder about our crazy writing/posting schedules. The fact is that they are necessary — without them we would descend into a creative pattern very similar to that described here by Sable.