2024 is here—can you believe it? I certainly cannot! It really feels like 2023 flew by, and the older I get, the faster life seems to go. In this article, I want to explore five photography ideas that you can try this year and see where the adventures take you.
Capture the Seasons
One goal I have for this year is to find a beautiful composition and capture that scene across multiple seasons. For example, I would love to find a minimalist, beautiful lone tree in a field and photograph it in Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter.
Some photographers do not like photographing the same scene multiple times, but there are so many variables to consider. One of the most important variables is weather. Weather conditions can really make an image stand out, seeing your scene in snow, with beautiful fall colors, during an amazing sunset, amidst mist or fog, and even in astrophotography. The potential here is endless, and it’s certainly something I want to try.
Can you imagine any scenes around the world that would inspire you to try this? Let me know in the comments below.
52-Week Challenge
There are a few challenges that photographers recommend, such as the daily photo challenge, but I find that one is a bit too much, especially when balancing it with my usual day-to-day life. However, a weekly or even a monthly challenge may be more fitting.
The goal is to capture one image you are happy with each week or month. You could consider creating a new Instagram account to share those images as a reminder, or for a monthly challenge, you could produce a calendar of those 12 images and gift it to your family for Christmas. One of my close friends, Adam, does this very thing, aiming to photograph one species of wildlife each month for his calendar.
You can make your own rules for this challenge, such as sticking with a certain theme or trying different genres along the way. The choice is yours, and you could become an even better photographer by giving it a go.
Try Out a Different Genre
If you want to become a “jack of all trades” in the photography world, this is a great one to try. I love trying my hand at different types of photography, whether it’s wildlife, astrophotography, landscape, portrait, weddings, food, or macro—there are so many types you can try and then improve upon.
My passion lies within wildlife and northern lights photography. However, most of the work I was known for locally was photographing dancers in urban environments, and I was published in several national newspapers a few times for that work.
Personally, I am a massive introvert, and I suffer from depression, but I wanted to challenge myself by photographing portraits, choosing dancers because I love how graceful they are.
After a while, enjoying the success of photographing dancers, I tried other areas of portrait photography, such as studio, weddings, and headshots. This gave me the opportunity to not only have new revenue streams, but also to feel more confident within myself.
You never really truly know what you love until you do it, and you can find out a lot about yourself and where your passions truly lie. Who knows, you may find the genre you’ve been waiting for and not realized it!
Print Your Work
Many photographers do not print their favorite images, but this is a skill that can be very valuable to you in the future. Whether you print the images yourself or go to a print lab, seeing your work in print can be an eye-opener.
It is always easy to look at your images on a computer screen or your phone, but seeing the image in print is a different feeling. The image is not backlit, so you will have a much different aesthetic to consider. You then have the options of different photo papers, which can elevate your image even further.
Whether you want a glossy or matte look, or maybe some texture in the print, these are all the options available to you, and you can learn a lot from seeing your images up close and personal. You may even decide to put some up in your house! I ordered some metal prints from Saal Digital for my favorite Iceland shots, and they take pride of place on my living room walls. The prints are even a talking point for anyone visiting me, which is always nice when they appreciate my work.
Plan a Photography Trip
Sometimes, it can be monotonous, photographing the same region for years on end, so every year or two, I love to travel somewhere and find new subjects to photograph. The trips could be abroad, or they could just be somewhere further away in your own country that you haven’t visited yet.
Of course, with my favorite genres being wildlife and northern lights photography, I would love to travel around the world more often, but I am still waiting for that call from Sony or National Geographic to become an ambassador (wink wink). Sony, call me! Pretty please with a cherry on top.
I absolutely adore winter environments, and one day I want to move to Iceland or Lapland, but until then, I will keep traveling there as a visitor to look for new wildlife or compositions to photograph. One of my big dreams is to photograph Brown Bears and Polar Bears, so I am trying to save up for a trip to Finland for Brown Bears, and then to Svalbard for Arctic wildlife.
What trips do you have planned or would love to go on? Let me know below.
Summary
I hope these five ideas can inspire you to try something new in the coming year or years. There is absolutely no harm in trying something different, and sometimes it can really pay dividends and might surprise you for the better.
Photography is about telling a story, and giving any of these ideas a go will in itself create a new story and take you on an adventure!
I wish all of you a very happy, healthy, and productive new year, and I wish you all the best for 2024.
